Renee Spierdijk

Renee Spierdijk was born in Amsterdam and came to London in 1977. She studied painting at the Byam Shaw School of Art and Goldsmiths College. She now lives and works in Cambridge, dividing her work between being Joint Head of Art at Kings College Choir School and her studio practice.

Her paintings are inspired by images of young women and girls originating from found photographs. Renee chooses portraits of children who are posed in formal clothes and settings, frequently holding or surrounded by political or religious artefacts. She is interested in the process of domestication and conditioning which the children seem to be subjected to and in which they appear patient, content, or quietly mutinous as they wait and hope to become themselves.