Helen Hanson taught Languages before becoming a professional printmaker. She exhibited with Greenwich Printmakers for 23 years and was a founder member of South Bank Printmakers, with work in galleries throughout the UK. She is a former Council Member of the Society of Women Artists, and was for a long time a Fellow of the Society of Botanical Artists, winning the President’s Award for her etching. Helen was for many years Administrator of Florum, an annual exhibition for artists inspired by plant life.

In her landscape etchings, pattern, texture and mood give a sense of place and regional flora are always important. After many years spent turning the press, Helen now specialises in landscape using ink and coloured pencil. This evolved as a natural successor to etching and she has made this unusual combination of media very much her own.

Helen now teaches and introduces landscape in ink and coloured pencil to others through a range of courses. She tutors locally and at Higham Hall in Cumbria, Missenden School of Creative Arts and for the Field Studies Council at Flatford Mill. Her first book Landscape in Ink and Coloured Pencil has just been published by Crowood Press, and she has been commissioned to write a second. Look out for a series of four articles in 2023 in The Artist magazine, presenting step-by-step guidance for seasonal landscape in ink and coloured pencil. Botanical coloured pencil remains a parallel interest and she tutors a well-established local course in Deal. Visit the tuition pages for news of current and forthcoming courses.