Statement
Painting, for me, is a form of visual storytelling. As humans, we use stories to connect, warn, entertain, and understand our place in the world.
My practice inhabits the friction between narratives; drawing from folklore, gossip, ancient myths, and half-remembered family histories. Each project begins with a fragment of one of these stories: a nursery rhyme, a 15th-century rumour of a witch’s extra nipple, or the dogs of the Soviet Space race. I pull at these threads until the familiar unravels into something far stranger.
I am particularly interested in the "slip" of a story. This is the precise moment where the grotesque becomes tender or where a throwaway detail reveals a culture’s hidden terrors. I don’t aim to illustrate these stories but create sideways retelling. They explore how male-dominated narratives infiltrate female spaces of birth, protection, and domesticity, questioning how those spaces shift when the story is reclaimed.
Recurring themes of autonomy, girlhood and power circle my work, focusing on the way narratives cling to bodies. The figures I paint are often elongated or uncanny; if a viewer reads a figure as sexual, I want them to interrogate that reaction. I am interested in a nudity that belongs entirely to the subject, a body that exists for itself rather than an external gaze.
Materially, I use oil paint to build layered, slightly surreal scenes. Through loose brushwork and stretched limbs, I create surfaces that sit between the familiar and the uncanny. These paintings do not offer fixed meanings; instead, they act as open narratives - personal, historical, and imagined - inviting the viewer to navigate their own way through the layers.
Bio
Millie Wood (b. 2003) is a painter studying Fine Art at Bath Spa University. Her work explores myth, ambiguity and the shifting narratives we use to understand ourselves. She has exhibited in London and Bath. She lives and works in the UK.
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Education
BA (Hons) Fine Art, Bath School of Art, Bath Spa University, 2023–2026
Foundation Diploma in Art & Design, Bath Spa University, 2022
Exhibitions
Bath Cats and Dogs Home Exhibition (Group Exhibition), Bath, February 2026
Valentines (Group Exhibition), Cellar door Production, The Lousinna, Bristol, February 2026
Shared Instincts (Group Exhibition), London, May 2025
Reciprocity (Group Exhibition), Michael Pennie Gallery, Bath, February 2024
Publications & Features
Suboart Magazine, April 2026 Edition
100 Emerging Artists of 2025, book published by Arts to Hearts Project
Awards
Jackson’s Art Prize - Extended Longlist & Longlist, 2026
Jackson’s Art Prize - Extended Longlist, 2025