Emily Cussins

Emily Cussins is a Netherlands based British artist with a BA in Fine Art/ Art History from Goldsmiths College, and an MA in Documentary Photography from UAL (LCC).

She grew up in the English countryside surrounded by ancient woodland, deeply connected to the more-than-human world. After the birth of her daughter she returned, in 2024, to the work she started as a child; painting with soil.

Today, her paintings are made in collaboration with soil, but also the sea, sun, rocks and plants … with which she creates abstract works that are an ode to our planet and micro universes of their own. Both ancient and of the future they explore our connection to time and the natural world - its past and possible future.

Emily often works with found natural objects in place of a brush and reclaimed, antique surfaces, embedded with memories, energies and histories of their own. The materials and their unique properties are her guide, and the border between human and nature’s marks are consciously blurred.

These works are her way to give more-than-human entities, an equal hand, respect and importance. To truly collaborate with them, in order to reconnect. To their ancient wisdom and unique magic. To the childlike playfulness and awe they bring up in us. And to the joy and urgency of working with, learning from and protecting them.

Emily is now based in Haarlem, NL, working in the woodland, dunes and beaches near her home (as well as further afield), and from her studio in a 17th century building in Haarlem centre. This site is her studio’s digital home.