MA Illustration alumna on her upcoming art exhibition in Falmouth
16 September 2026
After studying a foundation in art at Falmouth in 1989, Victoria Gillow continued her creative journey with a career spanning three decades. Not only did she work as a Cornish painter, but as an art coordinator for TV, while also holding frequent exhibitions. In pursuit of furthering her practice and developing her authorial voice, Victoria later returned to Falmouth to study her master's.
Since then, she has continued to work as a painter, displaying her work both locally and nationally, with her latest solo exhibition opening on Friday 18 September, at Otte Gallery in Falmouth.
We caught up with the MA Illustration: Authorial Practice alumna ahead of her exhibition to learn more about how her coastal ramblings have inspired her art. She also shared with us how Falmouth supported her to grow and develop her talent and the thought process that goes on while she’s capturing Cornwall’s coast, land and natural world through her artistry.
How has your time at Falmouth inspired the art you create?
I grew up a short distance from Falmouth, on the Carrick Roads, and have a deep connection with Falmouth’s town and the coast around it where my family have lived for generations. The opportunity to do a foundation in art in the late 1980s at this iconic art school, and to later return to Falmouth University in 2012 to study the MA Illustration: Authorial Practice, has been wonderful.
The MA allowed my authorial voice to become more present in my art; it was here that the layering of storytelling was honed through a series of mural and community art projects, such as the Falmouth Docks mural, funded by A&P and Falmouth Art Gallery, and a wonderful book that explored the narrative around the places I and others have related to in paint. Henry Scott Tuke’s painting The Message features as the anchor for the narrative. The Message is a book published by the art gallery and written and illustrated by myself. It’s still available in print.
How did your time studying MA Illustration: Authorial Practice support your artistry and the work you create now?
The MA enabled me to develop a deeply reflective art practice and re-engage with conversations with other creatives.
My exhibition at Otte Gallery, There or Thereabouts, continues to tell stories of the land and coast around Falmouth Bay. Here, I continue the concepts and ideas held in my work on the MA and invite the viewer to walk with me as I retrace the landscape that holds us. I have become more aware of the collective experience and that ‘we’ all have memories of those trees, and that headland. The pronoun ‘we’ is the one I use as I walk and as I paint.
The work created on my MA was invaluable in developing the authorial voice in my work, it was when I began to really hone an authentic and real approach to my painting.
What were your highlights from the course?
I loved the mix of people on the course: the cohort consisted of philosophers, artists and illustrators. The course itself offered a grounding in different approaches to storytelling. While studying, I continued to work on my narrative through paint but also became aware of the audience and the extension of narrative. In that way, the course helped me consider alternative approaches to storytelling.
Can you tell us about the art you create now, such as what inspires your work, what makes you passionate to create and what you hope people feel or think on seeing it?
I’m a Cornish painter, with my art practice intrinsically linked with growing up on the shallow shores of Cornwall’s south coast. My painting, although figurative and hinged on motifs we all recognise, also embodies an emotive response to a life lived by the sea and my respect and love of the ocean, the Cornish coast and its history. I aim to acknowledge the comfort of the places one knows, and the reverie of being completely immersed in a landscape.
While painting, I’m aware of the feeling of layered time and memory, as well as the moment of looking. I couple the response I have to a place in actual time, as well as in reflection, while working in my studio. I feel inspired when places evoke old memories as well as new ones, when the familiar is comfortingly the same — the tide, the trees, the fields I know — as well as being different and new.
I am increasingly aware of the importance of walking in my art practice, and how I’m inspired by it. ‘Mr Foot’s horse’ (a term my Nan used for this mode of transport) gets me to where I want to be; there or there abouts will be where I am today and that suits me very well. Having no fixed destination is part of this mantra. When asked whereabouts? I answer, there or there abouts. A notion that inspired the title of my exhibition at Otte.
Can you tell us about your upcoming exhibition at Otte Gallery in Falmouth? What does it mean to showcase your work here?
Otte Gallery is the perfect exhibiting space for me. Luke, the owner, has a deep connection with his Cornish heritage and we have been working together to develop ideas for the show. It’s the perfect collaboration. We are both graduates of fine art, and conceptually there is a kinship and a great deal of creativity when we work together.
Otte comes from the Cornish word Ottena: to look. When I am truly present in the landscape, and fully immersed in painting, I experience the moments in their entirety and notice or feel more. The title of the exhibition, There or Thereabouts, comes from notes I’ve had while out painting and a certain place, light, or form has taken my attention and I have noticed.
You might also like
Sam Jukes
Meet our MA Fine Art Online class of September 2026
Graphic Design graduate on using design for positive change
MA Film & Television alumnus on founding film production company
