Semi-abstract painter. Born UK (1975). Lives and works in Oxfordshire.
Eleanor Wong paints our relationship with animals, and with ourselves. For her, looking at an animal is a form of taming: the moment she looks, she starts shaping it into what she needs it to be. She does it knowingly, through paint. The paintings hold that taming against the wildness that resists it.
She works across oil, acrylic and mixed media, starting with play: building dioramas with animal figurines and drawing from life. The play is intuitive and unplanned, and it returns her to a child's way of seeing. She lets a narrative develop, then pushes it away to follow the painting, deciding later how much of it to let back in, leaving space for it to be found.
She trained as an Illustrator (BA Hons, Manchester, 1998) and spent a decade working for clients including The Guardian, The Telegraph, the BBC and Waitrose Food Illustrated, culminating in a period represented by Folio Illustration Agency. Painting ran alongside that until 2008, when it became her main practice. Her paintings began as a hybrid of illustration and painting, taking her children's drawings as starting points and balancing their directness with her own embellishment.
Her work has been selected for the Yardley Arts Summer Open 2026, juried by David Mach RA and Anthony Spira, Director of MK Gallery, and the Joy Open at East Quay 2026, juried by Matt Burrows (Exeter Phoenix), Rocca Holly-Nambi (b-Side) and Morag Myerscough. She exhibited at the Royal Watercolour Society Open, Bankside Gallery, London, in 2023, and was shortlisted for the Visual Art Open in 2021 and longlisted in 2022.
Exhibitions
2026: Oxford Art Society Open, Kendrew Barn Gallery, St John’s College, Oxford
2026: Joy Open, East Quay, Watchet, juried by Matt Burrows (Exeter Phoenix), Rocca Holly-Nambi (b-Side) and Morag Myerscough
2026: Yardley Arts Summer Open, Yardley Hastings, Northamptonshire, juried by David Mach RA and Anthony Spira, Director of MK Gallery
2026: Oxfordshire Artweeks Open Studios
2023: RWS Royal Watercolour Society Open, Bankside Gallery, London
2022: Longlisted for Visual Art Open, UK & International Emerging Artist Awards
2022: Burford Art Gallery, Oxfordshire
2021: Shortlisted for Visual Art Open, UK & International Emerging Artist Awards
2021: Oxford Arts Collective, Oxfordshire
2021: Burford Art Gallery, Oxfordshire
2021: Oxfordshire Artweeks Open Studios
2020: Burford Art Gallery, Oxfordshire
2020: Oxfordshire Artweeks Open Studios
2019: Pre-selected for RI Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours
2019: Oxfordshire Artweeks Open Studios
2019: Fitch & Fellow Gallery, Thame, Oxfordshire
2019: Oxford Art Society Open, Cloister Gallery, Oxford
2018: Oxfordshire Artweeks Open Studios
2017: Oxfordshire Artweeks Open Studios
Illustration
Clients have included The Guardian, The Telegraph, the BBC and Waitrose Food Illustrated, culminating in a period represented by Folio Illustration Agency.
2006: Images 30, AOI The Best of British Contemporary Illustration, The Old Truman Brewery, London
Education
1998: BA (Hons) Illustration (with Animation), Manchester
"You are old when you have lost the child within you. The key to growing old is staying young." - my Dad, 1936–2022
Eleanor, circa 1982