Stella Vine

File:Stella Vine installs her painting Diana branches in Oxford.jpg

Stella Vine stands in front of her painting Diana branches (2007) of Princess Diana at Modern Art Oxford in 2007.

Stella Vine (born Melissa Jane Robson, 1969) is an English artist, who lives and works in London. Her work is figurative painting with subject matter drawn from either her personal life of family, friends and school, or rock stars, royalty and celebrities.

After a difficult relationship with her stepfather, she left home and in her teens, had a son, with whom she moved from Northumberland to London. She worked in various jobs, including as a waitress, stripper and cleaner. She joined the NYT (National Youth Theatre of Britain) in 1983, and the Academy of Live and Recorded Arts.

In 1999 - 2001 she took her son to painting classes at the Hampstead School of Art, where she found her own vocation as a painter. In 2001 she was exhibited by the Stuckists group, which she joined for a short time; she was married briefly to the group co-founder, Charles Thomson.

In 2003 she opened her own gallery Rosy Wilde in East London. In 2004, Charles Saatchi bought Hi Paul can you come over I'm really frightened (2003), a painting by her of Princess Diana, which provoked media controversy, as did a subsequent painting of drug victim, Rachel Whitear. There was a dispute with the Stuckists, who said they had influenced her work; Vine said they had not.

Later work has included Kate Moss as a subject, as in Holy water cannot help you now (2005). In 2005 another painting of Princess Diana, Murdered, pregnant and embalmed (2005) was bought by George Michael.

In 2006, she re-opened her gallery in Soho, London. The first major show of her work was held in 2007 at Modern Art Oxford, which won over some previously hostile critics. Vine has provided clothing designs for Top Shop.

Life and career

Early Life

Stella Vine was born in Alnwick, seen behind Alnwick Castle

Stella Vine was born Melissa Jane Robson in Alnwick, Northumberland, England. Her name was changed to Melissa Jordan after her stepfather's name; she subsequently changed it to Stella Vine in 1995, inspired by Andy Warhol names, as "I didn't feel like I belonged to either of my fathers' families." She lived with her mother who was a seamstress and her grandmother who was a secretary. Her mother remarried when she was seven, and they relocated to Norwich. Vine was creative from a young age "making things and performing music and plays, as far back as I can remember" and first began painting as a child:

I used to make little water colours in the library, with those lovely Caran d'Ache pencils, the water soluable ones. I would paint Queen Victoria when she was a child, and copy the pre-raphelite paintings, and greek mythology.

Vine talked to The Guardian about being inspired during her childhood by TV series Bagpuss and its creator Oliver Postgate: "I loved Bagpuss as a child. I had a doll similar to Madeleine that my Granny made me. I remember so much of it - the mice singing these folksy fairytale songs. I still have the words and tunes in my head. It had a dark edge to it - it filled your imagination. I was always sad when Bagpuss went back to sleep. I would have loved to have had a daughter called Emily. I guess she was a bit of an Alice in Wonderland figure. I don't recall watching the programmes with anyone else, just happy as could be with some Marmite soldiers."

In 1981, she won a silver cup for "most original act" for a mime in a "Junior Startime" talent competition at the Norwich Theatre Royal. After a difficult relationship with her stepfather, she was briefly fostered aged 13, and then moved into a bedsit, where she started a relationship with a 24-year-old caretaker. Two years later she became pregnant.

At the age of 17, she gave birth to a son, Jamie, moving with him into a home for single parents and then to London, where she joined the NYT (National Youth Theatre of Britain) in 1983, and the Academy of Live and Recorded Arts, London, 1987-1990. She lived with musician Ross Newell, "the love of her life" for over four years, but "stupidly" left him for another relationship; in 2004 Vine said, "He's happily married now with children, but he is still my soul mate."

For five years she also performed as an actress in provincial theatres around the UK, as well as running her own improvised theatre company Minx Productions and playing with her band Victoria Falls. Vine said it was difficult to tour with a small child but nonetheless earned her Equity Card by performing Little Nell and Mr Quilp with Durham Theatre Company. She continued acting in Agatha Christie plays, playing the red herring or femme fatale roles like Kay Strange. Vine performed in Pinocchio at the old Leeds City Varieties Theatre and later played Geraldine Barclay in What The Butler Saw at Theatre Clwyd, The National Theatre of Wales which Vine enjoyed, having been a big fan of playwright Joe Orton whom she discovered when reading at drama school. Vine said she would wake up early and dance to songs by PJ Harvey before improvising around her character to prepare for each days rehearsals. Vine remembers seeing "wonderful paintings by Gainsborough" whilst rehearsing at Kenwood House, London.

In the late 1980s, Vine met and auditioned for film director Mike Leigh:

I saw Meantime by Mike Leigh in the late 80's, and it became my dream, to act or direct in improvised films. I met him in my early twenties, had a couple of auditions with him, he said "I can understand why you want to be other people."

Describing her paintings, Vine has commented: "Perhaps these works are my other people". Waldemar Januszczak in The Sunday Times highlighted a link between Vine's early acting career to that of her later art work: "method painting: painted projections of herself in the Stanislavski manner."

In 1995, she abandoned her ambitions to be an actress and, because it paid more than waitressing, became a stripper at the Windmill Club in Soho.

Vine took her son out of school because he had been bullied and educated him at home. In 1999 - 2001, she went with him to Hampstead School of Art for painting classes, and found her vocation as a painter.

Stuckism

File:2001 Vote Stuckist (1).jpg

Stella Vine exhibits her work for the first time, in the Vote Stuckist show at the Fridge Gallery, Brixton, June 2001. Still from a video interview by Charles Thomson.

Vine first met the Stuckists by attending musical events of Billy Childish, who Vine had "the misfortune to develop a crush on" like Tracey Emin before her. In June 2001 she exhibited for the first time publicly, in the Vote Stuckist show held by the Stuckists art group, with paintings of Sylvia Plath, her step father, a stripper and a life painting from Hampstead School of Art. She participated in the group's activities and took part in a demonstration in Trafalgar Square. She founded the Westminster Stuckists group, which she soon renamed The Unstuckists. In August 2001, after a two month romance, she married Charles Thomson, co-founder of the Stuckists, in New York, where, Thomson said Vine trashed the hotel room and left him for the remainder of the honeymoon. They separated after a short reconciliation in London in September 2001 and Vine never saw Thomson again. The couple were granted a divorce in October 2003.

Princess Diana painting

File:Rosy.jpeg

Stella Vine stands in the door of the derelict butchers shop she bought in 2003 before converting it into her Rosy Wilde gallery, a not-for-profit space for emerging artists.

Vine studied Philosophical Aesthetics with Johnathan Lahey Dronsfield at Birkbeck College in 2002 - 2003, attending the course Performance After Warhol with Professor Gavin Butt in 2002, and Women's Work with Kathy Battista at Tate Modern. In 2003, she opened the Rosy Wilde gallery in East London in a former butchers shop to show emerging artists.

This not-for-profit art space was on the verge of bankruptcy, when Charles Saatchi purchased her painting of Princess Diana Hi Paul can you come over I'm really frightened (2003), showing the Princess with heavy eyes and blood on from her lips. The work's title came from the thick red text painted across the canvas, a reference to Princess Diana's butler Paul Burrell.

As Saatchi anticipated, much of the media attacked the work, creating a considerable return in publicity for his investment. Media coverage focused on the controversial nature of the painting, as well as the fact that the painting had been bought for only £600 from an unknown artist, who was a single mother and an ex-stripper.

Saatchi had discovered the painting in a show called Girl on Girl in Cathy Lomax's Transition Gallery, which is housed in a converted garage in Hackney. Vine had originally wanted to price the painting at £100. Lomax described the painting:

Stella Vine's work deals with her fascination with the trashy and the dark. Underlying this is a sometimes contradictory love for her subjects. Hi Paul can you come over... examines that pivotal moment in the standing of the British Monarchy, the death of Princess Diana and the horror of her crash. All the conspiracy theories are summed up in this painting as a wild eyed and tiara clad Diana cries for help whilst painterly blood drips from her luscious lips.

Stella Vine's Hi Paul can you come over I'm really frightened (2003), portrait of Princess Diana, bought by Charles Saatchi

A subsequent purchase by Saatchi of Vine's painting of Rachel Whitear (also with blood running from the mouth) created further media reaction, as Whitear was a former drug user, whose body was due for exhumation. Vine refused to acquiesce to the parents' request, backed by the police, not to exhibit the painting, then on view in the Saatchi Gallery in the New Blood show during March 2004. Saatchi had delegated to her the decision to keep the work on display or withdraw it. Emma Saunders of the BBC said, "whatever the rights and wrongs of displaying such work, the images are startlingly beautiful" Vine discussed the controversy surrounding her Rachel (2003) painting on BBC Radio 4's programme Front Row

In 2004, David Lee, editor of The Jackdaw magazine, attacked Charles Saatchi's New Blood exhibition for having "promoted a rotten, talentless painter called Stella Vine to public notoriety" and Richard Dorment, The Daily Telegraph critic, said: "It's trash. It is another stab at creating the visual equivalent of tabloid journalism." Waldemar Januszczak, The Sunday Times critic singled her out for praise in his otherwise hostile review of the Saatchi Gallery's New Blood show in 2004, and later said, "although I didn’t much want to like Vine’s contribution, I found I did. It had something."

June - July 2004, Vine held her first solo exhibition, Prozac and Private Views, at Transition Gallery, London, featuring new paintings such as Ted (2004) and a self portrait as a child Melissa pink dress (2004). The show included two Vine sculptures including Sylvia cooker (2004), a gas cooker with enamel painting of Sylvia Plath on its door. Vine was interviewed about the exhibition by Jenni Murray for BBC Radio 4's programme Woman's Hour.

Stuckist dispute

Thomson said that the influence of the Stuckists was apparent in Vine's work and that Saatchi's promotion of her as his discovery without any acknowledgement of the Stuckists "threatened to hijack important elements of our identity." The Independent said, "Thomson can fairly claim to have discovered Vine, who was a protégée of the Stuckist movement." The Stuckist web site carried a headline "THE STUCKIST STELLA VINE", which Vine resented furiously and saw as harassment.

When asked "if it wouldn’t be simpler for her simply to acknowledge that they [the Stuckists] had a minor role and move on," Vine said, "I have said in my blogs and in interviews, the people who have inspired me, you know: Sophie Von Hellerman, Anna Bjerger, Paul Housley, Karen Kilimnik, Elizabeth Peyton ... I don’t have a problem being generous with who inspires me. If someone inspires me, hats off to them." She said there had not been any influence from the Stuckists, and that she had "a very, very big problem with someone who saw me coming and exploited me as a mascot."

Thomson reported Saatchi to the OFT (Office of Fair Trading) for alleged breaches of the Competition Act by abusing a dominant market position; he cited Saatchi's promotion of Vine as an example. The OFT rejected the claim, saying there were not "reasonable grounds to suspect that Charles Saatchi is in a dominant position in any relevant market."

Post Princess Diana painting

The media attention had left Vine depressed and even suicidal. She subsequently sold her gallery, and travelled abroad, teaching art to children in Spain. She moved back to her home town of Alnwick, where she presented work to the local Bailiffgate museum, and then returned to London, living in a hotel for a short while in Montague Street; she said, "... as I couldn't make a mess in the hotel, I was painting in the van because I had to get work ready for a show in New York".

File:StellaVineFame.jpg

'Fame' James Jessop and Stella Vine at This Way UP Gallery London 2005, photo by James Sutton.

Vine moved to a flat in London's Bloomsbury district, opposite the British Museum, feeling at home with the historic character of the area. She continued with an erratic, bohemian life, using a local Camera Café as her office. There followed solo shows in Israel, Los Angeles, London and New York. She was included in the second Prague Biennale. Also in 2005, her solo show of new paintings Stellawood was staged at Tim Jefferies' gallery in Mayfair, London. At this time Vine collaborated with the artist James Jessop for the exhibition Fame at the This Way Up Gallery above the Dragon Bar in East London. The installation of paintings was based on the New York graffiti scene of the 1980's, including depictions of Fab Five Freddy, Keith Haring and Blondie.

In July 2005, Vine made a painting of the No. 30 London bus which had been destroyed by a suicide bomber in Tavistock Square, outside her Bloomsbury flat; part of the 7 July 2005 London bombings. Vine painted over the artwork almost as soon as she had made it, as she found the work "simply too disturbing". Vine documented the bus painting before she re-painted over it, but refuses to show the photographs publicly during her lifetime. She described it as stunning and moving but "extremely harrowing to paint because there were bodies on the bus." The canvas now shows the model Abi Titmuss wearing bleeding red shoes. Vine's decision to paint over the work was because she believed it too shocking to be exhibited but said freedom of expression was more important to her than money or success and that she reserves the right to paint anything that is shocking in life: "As an artist, if you can't take that freedom, you're a wanker."

In August 2005, her painting Hi Paul can you come over I'm really frightened (2003) was listed in The Guardian at number three in a list of the ten worst paintings in Britain, having been chosen by David Andrews, a caricaturist who works in Leicester Square. A new painting of Princess Diana, Murdered, pregnant and embalmed (2005), by Vine was bought by George Michael for £25,000, reported in The Sun newspaper which condemned it as "sick".

Kate Moss and reopening of Rosy Wilde

Holy water cannot help you now by Stella Vine

Vine has made a number of large paintings of Kate Moss including Holy water cannot help you now (2005) and Kate unfinished (2005). Some of Vine's paintings of the supermodel were painted during the media scandal regarding Moss' alleged cocaine use. One painting of Moss exhibited at Hiscox Art Projects in London, had a slogan Must be the season of the witch across it in red paint. Waldemar Januszczak said the show was "a combination of empathy and cynicism that can be startling."

Vine herself admitted to a four-month cocaine addiction. She said, "I had been painting Kate Moss for a long time, both before the time of her crisis and during it. I felt very strongly for her—she's a hard-working mum and it seemed as if suddenly the world turned against her." A Vine painting of Kate Moss was bought by fashion designer Alexander McQueen.

In 2006, she re-opened her Rosy Wilde gallery, this time on the first floor above the first Ann Summers sex shop in Soho, London. She commented on her experiences in the commercial gallery world: "The art world is really exactly the same as the sex industry: you have to be completely on guard, you will get shafted, fucked over left, right and centre." Vine said:

I have always been ambitious, no doubt about that. I always felt like I had to reach the dizzy heights of fame and success or whatever the heights are of a number of given professions I have dabbled in, to prove myself, "Stripper of the year", a Bafta or whatever, for me it was by creating something interesting and entertaining or moving, but not by compromising the thing I was creating, that thing had to reach those heights, I guess it's about being accepted and loved a bit or a lot.

September - October 2006, Vine was invited by the Museum of New Art in Detroit, to create a USA solo exhibition The Waltz. Rather than a regular exhibition, Vine painted a large-scale mural across the museum space over a period of 5 days. The "live painting performance" was filmed and later exhibited alongside the stacked mural as a six-channel video installation showing Vine creating the mural, adding an extra dimension to her work.

Modern Art Oxford 2007

July – September 2007, the first major solo show of Vine's work was held at Modern Art Oxford. The show included paintings which had not previously had much exposure, and also work made specially for the show, including a Princess Diana series of paintings. A book to accompany it had an essay by Germaine Greer.

Prior to the show opening, Vine said:

All those people who derided me did me a favour, because now I don't care what anyone says about me. I feel I am now able to be a really powerful painter, to take on the mantle of the US male expressionist.

Richard Dorment of The Daily Telegraph, who had previously described her work as "crappy", said of the show, "Well blow me down, she's good after all. Stella Vine is bang on the money: the paintings in her first solo show skewer celebrity culture with a vitality and truth that can't be faked". At the same time, Thomson, furious at her refusal to acknowledge her debt to the Stuckist group, held a rival show I Won't Have Sex with You as Long as We're Married, which was apparently said by Vine him on their wedding night. Tate gallery Chairman Paul Myners visited both shows in succession.

Lynn Barber, art critic for The Observer wrote: "I think she's the real deal". The Guardian commented: "Vine's lurid and gutsy paintings are causing a storm in the art world. And rightly so." Aria Akbar of The Independent suggested Vine's examination of celebrity culture to have descended from the same tradition as Andy Warhol's pop art movement.

Andrew Nairne, director of Modern Art Oxford, said in the gallery's Summer brochure, that Vine will be discovered to be one of the most remarkable painters of our time. Germaine Greer wrote in the show catalogue, "Stella Vine remains viscerally connected to the facts of her life, she is not her own hero. Her art is not performance", and that Vine "seizes on her celebrity subject and throttles her into paint, smearing her lipstick and melting her eye-makeup, she is as implacable as any rapist."

Ana Finel-Honigman wrote in her introduction to an interview with Vine on the Saatchi Gallery web site: "the quality that critics use to undermine the credibility of Vine's art—that it is adolescent—is actually the source of its indisputable emotional impact." Finel-Honigman described Vine's art as bitterly honest in the same way Holden Caulfield's observations were about "a world filled with phonies", and Kurt Cobain's songs about "adult lies and injustice", and Sylvia Plath's "over-heated anger and bitterness at the world's betrayals" and that "Plath would surely appreciate Vine's portrait of Ted Hughes, with the epithet, Daddy, I have had to kill you emblazoned on the canvas." The musicians Gina Birch of rock band The Raincoats and KatieJane Garside of rock band Daisy Chainsaw both performed live at the party to commemorate the end of Vine's solo show. Birch had previously performed at Vine's gallery Rosy Wilde in 2003 and at the opening of Vine's exhibition Prozac and Private Views in 2004. In September 2007, Immodesty Blaize said she had been entranced by Vine's painting Diana Crash (2007) at Modern Art Oxford finding it "by turns horrifying, bemusing and funny".

Talks and collaborations 2006-2008

Vine was a curator for the Noise Festival, a festival of art for under 25 year olds, launched at Tate Liverpool in April 2006. In June 2006, she gave a talk at Tate Modern on "the contrived eroticism" of Sleeping Girl, a 1943 a painting by Balthus. In July 2006, Vine held a family art workshop People Pets and Places at the Bailiffgate Museum. In August 2006, she was featured in the tabloids, when her painting of Celebrity Big Brother stars, Samuel "Ordinary Boy" Preston and Chantelle Houghton, "was used as the invitation to their wedding".

In January 2007, Polite cards held a launch in London for a range of greetings cards designed by Stella Vine alongside artists David Shrigley and Vic Reeves. In the same month, Vine was announced as a judge for a UK nationwide art competition held by Visto Brahma.

In May 2007, Vine gave a public talk with Germaine Greer as part of the Womens International Arts Festival. Vine was later interviewed by students from John Mason School, and Oxford Community School, Oxford in July 2007, organised by Arts Council England.

In July 2007, Vine collaborated with Topshop clothing chain, creating a limited edition fashion range inspired by her artworks. These included T-shirts, vest tops, and T-shirt dresses, the labels designed in pink glitter. The Guardian commented that "the fact that the range of T-shirts she has recently designed for Top Shop - emblazoned with slogans like Breaking Up With Her Boyfriend - are flying out, speaks volumes for her public support."

In November 2007, Vine performed the poem Lady Lazarus by Sylvia Plath, in the Purcell Room, at the Southbank Centre in London, as part of Art of The Visual, a symposium organized by Sally Bayley. On 12th November 2007, Vine was interviewed by Alan Yentob for BBC One's series Imagine in the documentary Spiderwoman about the art of Louise Bourgeois. Vine was filmed in an episode of Horizon called Battle of the Brains for BBC Two in 2007.

December 2007 - January 2008, Vine contributed a painting to a group show called Trans-Europe in Berlin, Germany alongside the work of six other female European painters. Vine created a portrait of supermodel Elle Macpherson in February 2008.The painting was later exhibited at an event organised by Macpherson in London. In March 2008, a portrait of Vine, taken by photographer Venetia Dearden, was part of the North Face exhibition at Alnwick Castle, comprising ten photographs from the National Portrait Gallery's collection. In October 2008, Vine donated a free painting called Mark (2008) of musician Mark E Smith to the Free Art Fair in London.

In November 2008, it was announced that Vine had begun painting a series of new work for a large solo show at The Eden Project, Cornwall, England to be held in June - September 2010. In December 2008, Vine began collaborating with Tatty Devine, the accessories boutique in London. Vine also created an affordable art book in the style of a fanzine in collaboration with Mörel Books. In the same month, Robert Diament became her agent and manager, having previously worked on projects with Banksy. Vine said that she would spend Christmas Day 2008 with a run around the Serpentine, or a walk in Hyde Park or across London town with her son's bull mastiff dog and a small haversack of whisky and coffee.

Charity Work

In 2005, Vine gave three previously unseen paintings to the Imagine A World exhibition, organised by Amnesty International charity, highlighting violence against women. In 2006, she donated a painting depicting John Peel and his wife, to an auction for Terrence Higgins Trust. In 2007, Vine donated two works to the Spectrum Art auction: a painting Diana blue hairband, depicting Diana, Princess of Wales and a limited edition screenprint Melissa red jacket (2006), a self-portait of Vine as a child. On 3rd November 2007, the painting raised £10,000 for the charity.

In 2008, Vine created the painting Didier (2008), depicting sports star Didier Drogba, for the charity Sport Relief. Vine also allowed them to create a limited edition print of Didier (2008) to help raise further funds for the charity. In July 2008, British pop star Adele paid £8,000 in a charity auction in aid of Keep A Child Alive for a commissioned painting by Stella Vine. Adele said she planned to ask Vine to paint a portrait of "my mum and me". The money raised helps children and their families with HIV/AIDS in Africa. In September 2008, Vine donated a small painting to the Macmillan De'Longhi Art Auction in aid of Macmillan Cancer Support charity. The auction lot was a commission painting by Vine where she offered to paint "a picture of yourself, your friends or family". The work sold for over £9,000. In November 2008, Vine donated a painting of Elizabeth Taylor to the Rumble In The Jumble charity event in East London hosted by Gwyneth Paltrow and Kids Company.

Vine lives and works in London.

Art

Paintings

Vine's paintings are the most well documented part of her artistic output. She paints in both oil and acrylic with "trademark drips of paint falling from the lips and chin" of her subjects. The themes of Vine's painting focuses on two main topics. Firstly, Vine draws inspiration from her private life. Her autobiographical themed paintings include images of herself (Melissa) and her brother (Allistair) as children in Allistair, Melissa and Ellenor (2004), Ellenor and Melissa butterfly (2005), Melissa red jacket (2005) and her childhood school class in 4P (2005). Welcome to Norwich a fine city (2006) refers to when her family moved to Norwich in her childhood. Later life experiences are shown in paintings such as The Windmill (2004) which refers to a strip club in London where Vine was a stripper. Whilst a large number of works are portraits of Vine's mother such as Ellenor wedding dress (2005), Ellenor bluebell (2004), Ellenor Seaton Point (2006) and Ellenor stripy top (2004).

Vine is best known though for her paintings of famous stars and celebrities including Elizabeth Taylor in Elizabeth and Lassie (2005), Marilyn Monroe is Marilyn and Arthur (2005), Kate Moss in I only make love to Jesus (2005). Her series of paintings depicting Diana, Princess of Wales led to initial media attention including Hi Paul, can you come over I'm really frightened (2003), Diana branches (2007), Diana veil (2007) and Diana pram (2007) which included the slogan I vow to thee my country.

Vine has painted bands such as The Smiths, PJ Harvey in Polly Bristol (2004) or Polly boob tube (2004). The Beatles in The Beatles in the hollyhocks (2005). She painted Nirvana's singer Kurt Cobain and wife Courtney Love in Kurt and Francis Bean (2005) and Courtney black cab (2004).

Vine created a series of paintings of the super model Lily Cole in 2005 for the US publication BlackBook Magazine. The works known as The Lily Series (2005) include portraits of the star leaving the London restaurant The Ivy, bathing in Van Cleef & Arpels jewels, and reading the novel Beyond Good and Evil in designer clothes and perfume, before the character overdoses.

Andrew Nairne argues that "those who criticise Vine's work for being celebrity obsessed have missed the point. Her work is not only about celebrities, he says, but also about herself. For example, portraits of Moss and a young Princess Diana, both of whose sometimes tumultuous personal lives she identifies with, bear a resemblance to Vine. He said: "She is open to the idea these paintings are about her, that they are self portraits, and that they are actually about her, and by extension, they become about all of us and how we relate to our own self worth"".

Drawings

Vine contributed a drawing Joe eating hash cakes (2004) to Arty Greatest Hits, a book documenting the first four years of Arty, a fanzine dedicated to art.

Vine exhibited a series of pencil drawings, in hand-painted blue frames, for her solo show at Modern Art Oxford in 2007. Subjects included Gina, Vicky and Anna (2004), Count Axel (2004), The Bionic Woman (2005), Joe eating hash cakes (2004), Kitty Fisher (2006) and Joan (2006).

Found Objects

Vine creates art installations and sculpture using Found Objects. In the work Girl in Lourdes (2004), Vine created an installtion using found objects such as a mannequin, a dress, a wig, a prayer book, holy water, a Lourdes candle, a found Lourdes souvenir, a Virgin Mary figurine, a table with flowers in a jam jar. A wall painting with the slogan Hotel Saint Bernadette accompanied the work and the mannequin had also been painted on by the artist. Another work Sylvia cooker (2004), Vine painted poems by Sylvia Plath in enamel onto a found gas cooker, with a portrait of Plath decorating the oven door.

Installation

In 2006, Vine created an installation work for her solo exhibition Whatever happened to Melissa Jane? at The Bailiffgate Museum in Alnwick. The installation consisted of glass cabinets displaying personal mementoes, photographs, magazines, books, CDs, cuttings of newspaper images; the source material for many of Vine's paintings.

Video and Performance

For Vine's USA exhibition The Waltz in 2006, she created a "live painting performance", over a five day period, of a large-scale mural across the museum. The performance was filmed and later exhibited on TV screens on plinths alongside the stacked mural as a six-channel video installation. The videos were described as a "mirrored televised document" showing Vine's creative process making the mural and revealing "a conceptual fourth dimension, a world beyond the painting"

In 2006, Vine launched Stellacam, which ran all day, every day for a 3 month period, enabling fans to watch her painting at her Bloomsbury studio and home. The webcam feed was streamed live online via her website and at social networking website MySpace. Stellacam had an audience of thousands.

Solo Shows

• 2004 Prozac and Private Views, London, UK
• 2004 Petal, Tel Aviv, Israel
• 2005 Stellawood, London, UK
• 2005 Petal (Part Two), Los Angeles, USA
• 2006 Whatever happened to Melissa Jane?, Alnwick, UK
• 2006 The Waltz, Detroit, USA
• 2007 Stella Vine: Paintings, Oxford, UK

Collections

• Saatchi Gallery
• George Michael
• David Roberts
• Adele
• Robert Diament
• Alexander McQueen

Further reading

• Nairne, Andrew and Greer, Germaine. Stella Vine: Paintings (Modern Art Oxford, 2007) ISBN 978-1901352344 [2]
• Vine, S. "Stella Vine" (Mörel Books, London, 2008) "Stella Vine: Zine"
• Alleyne, R (2004-02-24). "First blood to Saatchi as a star is born". The Telegraph. Retrieved 2007-09-28. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Deveney, C (2004-03-14). "Stripped bare". Scotland on Sunday. Retrieved 2007-09-28. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Morris, S (2004-03-16). "Gallery urged not to show portrait of dead addict". The Guardian. Retrieved 2007-09-28. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Ito, T (August, 2005). "Stella Vine". Interviews. fogless. Retrieved 2007-09-28. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• "Alnwick Sensation". Inside Out. BBC. 2004-09-27. Retrieved 2007-09-28. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Januszczak, W (2007-06-10). "The paint stripper". The Times. Retrieved 2007-09-28. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)

External links

• Stella Vine web site
• Rosy Wilde Gallery (historic site)
• Stella Vine paintings and CV
• Interview with Lynn Barber at Guardian.co.uk