'Human’ explores the tension experienced in our relationship with technology and especially AI: it seems there is an unbearable fascination with yet horror of the concept that as humans we are moulding our own nemesis. A naked woman bends over a form with humanoid aspect, smooth and blood red. There is something of a foetus about her or it. Her essence and possibility of being alive are ambiguous. The woman gazes at the creature, and caresses her. We are asking as never before what it is to be human, where the line is drawn and if humanity as we know it will even continue into the future.

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Judy Clarkson was born in Harrogate, N. Yorks and graduated from St. Martin's School of Art in Fine Art in London where she still lives. Working in oil on canvas, she seeks through this traditional medium to portray a contemporary vision of the human condition. Often there is an implied drama in her compositions, the subjects caught in a moment or predicament. Simple props such as high heels or chess pieces acquire a presence beyond the everyday: the mood or message of each piece cannot be defined but rather experienced. The subjects of her paintings  are deep within their own being, their images intimate, the compositions spiralling into resonant landscapes of the soul. The open-ended nature of these images asks of the viewer to bring their own interpretations and experiences to the picture. Her paintings are densely worked in layers of oil paint which build the subject, almost like a sculpture. Although realistic from a distance, in proximity loose brushstrokes  hold the marks of the brush as if still fluid and in movement. For her, painting is a passion and a conduit of spiritual realisation.

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Clarkson has won numerous prizes, most recently The Hunger Magazine Prize 2026, The Daler Rowney Prize, New Emergence Art 2025 and The Paula Rego Painting Prize, Women in Art 2025.

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