Explore Modern Still Life Paintings

I’m Lydia Kapsza, a Manchester-based painter whose practice is shaped by a background in theatre and live art, where storytelling, movement and atmosphere play a central role. Growing up in Suffolk, I developed an early sensitivity to quiet spaces and everyday observation, something that continues to influence the still, domestic moments that appear throughout my work.

I rediscovered painting during a difficult period with my mental health, and it has since become a way of slowing down and finding steadiness. My process is instinctive and playful; I build paintings through layered gestures of colour, focusing more on feeling and rhythm than strict representation. Rather than recreating scenes exactly as they are, I respond to the emotional weight behind them, using paint as a way to process, pause and reconnect.