Lydia Solomon

With a father who was Principal of Rochdale College of Art and L.S.Lowry as a close family friend and frequent visitor to our home, I grew up surrounded by Art. In fact, my parents owned a very significant collection of original Lowry artworks, but that is a story for another time. Watch this space!

Since gaining my degree at Loughborough,I have exhibited both in the U.K. and abroad. I have also featured in numerous publications and reference books and have been seen on commercial television.

My initial subjects tended to be the sombre streets and derelict  mills of my native Lancashire. However, since taking up scuba diving I have found another huge source of creativity and inspiration in the undersea world  of coral reefs. My love of the old, the derelict, the slightly decayed, can also been seen in some of my more recent works based on old French farmhouses and country cottages. I suppose it has also informed my recent choice of husband!

I work with pencils, watercolour, pastels, paints, inks and dyes, as well as hand and machine embroidery techniques. I am also very interested in re-interpreting major art movements, such as Pointillism and Impressionism, in threads and fabric.

Cromford Easter exhibition 2010.

This fine man, my husband, has been helping me set up exhibitions for nearly two decades .

Addendum

You can not have got this far into Lydia's web site without learning the sad news of her death on 15th of August 2010. What this web site does not show however is that not only was Lydia a talented artist but was also a musician of some note (Excuse the pun! Groan, groan!) .

She was an accomplished flautist, played the piano well and since her 50th birthday, when she wanted an accordian as a birthday present, she was teaching herself and making great progress towards immitating the French accordian players that she so loved to hear around Montmartre and on the Paris metro.

She was also a brave but almost utterly untalented cyclist - something she put down to living on a hill when she was young, with a mother who would not let her have a bike. It took Lydia quite some time to master the idea that it was easier, safer and considerably less painful to get off a bike when it had stopped! She was also the only person I have ever met who went down hills slower than they went up them.

That being said, however many times she fell off she would always dust herself down, wipe away the blood and get straight back on again - so typical of the determination that she showed in everything she ever did. Some of the most enjoyable holidays we spent together over the last few years have been those when we explored the quiet lanes, by-ways and canal paths of the French countryside as well as numerous French hospitals and medical centres!. Lydia taught herself the language (GCSE A*), loved to use it, loved the country and the people and was never happier than when she could 'people watch' in a small country bar or a backstreet Paris bistro.

Lydia did not live long enough but she lived life to the full and has left both a huge hole and an even bigger legacy.

In a sky full of stars, some stars shine brighter !

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