Zelga Simone Miller
Zelga Simone Miller
Zelga’s practice explores tenderness, care and collective strength, expressed through the conscious and unconscious nuances of physical form and gesture. Influenced by feminist thought and informed by communities grounded in care and quiet resistance, her work seeks to challenge hierarchies that dismiss the emotional or the decorative as superficial, and to honour the space where vulnerability and resilience coexist.
Zelga’s imagery is rooted in the expressive potential of drawing. Through a reductive approach to line, she foregrounds the power of colour and composition in paintings and woodblock prints that address the complexities of our inner lives. Meaning and emotional weight find their voice in the smallest of details, in the tilt of a head or a fold of draped fabric. Figures emerge through subtle veils of colour and light, held between stillness and becoming, care and rebellion. Visual fragments, a mouth, a strand of loose hair, anchor the picture plane within fields of softly diffused colour.
Inherent in these artworks are the intimacies of 21st-century womanhood, expressed through the sharing of ritual tasks and in unguarded moments of introspection. Here, the female gaze, so central to our interpretation of societal narratives in both art and life, is returned not in defiance, but openly, in acknowledgement of shared experience. Through the language of physical poise, a lowered gaze or a glance cast outward, Zelga creates a subtle sense of intimacy between subject and observer, drawing us close to images rich in psychological and emotional resonance.
Zelga’s imagery is rooted in the expressive potential of drawing. Through a reductive approach to line, she foregrounds the power of colour and composition in paintings and woodblock prints that address the complexities of our inner lives. Meaning and emotional weight find their voice in the smallest of details, in the tilt of a head or a fold of draped fabric. Figures emerge through subtle veils of colour and light, held between stillness and becoming, care and rebellion. Visual fragments, a mouth, a strand of loose hair, anchor the picture plane within fields of softly diffused colour.
Inherent in these artworks are the intimacies of 21st-century womanhood, expressed through the sharing of ritual tasks and in unguarded moments of introspection. Here, the female gaze, so central to our interpretation of societal narratives in both art and life, is returned not in defiance, but openly, in acknowledgement of shared experience. Through the language of physical poise, a lowered gaze or a glance cast outward, Zelga creates a subtle sense of intimacy between subject and observer, drawing us close to images rich in psychological and emotional resonance.
Zelga Simone Miller
MARKING TIME
Pastel on cradled wooden panel
122cm x 92cm
2025
Pastel on cradled wooden panel
122cm x 92cm
2025
More products
Zelga Simone Miller
Lives and works in London, UK.
solo Exhibitions
2024 Drawing Thoughts, Sewell Gallery, Oxford
2024 The Line, the grain and everything in between, Sarah Wiseman Gallery, Oxford
2022 Going Solo, ronapainting, Oxford
Exhibitions
2026 ACS Studio Prze Shortlist
2026 Unit one -Gallery One work, One week, One conversation RA Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London RCA, Queen Alexandra House, London
2026 Shifting Realities, Hockney Gallery, London
2026 The Quiet Collector, Fine Art, UK
2026 Extinction, Peckham Old Station Gallery, London
2026 Royal College of Art MA Graduate Show, London
2026 Soho House Collection, London
2025 Salon d’Automne, Paris
2025 Woodcut Print, Janet Rady Fine Art, London
2025 Summer Exhibition, Fenn Ditton Gallery, Cambridge Summer Exhibition, CCA Galleries, Jersey
2025 Chapters, Sarah Wiseman Gallery, Oxford
2025 Into Which Colours We Fall, Sarah Wiseman Gallery, Oxford Soho House Collection, Soho Farmhouse
2025 Layers, The Department Store, London
2025 Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, London
2024 RA Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London Childhood Reimagined, Janet Rady Fine Art, London / Dubai Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, London
2024 Society of Women Artists Exhibition, Mall Galleries, London LOOP, Bankside Gallery, London
2024 Miniatures for Macmillan, Candida Stevens Gallery, London/Chichester
2024 Art with a heart, Zuleika Gallery, London
2024 50/50, Unit 1 Gallery Workshop, London
2024 OVADA Contemporary, OVADA, Oxford
2024 Open, Espacio Gallery, London
2024 Eye of the Beholder, 508 Gallery, London
2024 Soho House Collection, UK
2024 Print Mo, NKollective, Colorado
2024 Mud for you, Fitzrovia Gallery, London
2024 Ruth Borchard Self Portrait Prize, Online
2024 Drawing in Relation, Loughborough University, Loughborough
2023 RA Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London London Art Biennale, Chelsea Old Town Hall, London ING Discerning Eye, Mall Galleries, London
2023 Oxford Art Society Open, Sarah Wiseman Gallery, Oxford (First Prize)
2021–2022 Awagami International Miniprint Exhibition, Japan OXO Tower Wharf Exhibitions, London
2021–2022 RA Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London Sculpture Now, Society of Scottish Artists, Online
2021–2022 Maze, OXO Wharf, Bargehouse, London
2021–2022 Hope Menier Gallery, Southwark Street, London
Awards, Appointments & Recognition
2026 ACS Studio Prize shortlist
2025–2026 Ali H. Alkazzi and Basil H. Alkazzi Scholarship Award, RCA shortlisted
2024 Judge, Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair
2024 A Space Between, Resident Artist, April
2024 First Prize, Oxford Art Society Open, Sarah Wiseman Gallery
2023 Printmakers’ Printmaker Prize, Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair
Education
2025 - 2026 MA Painting Royal College of Art 2022 - 2025 TURPS (Painting)
2017 - 2019 MFA Fine Arts, Wimbledon College of Art (UAL) and Oxford Brookes University
2017 - Central Saint Martins - Oil Painting 2016/17 - Ruskin School of Art - Complete Drawing
Lives and works in London, UK.
solo Exhibitions
2024 Drawing Thoughts, Sewell Gallery, Oxford
2024 The Line, the grain and everything in between, Sarah Wiseman Gallery, Oxford
2022 Going Solo, ronapainting, Oxford
Exhibitions
2026 ACS Studio Prze Shortlist
2026 Unit one -Gallery One work, One week, One conversation RA Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London RCA, Queen Alexandra House, London
2026 Shifting Realities, Hockney Gallery, London
2026 The Quiet Collector, Fine Art, UK
2026 Extinction, Peckham Old Station Gallery, London
2026 Royal College of Art MA Graduate Show, London
2026 Soho House Collection, London
2025 Salon d’Automne, Paris
2025 Woodcut Print, Janet Rady Fine Art, London
2025 Summer Exhibition, Fenn Ditton Gallery, Cambridge Summer Exhibition, CCA Galleries, Jersey
2025 Chapters, Sarah Wiseman Gallery, Oxford
2025 Into Which Colours We Fall, Sarah Wiseman Gallery, Oxford Soho House Collection, Soho Farmhouse
2025 Layers, The Department Store, London
2025 Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, London
2024 RA Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London Childhood Reimagined, Janet Rady Fine Art, London / Dubai Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, London
2024 Society of Women Artists Exhibition, Mall Galleries, London LOOP, Bankside Gallery, London
2024 Miniatures for Macmillan, Candida Stevens Gallery, London/Chichester
2024 Art with a heart, Zuleika Gallery, London
2024 50/50, Unit 1 Gallery Workshop, London
2024 OVADA Contemporary, OVADA, Oxford
2024 Open, Espacio Gallery, London
2024 Eye of the Beholder, 508 Gallery, London
2024 Soho House Collection, UK
2024 Print Mo, NKollective, Colorado
2024 Mud for you, Fitzrovia Gallery, London
2024 Ruth Borchard Self Portrait Prize, Online
2024 Drawing in Relation, Loughborough University, Loughborough
2023 RA Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London London Art Biennale, Chelsea Old Town Hall, London ING Discerning Eye, Mall Galleries, London
2023 Oxford Art Society Open, Sarah Wiseman Gallery, Oxford (First Prize)
2021–2022 Awagami International Miniprint Exhibition, Japan OXO Tower Wharf Exhibitions, London
2021–2022 RA Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London Sculpture Now, Society of Scottish Artists, Online
2021–2022 Maze, OXO Wharf, Bargehouse, London
2021–2022 Hope Menier Gallery, Southwark Street, London
Awards, Appointments & Recognition
2026 ACS Studio Prize shortlist
2025–2026 Ali H. Alkazzi and Basil H. Alkazzi Scholarship Award, RCA shortlisted
2024 Judge, Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair
2024 A Space Between, Resident Artist, April
2024 First Prize, Oxford Art Society Open, Sarah Wiseman Gallery
2023 Printmakers’ Printmaker Prize, Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair
Education
2025 - 2026 MA Painting Royal College of Art 2022 - 2025 TURPS (Painting)
2017 - 2019 MFA Fine Arts, Wimbledon College of Art (UAL) and Oxford Brookes University
2017 - Central Saint Martins - Oil Painting 2016/17 - Ruskin School of Art - Complete Drawing
Find our news first!