Camille Souter HRHA

Camille Souter was born Betty Pamela Holmes in Northampton in 1929 but was raised in Ireland. Known for her contemporary style, her colourful paintings are of everyday subjects such as flowers, fish and unexceptional landscapes. It was her husband Gordon Souter who nicknamed her ‘Camille’ after the heroine of Alexandre Dumas’ novel La Dame aux Camélias.’She originally trained as a nurse at Guy’s Hospital in London, but after falling ill decided to take up painting. Spending some time in Italy first, she returned to Ireland in 1956 to begin her career as a self-taught artist.
It was around the early 1960s that she began to attract the attention of several key art collectors, such as Sir Basil Goulding. Souter is a member of Aosdána and has been involved in various solo and group exhibitions, including at the Irish Exhibition of Living Art and the Oireachtas Art Exhibition. Retrospectives of the artist’s work have been held at the Douglas Hyde Gallery (1980) and at the Royal Hibernian Academy’s Gallagher Gallery (2001). She has been presented with the Landscape Award at the Oireachtas Exhibition (1973), the Gainey Award (1975) and first prize at the Claremorris National Art Exhibition (1978).