Whilst studing in West Berlin in 1984, Gwen Hardie was for a time taught by the German painter Georg Baselitz, who  encouraged her to develop a looser and more dynamic representation of the human figure. Hardie produced a series of works based on elements of her own body, beginning a fascination with the landscape of the body, showing it close up but on a large scale, at times abstracted beyond recognition. In The Growth of Two Organisms her interest in biology and painterly abstraction is still the subject, as something organic grows in pink, fleshy tones.

Gwen Hardie, born 1962

Gwen Hardie was born in Fife and grew up in Aberdeenshire before attending Edinburgh College of Art to study. Her career started well: in 1990, she was the youngest artist ever to have a solo show at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. Before relocating to New York City in 2000, Gwen Hardie lived and worked in London and Berlin. Hardie has received residencies at The Bogliasco Foundation in Italy (2015 and 2006), as well as Yaddo, MacDowell, and the VCCA in the United States. Hardie's work can be found in both private and public collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the British Council in London and the Calouste Gulbenkian Modern Collection in Lisbon.