Victoria Ross
Visual Artist
Victoria Ross is a self taught visual artist working exclusively from the figure through painting and drawing, exploring what it is to be human, in particular loss, vulnerability and fragility. The subjects are often based on old family photographs or found photographs, exploring the human need to capture time and the impossibility of that desire.
This latest series of paintings, Siblings, began in response to Ross’s brother recently selling their childhood home and moving away – “When I visited the house for the last time before the sale, he showed me the inside of a door where my name, painted on in childhood, was still visible. It was strange — almost surreal — to be able to reach out and touch the letters I had written so long ago. These paintings grew out of a sense that something precious had been lost, and they tapped into the broader yearning that runs through all my work.
I knew I wanted to capture something of my childhood in that house, but I wasn’t interested in the physical space. What mattered to me was the emotional space I had shared with my siblings. I was drawn to the feeling of longing that surfaces every time I look at photos from that time — that sharp melancholy, that ache to reach out and touch the past, just as I touched the letters on the door. The impossibility of this isn’t lost on me. That paradox is what fueled the series.”
Victoria Ross: Siblings
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Martin, Unsure, 2025
Watercolour and oil on canvas
This painting is based on a group photograph of Ross and her siblings. Her brother looks puzzled and uncertain.
Stephanie Squinting at the Sun, 2025
Watercolour and oil on canvas
In this work Ross paints her sister, photographed on a family day out. Her expression is unclear – is she smiling or grimacing?
Pensive, 2025
Watercolour and oil on canvas
This self portrait is based on a family studio photograph. Ross holds a slightly awkward pose and looks off to the side, watchful and perhaps not quite part of the group.
At first glance, the paintings in Siblings may feel uncomfortable to look at — small figures floating in empty space on bare canvas, their faces half-visible — though over time they begin to speak. They are a dance of tiny marks, barely visible, beside bolder, thicker smears of paint. They’re a conversation between loud colours and very quiet ones — and always, the bare weave of the canvas behind them. The figures are unfinished, imperfect, like memories: drifting, partial, always a little out of reach.
Martin in School Uniform, 2025
Watercolour and oil on canvas
Victoria Ross often uses a limited palette, though this work introduces flashes of red and a bold blue shirt, which is echoed in the background.
Victoria in Pinafore, 2025
Watercolour and oil on canvas
This painting is based on a small school photograph of the artist in a crisp white shirt and pinafore – bright white in an otherwise muted composition.
Stephanie in School Uniform, 2025
Watercolour and oil on canvas
This image highlights the background colour based on an original photograph – an alluring pure aqua which emblazoned the sitter.
About Victoria Ross
Victoria Ross is a self-taught visual artist born in Glasgow, now based in Linlithgow, who makes pared-back, expressive paintings and drawings. She paints people as she experiences them—fragile, full of gaps, with broken edges. Working from old family photographs and using a muted palette of watercolours and oils, Ross creates delicate, ethereal portraits by constantly setting herself creative problems that no one else has asked her to solve.
Ross’s work is an ongoing conversation between inner yearning and the world’s refusal to stop turning. It’s an embodied attempt to accept time’s passing, to gently honour those who’ve gone before, and to cherish her own small life. A quiet invitation to think less and feel more. Recent exhibitions include group exhibitions Neuk Perspectives, Patriothall Gallery (Edinburgh, 2024), Shared Perspectives, EH49 Hub (Linlithgow, 2024), The Time of Her Life, House of Smalls Gallery (Edinburgh, 2024) and solo exhibition Capturing Transcience, Glisk Gallery (Burntisland, 2023).
Find out more about In Tension and see exhibiting pages from other artists