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Artist to Watch: Georg Wilson’s Dreamy, Bucolic Landscapes Capture the Power of Nature

Inspired by the English countryside, folklore, and pastoral traditions, the rising star painter explores the symbiotic relationship between living beings and nature

By Lucy Rees
Surreal painting of a figure relaxing in a lush, green forest with scattered foliage and a serene expression.
The Wet (After Ophelia), (2024) by Georg Wilson. Photo: Courtesy of the artist and Pilar Corrias, London.

At the heart of Georg Wilson’s practice is a fascination with ecology, the symbiotic relationship between living beings and nature. Informed by the English countryside, folklore, and pastoral traditions, the London-based rising talent creates dreamy, imaginary worlds rendered in rich jewel tones. Enigmatic, animal-like creatures inhabit lush, bountiful scenes. “I always want there to be some sort of bite or snarl—a kind of resistance or itchiness, like a push in my paintings,” Wilson says. “Nature isn’t always a safe, cuddly place.”

With degrees from the University of Oxford and the Royal College of Art in London, she is heavily inspired by art history and traditions of storytelling. “The art and cultural objects of the past are really important to my painting practice,” says Wilson, whose buzzworthy debut at Pilar Corrias in London this March, “The Last Oozings,” looked to the Pre-Raphaelites. “They had this intense observation of the nature, and they believed that specific plants had symbolic meaning.”

Artist standing on a ladder next to a large, colorful mural featuring a nature scene with animals and plants.
Georg Wilson with her work The Arrival of Spring (2024), in her London studio. Photo: NICK WHITWORTH

With a process that mimics the cyclical rhythms of nature, Wilson works in real time to capture seasonal shifts. She has been busy creating a new body of work, part of which will be on view at the gallery’s booth at Art Basel in June, depicting spring and the wild plants that are bursting out of the soil as well as the life that emerges from the rivers and ponds. “I like the framework that the seasons provide,” says Wilson, who has also been included in recent group exhibitions at Hauser & Wirth Somerset and Lévy Gorvy Dayan in London. “I’m more in tune and present, and the range of subjects is forever renewing and feeding me.”

Colorful autumn tree and bushes under a bright sky, with two figures walking in a dreamy, painterly landscape.
The Oak Cycle, (2024). Photo: Courtesy of the artist and Pilar Corrias, London.
Intricate artwork of an ant surrounded by colorful leaves, branches, and various forest elements on a dark textured background.
The Last Oozings, (2024). Photo: Courtesy of the artist and Pilar Corrias, London.

To help her prepare, Wilson has been taking trips around England, from Northumberland to Essex to Cornwall; poring through old British flora books from the 1950s; and experimenting with painting on copper. “Ultimately, I want to encourage the viewer to have a sense of curiosity about the next landscape or piece of nature they might see,” she suggests, “even if it’s just a small weed poking out of the pavement.”

A version of this article first appeared in print in our 2025 Summer Issue in the section “Artists to Watch.” Subscribe to the magazine.