When a spacious 1930s house, near the centre of a popular High Weald village, came on the market, artist Corinne Corbett-Thompson knew at once it was what she was looking for. It had lots of room, it was rural but not remote – you could walk from it to the village shop and pub – and above all it had a large attic space which would make a perfect artist’s studio.

Eleven years and quite a lot of remodellingwork later, the front door welcomes you into a marvellous kingdom of light, space and colour. So much so, you almost feel that you’ve stepped into another world. Everywhere you look, your eye lights on paintings and ceramics that prompt thoughts of deserts, mountains and seas, while swirling circular paintings whisk your thoughts up to the planets and the stars. And the effect is multiplied at the moment, because work for an upcoming major solo exhibition in Hastings is stacked and hung on every surface.

But more of that later. First came the house…
“We had been living in Cranbrook, in a 15th century beamed cottage with tiny leaded-light windows,” says Corinne. “But I paint on the floor, so in the cottage, when I painted, I always had those criss-cross shaped shadows falling over the work and I couldn’t see what I was doing.”
The cottage also only had a small garden, down a back lane from the main house, while the house she and her husband moved into had a large garden, with green space all around. It was on this green patch that they lived for a year, in a caravan

parked next to the drive, while work was done inside the house to create the particular kind of spaces they needed for their busy lives. As well as being a painter and ceramist, Corinne is a fitness instructor, running both online and outdoor classes, while her husband, an executive in the energy industry, also paints and is just finishing a Classics degree. On top of which they both cycle and wild swim, and Corinne is a very hands-on ‘grand-mère’, with all her three children and partners, plus five grandchildren, at times moving in for extended stays.

The house needed to serve all these differing needs, so a semi open-plan area was created on the ground floor, with the kitchen at the heart of it, and other spaces circling around it, much like the swirling clouds in one of her space paintings. The living and dining area at the back of the house make the most of light pouring in

from the terrace of the south-facing garden. This then leads round to an area that Corinne uses as an office, and then around to another space at the front of the house which is used as a break-out sitting and television area. This darker, north-facing space is made cosy with a teal wall, a navy sofa and a brilliant yellow armchair.

To one side of this is her husband’s office, where he retreats to find quiet and order, among other paintings by both him and Corinne, while the other side of this inventive gyratory system leads to a boot room and utility area and then outside to an annex, which is used either for tenants or family members, as needs change.

Upstairs there are four bedrooms, in frequent use, and above them, Corinne’s sky-lit, roof space studio, with a feast of works in progress, and dustsheets on the floor which have turned into glorious colourful abstracts in their own right, over years of use.

This is a house made beautiful not by a rigorous interior designer’s eye, but by being the kaleidoscope reflection of a life where every moment is lived actively, creatively and reflectively. (In fact, Corinne would very much like readers to know that, just outside the frame of every lovely photograph featured here, is all the usual chaos and muddle of family life.) “All I do is keep my decor simple,” she says, “mainly white walls, lots of light. And I’m fairly ruthless about getting rid of things – if I realise I haven’t properly looked at something for two years, I thank it and send it on its way.”

Corinne grew up in Spain, and still keeps a flat in her home village near Benidorm. Over the course of an eventful life she has lived in Sarawak, Oman, Turkey and Brunei, and all these different influences coalesce in her work, which has been exhibited in Madrid, Monaco and London, and bought by collectors in Spain, France, Australia and America. The American astronaut Nicole Stott bought a circular universe painting because, she told Corinne, it reminded her of what she had seen in space.

“I’ve been on a long reflective journey,” she says. “From the earth, outwards to the universe. I never know what I’m going to paint. I put on my overalls and I feel like I’m almost a conduit. It’s all intuitive. The paint dictates what I do.”

However she is clear that all the time she spends outdoors, informs her painting. When she is not teaching her ‘pole-zing’ classes in the woods, she is sea swimming, or walking, or cycling. In recent years, she and her husband have cycled from John O’Groats to Land’s End, and the entire length of Spain.

“The one is always part of the other. It works as a whole. I bring things back to my painting from what I’ve experienced outdoors. And I couldn’t do my fitness work without having my painting to retreat into. I’m so aware of the planet that we live on, its beauty and its fragility, and that we all have a voice, if we want to use it, to help look after it, and to try and make people think about the things they do.”

At seventy, Corinne raised her voice with a series of birthday challenges including walking seventy miles alone round the Isle of Wight, undertaking seventy litter picks, cycling 700 miles and planting seventy trees – in fact, this turned into several hundred – and now her art installations and ceramics reflect her concern about the rising tide of plastics and pollution.

In her studio, to the side of the colourful dust cloths, a mirrored river of blue bowls is taking shape, the centrepiece installation of her forthcoming exhibition, showing how water can emerge from pollution, back into crystal clarity. Another installation consists of small, seascape tanks, contrasting a dirty and polluted sea bed environment, with a sparklingly clean and alive one. “I want to make people think about the healing of our planet. Obviously there are so many things to worry about, but it’s so important to have hope, and if we all raise our voices together maybe things will change.”
It is her work reflecting all this that will be showcased in the Hastings Museum & Art Gallery this autumn and winter.

Meanwhile her influence is clearly percolating down into future generations. Around her kitchen shelves, another gallery is growing, of all the art works of her young grandchildren, who she encourages to draw and paint, as well as to walk, swim, play tennis and paddleboard.
“Life is so short and precious, and our planet so beautiful and fragile, I just don’t want to waste a moment,” she says. And her house is a vibrant and colourful testament to exactly this.

Address Book

Corinne Corbett-Thompson’s solo exhibition will be running at Hastings Museum & Art Gallery from 28 September 2024 until 12 January 2025. Find out more at corbett-thompson.com