Tanya Russell MRBS has become well known over the last 30 years for her life-like and vibrant animal sculptures. For Tanya her practice is not only about capturing the animals she sculpts with marks and movement. It’s about our relationships with those animals and their welfare.

Tanya apprenticed for 7 years with her parents, sculptors Lorne McKean FRBS and Edwin Russell FRBS and after practicing as a sculptor for a number of years, she founded the The Art Academy in London Bridge, now a degree validated and thriving art college. She is also author of ‘Modelling and Sculpting the Figure’. Tanya has completed many public and private commissions nationally and internationally, including 4 large public commissions in London. Tanya exhibits in gardens and galleries across the country.

Artist Statement – “I create artwork about our relationships with animals asking ‘how can my work better the lives of animals? How can I support nature, habitats and welfare through my art? It’s wonderful always looking at and working with a subject that I love. I’ve sculpted since I was a child, and I’ve found throughout my life that expressing animals in clay is an evolving struggle of exploration and respect. I’ve spent my entire life working with rescue animals, fostering dozens of them, volunteering in a rescue centre and now partnering with 3 animal rescue charities, providing them with 10% of the proceeds from all my sales. Now my husband and I are fortunate to be able to immerse ourselves in nature and inspiration – working together from my studio in mid-Wales, making animal sculpture, creating woods and habitats, and living with our farm and rescue animals.”

Animal Charities – Tanya’s particular passion is animals and animal welfare, and much of the work over her career has been done to raise money for animal charities, or raise awareness for animal welfare causes. Prominently, she raised nearly £20,000 for Battersea Cats and Dogs home through her auctioned commissions. She now works closely with 3 animal charities, providing 10% of the proceeds from all her sculptures sales to them. 

– The David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation supports wildlife around the world.

– The Dogs Trust campaigns for dog welfare improvements in the UK and internationally, rehoming thousands of dogs a year.

– And All Creatures Great and Small provides enormous support for farm animals and pets in Wales.

Tanya moved to Wales with her husband Charles in 2018, to a small farm with a custom-built sculpture studio, which had belonged to sculptor and painter, Robert Clatworthy RA.