Michele Ashby

Michele Ashby is a pastel artist based in Yoxford, Suffolk, whose work spans portraiture, self-portraiture and still life. She came to art from a successful career in graphic design: she holds a BA (Hons) in Graphic Design and ran her own graphic design business for around 25 years before turning to pastels, drawn in by the vibrancy and immediacy of the colour, and becoming a professional artist. She started out painting pet portraits, a springboard from which she pushed herself in other directions and found the subjects she most loves to paint. She works with Unison soft pastels alongside a wide range of pastel pencils.

Ashby is a Council Member of the Pastel Society, a Master Pastelist and Signature Member of the Pastel Society of America, an Eminent Pastelist of IAPS (the International Association of Pastel Societies), a Council Member of the Society of Women Artists, a Member of the Society of Graphic Fine Art and an Associate Artist of Unison Colour Pastels.

Her work has won many awards, among them The Hosking Houses Artist Residency Award with the Women in Art Prize 2026, 3rd Prize in the British Art Prize 2025, and the Prix de Pastel (Best in Show) at the 12th IAPS Master Circle Division Exhibition, IAPS PastelWorld 2024. Her pastel Jamel won the Chartpak award for excellence in pastel at the Pastel Society of America's Enduring Brilliance exhibition, and she has won Best in Show with the Institute of East Anglian Artists. She has been selected or preselected by four London art societies showing at the Mall Galleries: the Pastel Society, the Royal Society of Marine Artists, the Society of Women Artists and the Society of British Artists. Her work has been exhibited at The National Arts Club, New York, The Butler Institute of American Art, Ohio, and The Zhou B Art Center, Chicago, Illinois, as well as The OXO Tower Gallery and The Mall Galleries in London.