About Andrea

Art, Love and the Ocean

I’ve always loved being by water.

A river or lake will do in a pinch, but nothing quite tops the ever-changing moods and colours of the sea. There’s a magic in the shifting shorelines, the breaking waves and the miniature worlds of the rock pools.

Watercolour paints share some of those qualities. Capricious and sometimes unpredictable, they flow across the paper in a wash of glorious colour. Painting with them is almost as hypnotic as watching the ocean.

An Artist Afloat

Andrea England Vancouver Island Watercolour Seascapes.jpg

Sea shore watercolour painting by Andrea England.JPG

Whilst the sea has always called to me, I never thought I’d become a sailor. And then, in the islands of Tonga, I met Jim and his sailboat, Island Prism.

Love grew along with my sea legs and we got married on Island Prism’s foredeck in Auckland, New Zealand.

For our honeymoon, we sailed to Vanuatu, Australia and through South East Asia. I started sketching the places we visited and rediscovered my lost love of art. The drawings I created let me explore and connect with places in a deep and personal way.

When we decided to sail across the Pacific to Jim’s native Canada, I painted our adventures across storm-tossed oceans to tropical paradises and the forested coasts of the Pacific Northwest.

Painting Across Oceans

Oyster shell watercolour palette on sailboat

Andrea England Watercolour Sketching Vancouver Island

Today, Island Prism is still our home and my studio.

The waters around Vancouver Island are our cruising grounds and my source of endless inspiration.

My muses are orcas, cedars, arbutus trees and humpback whales, current-swept coastlines and rolling waves. Each painting shares the movement, tranquility and energy of life by and on the sea, so you can always have a bit of the ocean with you.

Andrea England West Coastal Watercolour Fine Art.jpg

To Victoria BC

Read Our Adventures in the Log Book

Paint Your Own Adventures

Have you ever dreamed of sketching your own adventures, or capturing your memories of the coast in flowing watercolours?

Choose an online course and dive in to a world of creative exploration. Get inspired and build essential skills as you paint your favourite shorelines or create gorgeous illustrated journals of your travels and wanderings on land and sea.

Online Art Courses