Susan Ryder has long been one of the country's leading portrait painters. A member of the New English Arts Club and past vicepresident of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters, she has painted many notable sitters including Queen Elizabeth II, Diana, Princess of Wales and many more.

Inspired by the work of Edouard Vuillard and the teaching of Bernard Dunstan, she is still passionately in love with lamplight, to her it is more thrilling than the most beautiful sunset. Setting her scene before starting an interior can take time, moving a lamp a fraction, draping a jacket over a chair or dribbling wine into a glass to just the right level, the upright stem of a glass is her passion too.