Janette Kerr on being a foul-weather artist, her passion for the sea and painting outside

Acclaimed seascape artist Janette Kerr has a thing for the northern landscape. Described as a foul-weather painter, she's renowned for spending weeks on board boats and ships to get up, close and personal with her favourite subject, no matter the weather.

For her latest work, she enjoyed three weeks on a three-masted schooner sailing up the coast of Svalbard in Norway up to the Arctic Circle. And, more recently, she was inspired by the Shetland Islands, where she, in fact, lives half the year.

Contemporary and experimental, Janette does not aim to create meticulous studies of the landscape, preferring instead to respond to what is sensed rather than what is seen. Her paintings explore the boundaries between representation and abstraction whilst embodying the power and immediacy of both land and sea. We spoke to Janette about this and more.