CECILE DE VILLIERS
Studio De Villiers
Cape Town, RSA
I paint to hold what is fleeting; because stillness, too, deserves remembering.
- C. de Villiers
Meet the artist
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Cecile de Villiers is a South African oil painter whose work offers stillness as sanctuary. She paints to honour what is quiet, sacred, and often missed — the breath of light across a still life, the hush of a solitary landscape, the emotional presence of ordinary beauty.
A lifelong awareness of fragility and beauty informs her practice — shaped by environments where light, silence, and safety never arrived together. She paints not for spectacle, but to remember what deserves to be felt.
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Guided by intuition and music, she builds her paintings in silence. Her process is immersive and slow, using oils, brush, and palette knife to layer texture and light. Each piece is finished only when it feels emotionally resolved — not perfect, but true.
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Her work sits at the intersection of impressionism and abstraction, but always speaks in its own language: stillness, depth, tenderness, joy and peace.
These pieces are my way of sitting with the sacred ordinary. I paint what I want to remember was real.
- C. de Villiers
Artist statement
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Cecile’s art is not decorative. It is devotional.
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Her work is a quiet refusal to rush — a visual invitation to feel. She paints not to impress, but to bless. There is no urgency here. Only attention.
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Her paintings are visual sanctuaries: places where light slows down, time stretches, and presence returns. This is work for those who want to remember what matters — not with words, but through colour, texture, and space.
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She lives and works in Cape Town. All original pieces are signed, dated, and accompanied by a certificate of authenticity. A selection of works are also available as fine art prints and wearable pieces.
Inside the studio
Each painting begins in silence, lit by morning sun, music playing softly in the background. Cecile paints slowly, trusting her intuitive sense of rhythm and composition.
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She works in oil using brushes and palette knives — tools that let her shape feeling into form. Her palette is layered, often dominated by soft blues, ochres, and quiet whites.
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Subjects emerge gradually: a vessel, a cloud-washed hillside, a linen-covered table. The work speaks before it is understood.
She paints one piece at a time, finishing only when the work feels like a breath — alive, balanced, and emotionally at peace.