Nora West trained in Creative Embroidery and screenprinting at Goldsmiths College, London.

After graduating in 1968, she married a New Zealander and they had four children in the Cotswolds, U.K. The family moved to Auckland in 1982.

Her work employs an eclectic blend of hand and machine stitchery, mixed media, textile painting and printing, in a colourful illustrative style that refers to pop and folk art.

She is fond of visual puns and adages, the decorated texts of Victorian samplers and trades union banners.

Solo shows include Various Applications (Patches of Ponsonby 1986), Battleflags (Lopdell House 1987), Points and Barbs (Oedipus Rex 1988), and The Moving Picture Show which toured the North Island in 1994.

She has curated shows for the N.Z. Peace Foundation and written on art and politics for Art New Zealand.

Much of her work has been in the form of banners for peace, justice, environmental and feminist campaigns. She works with Barbara Joseph as 'Flying Colours', a community bannermaking team.

She has worked as a polytechnic lecturer, an executive member of NZ's Community Arts network and facilitator of a number of collaborative textile projects within the prison and mental health communities.

Her Master's thesis at Auckland University of Technology looks at the crossovers of art, fabric and political activism.

Nora West, POI Research Team,1999