THREE years ago, Judith Green gave her design job the brush off, to pick up her palette as a full-time pursuit.

Judith, who lives in West End Avenue, Pinner, has now been selected to exhibit some of her work with the Royal Institute of Oil Painters at the Mall Galleries in central London this month.

Speaking of her decision to leave her role as art director of The Green House, the design consultancy in Harrow-on-the-Hill which she founded with her husband, Brian, Judith said: "A lot of my friends and family were surprised when I gave up working full time.

"It's a big sacrifice for everybody, but you begin to realise there are other things that are more important.

"I think that you can be working for many years, and when you do something else, you are learning so much more and it's like someone has turned the lights on.

"For me, it's something I'd always wanted to do. You have to jump off the bandagon."

In 2000, Judith was awarded a bursary place on the postgraduate course in drawing at the Prince's Drawing School at the Prince's Foundation in London. She has since exhibited and sold with various galleries in the UK, including the Royal Academy of Arts, and has work in numerous private collections.

"The Prince's Foundation is fantastic because it's given so many people opportunities," she said.

"There are students who have just graduated and there are people like me who have had different careers and came back to painting."

Judith's work is striking and colourful, and often drawn from life and the landscape.

"I am looking at simplifying nature," she explained. "I am attracted to art which has a very strong geometry in it.

"Now I can see more clearly what attracted me to the diagonal forces and flatness of work by artists such as Cezanne."

 Emily and Dittisham by Judith Green will be shown at the Royal Institute of Oil Painters' 116th annual exhibition at the Mall Galleries in The Mall, London SW1, from 10am until 5pm daily from November 26 to December 7. Admission costs £2.50 (£1 concessions). Call the gallery on 020 7930 6844 or visit www.mallgalleries.org.uk for details.