Ella completed her Fine Art degree at Oxford Brooks and then went on to complete a Masters at Bournemouth University where she is now based and paints full time. Ella draws on personal memories to create works that deeply connect with time, flux and the instability of a moment. Moments shift, memories change, lights flicker and suddenly we are experiencing something completely altered and fragmented.

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Allowing for figures to emerge from layers of oil, the characters seemingly exist in a state of flux between themselves and their dream-like environments. The process of layering marks and building recollections reaches a point of abstraction, where the scenes are confused and distorted. She describes the process of painting as trying to remember; it is a search for clarity and the concurrent negation of that clarity.

Ella exhibits regularly across the country and Europe. In 2017 Shepard worked alongside BiC pens and created pieces in collaboration with Parkinson's UK at Store Street Gallery. In 2018 she won the Young Bath Art Prize and her painting was chosen for the cover of Young Romances’ album, 'Don’t Look'.

Ella has been commissioned by and exhibited with Modern Art Oxford, The Arts Council and residencies have taken her to Bauhaus University and Cove Park. Her work has been featured in Art and Framing Today, What is art?, House and Garden and Paint Britain. Ella’s work can be viewed in Oxford’s Public Art Collection.

Awards include Jorge Aguilar-Agon National Artist Award, Bath Art Prize, Lena Fritsch’s Selection Award (The Ashmolean Museum), The Eaton Fund and Jackson’s Painting Prize Longlist (2023).

Ella’s painting “In Being I Am” was recently selected for the Margate Art Prize exhibition by Tracey Emin.