A DORCHESTER artist is taking the art world by storm after scooping a top national award.

Rebecca Lardner, of the Green, Fordington, has won the Best-Selling Up and Coming Artist in the Fine Arts Guild awards 2008.

She is also scoring commissions for her paintings.

Miss Lardner's distinctive oils on canvas of bright seaside scenes started as bright pictures on postcards but are now exhibited in galleries around the world.

The 36-year-old artist now sells her commissioned paintings to collectors all over the world including a number of high-profile clients such as Paul McCartney's music academy as well as a range of magazines and record sleeves.

She said: "This week it is a Dorset Arts Week and I have got an open house so it has been manic.

"I am literally up to my eyeballs painting all the hours of the day."

Miss Lardner said it was fantastic to win the highly prestigious award from such an old, traditional art guild.

She said: "The style of my paintings seems to be more popular than ever.

"It started off with greetings cards and it snowballed and now I am doing mostly original art work."

Miss Lardner was born in the Purbecks and completed an art foundation degree at Bournemouth and Poole School of Art and Design.

She then went on to the University of Liverpool where she studied classics and illustration.

Her paintings are based on scenes from the English seaside, which she describes as "soothing".