About Me
Order giving way to entropy, artifice to nature
My current Art practice is inspired, in large part by a fascination in Dante’s Divine comedy. Like Dante, I see examples of ‘circular’ behaviour in my everyday life and believe there must be a better way forward. I aim to combine this with my understanding of Mesoamerican civilisations, Animism and Buddhist teaching to seek guidance and direction. We need to learn from the past and in our actions, work towards a better future.
My multi-media practice incorporates a mixture of materials found in the environments I am working within, along with my oil painting which I have been developing over more than thirty years. I love the nature of oil paint. I aim to sympathetically draw materials together to point towards a new life and a better future.
My paintings have always recorded experiences, rather than observations or portraits. I began as a painter, recording my time moving through, or living within a landscape. My UC solo exhibition for instance, documented a journey around the North Devon coast. I grew up in North Devon and have a life long love of the sea and its presence as an ever changing entity. Coastal life stimulated a fascination in mans desire for authority and legacy. Something nature and the sea has little respect for. This in turn prompted explorations of walls and signs. Here we see mans attempts to demark, contain, protect, own and separate. Erosion and decay are clear demonstrations of time passing. A legacy of futility and impermanence. I was here. I was important? From scratched initials on a tree to shop signs. What will we leave behind? Nature can reawaken us to the worth of life and the impermanence of it.
Recent journeys have taken me to Japan, Thailand, Peru and Berlin. Animist belief in the spirit of objects along with the Inka’s 3 realms and the Mayan compass have informed my more recent work based on Dante’s circles of hell. I consider myself an abstract impressionist.
I am an artist and Art teacher with over 30 years experience? I predominantly teach students with special educational needs. They have taught me a great deal, including to enjoy mark making. Mark make without pretence. Enjoy the materials, express your vision and relish your own expressive acts. Be true to yourself.