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Artists Statement

I am an abstract painter inspired by nature and music. The sea provides me with powerful inspiration and I am endlessly fascinated with the horizon and it’s symbolism. I paint my abstract seascapes from memory rather than life and I want to evoke a sense of place however abstract the work becomes.

I aim to express the timeless feeling of calm experienced when staring at the sea. Lately I have been concerned with minimalism in my work and have tried to capture a stillness that I have experienced during lockdown. I have been mesmerised by light on the horizon and have painted a series of seascapes depicting this, some of which have turned out quite simple and abstract. Sometimes my pantings turn out to be more figurative. I often paint with my hands and with sponges rather then brushes. I paint with oil on canvas and usually use the paint straight from the tube and mix it on the canvas with my fingers. I love bright pure colour and want my paintings to be vivid and alive. I often like to take an idea and see how it travels across a series of canvases, each one evolving into something new.

Music is integral to my work and my paintings are always named from song titles and lyrics. I always listen to music to get me in the zone when painting and feel that this has a strong influence on the finished work. Lately I’ve been listening to a lot of dreamy folk music like Johnny Flynn, John Martyn and Fairport Convention with Sandy Denny. I think this contributes to the ethereal yet vivid quality of the paintings. I often get lost in the music and don’t realise where the time goes!

Lyrics often jump out at me when I’m painting and seem to fit the artwork perfectly. I feel that a snippet of a song lyric as a title gives the painting extra depth. Recently I’ve chosen song lyrics from Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, Crosby Stills & Nash, Bob Dylan, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Kinks, Pink Floyd and David Bowie amongst others to title my paintings.

I’m very lucky to be doing what I’ve always wanted to do. I loved drawing and painting as a child and always wanted to be an artist when I grew up. Looking back on my school reports my teachers reinforced this by saying that art was all I was interested in. My family had lots of art books that I used to look at all the time and I was fascinated by the Impressionists and Pre Raphaelites. I am actually distantly related to John Everett Millais. My parents had a few Turner prints on the wall that fired my imagination and looking back they must have been a great influence to me. Growing up in the land locked Midlands I always wanted to be near the sea. Luckily my childhood holidays were spent in a caravan in Wales, where we spent a lot of time on beautiful windswept beaches looking at the ocean and sheltering from the British Summer. I chose to go to college in Brighton to do my BA in Fine Art and my love of the sea grew. Now I live in Hastings and try and spend as much free time as I can contemplating the coast. My studio is a Summerhouse in my garden with sea views that constantly inspire me and I love painting the light on the horizon. I have always felt driven to paint and can’t imagine doing anything else