A Story…

I had started oil painting on Daler boards at 12 years old but it was not until 1984, whilst travelling in Spain, as a musician, that I decided I would rather be a visual artist and soon returned to England where I took up life drawing classes and building a portfolio to gain access to a Foundation course in art and design where I applied to study at St.Martins School of Art in London, where, for three years I proceeded to feel miserable and although I learnt various printmaking techniques at Central School of Art & Design, London I did not manage to find either subject matter or a style to hang my creative hat on. I did learn to regularly draw in a sketchbook and looked at variety of art theories and met many creative souls.

In 1994 I signed on for a two year part-time MA at Brighton University under the tutelage of Head of Masters Degree in Fine Art Lawrence Preece and furthered my interest in printmaking and made a particular study of the English conceptual artists' collaboration Art & Language.

In 1998 I moved to live on the edge of Eryri National Park (Snowdonia), Wales and soon began creating circular drawings and paintings, partially as the result of working with Julia Cameron’s ‘The Artist’s Way’, and partly because I had been observing the end grains of sawn logs. I was looking to unlock my creative confusions, that time away from a studio (a couple of years as a single parent, I found that drawing three sketches a day, first thing in the morning was useful for me seeing the patterns that I was engaging with.

Several sketchbooks later I had realised certain insights about my practice and decided to pursue my interest in circular patterning, mandalas (I was reintroduced to calm abiding and insight meditation) and the idea of individuation (my father was in therapy for forty years and my mother was a psychotherapist, both Jungians).

So, with hundreds of A5 sketches made, I began collaging them, but still unsatisfied with the result and finding myself in a creative cul-de-sac I had a meeting in 2007 at Aspex, Portsmouth, a visual arts and educational charity, with creative advisor Jonathan Parsons, who suggested I enlarged the sketches; this I did, but having not listened properly I painted a larger image, but kept on using very small brushes, making my designs very detailed and large.