My work uses details from vintage photos, toy models and historical artworks, enlarging and altering them in my own way sometimes to the point of abstraction. I’m partly paying homage to the originals and partly exploring why these specific images capture my attention. The subjects I choose often speak to current world events, or events in my own life.

Certain themes have recurred over the years; reconnaissance photographs taken by my father in WW2 were central to my work for ten years or so and their influence can still be seen. Antique black and white film footage from the 1906 San Francisco earthquake was a basis for another series of paintings exhibited as 'Brave City', also photos from the aftermath of the Guernica and Dresden bombings in WW2.

During the lockdown period, charcoal drawing on paper became central to my work-practice again. I began to draw directly onto the canvases in charcoal, fixing the charcoal with varnish before applying the colour. I incorporate different methods of applying the oil paint; scraping, brushing and diluting back.

More recently I have returned to oil paint as the central medium employed in my work. Having trained as a printmaker, I learnt to embrace chance happenings and 'mistakes' during the creative process. As a result I like to see the tracks of the working process; areas of raw canvas, smudges and rough brush-marks left unchecked. I see this as a celebration of the human-hand at work, its skills, alterations and decision-making are an antidote to the computer-corrected CGI images that flood our screens every day.

All work is for sale unless indicated and Arundel Contemporary Gallery in West Sussex always has some recent work in stock. Please use the contact link to arrange a studio visit or for any further information.