Art
Artist Statement
My work is inspired by the experience of immersing myself in nature, especially in wild landscapes such as those in County Donegal, Ireland (where my family have lived for generations) and in Dorset, where I currently live.
My paintings dig deep – both into the land and my emotional response to it – capturing the moods, textures and history of a place in a way that also acknowledges my inner landscape.
I work with mixed media using whatever tools the environment offers to best capture what I want to convey, from sticks to pebbles or simply my fingers!
I also enjoy incorporating natural elements as another way of capturing a true sense of place. This might include mixing sand and grasses into the paint, creating ‘inks’ from natural pigments (such as crushed hawthorn or blackberries) or simply dipping a finger or brush into the damp mud at my feet.
My paintings are expressive in nature and can be a depiction of different memories and sensory experiences. The most recent series, inspired by my residency at Cape Cornwall, leans further into abstraction. This gives me the freedom to draw attention to the details in the landscape that best suggest its history or its impact on the senses and, I believe, gives the work an enhanced sense of place.
Capturing the coast
During 2023 I became a roaming artist, thanks to my 50 Pictures for 50 Years project, in which I partnered with the South West Coast Path Association to celebrate its 50th birthday. It was a hugely rewarding, challenging and inspirational experience, if also – thanks to the weather – an occasionally terrifying one!
One could spend a year – years even – exploring and interpreting just one square mile of beauty; so trying to do justice to 630 miles of Coast Path was clearly an impossible task! I decided instead to approach it as a year of creative play, to remove any expectation of outcome and to allow myself to simply see what emerged.
Giving myself the freedom to just play was liberating, powerful and informative, and sowed the seed for the creative play workshops that I now offer as part of The Creative Path. (Find out more on The Creative Path page).
You can see some of the Coast path sketches in the gallery below but the entire ‘50 Pictures’ are being displayed in The Creative Path exhibition at Durlston Castle in July 2024.
If you like what I do
Please feel free to chat to me on Instagram or get in touch via the contact form below if you have any questions about my work. And do sign up for my quarterly newsletter below to be kept updated on my exhibitions, creative workshops and retreats.
Art Events for 2024
I’m delighted to say that my partnership with the South West Coast Path is continuing into 2024, with lot of exciting events already in the diary. Here are just a few.
Workshops: I am continuing to lead Creative Path workshops along the way, encouraging other people explore into their creativity in the wild, and discover the many positive benefits that brings (find out more on The Creative Path page).
As part of my Creative Path exhibition at Durlston Castle (see below), I am offering a free creative play at Durlston Country Park on the morning of July 10th. Please reserve a space via the Events page on the Durlston Country Park website.
An exhibition: Durlston Castle in Swanage is hosting an exhibition of my work on – and inspired by – the SW Coast Path from July 5-15th.
The Creative Path exhibition aims to encourage everyone to enjoy creative play in nature and will showcase creative pieces produced by the community groups that I have worked with on the Path, as well as my sketches and paintings.
Sign up to my newsletter to be kept informed about the opening of that, and further details.
Coast Path Residency: I am so grateful to the people at Brisons Veor, Cape Cornwall, for offering me a two-week residency there in March 2024. I spent two wonderful weeks living and working alone in a studio that not only was substantially larger than my garden ‘shed’, but also overlooked wild crashing waves. It was inspirational in so many ways, and I’m looking forward to developing the sketches and ideas that developed there.
To be kept informed about events, workshops and more, you can sign up to my quarterly newsletter. I promise never to fill your inbox with unwelcome spam.
