art

13th February 2025

in

Hi there - it’s been a while since I’ve showed up on here, but I’ve been looking at what I think could be a really good platform for my work. I’m not saying anymore at present as I’m still trying t get my head around it, but if it works it could be a good alternative to social media, which I talked about briefly in my last post. Since then I have been back on those sites, Facebook and Instagram (but not Twitter - I couldn’t bring myself to turn over that rock again, except to sign in just long enough to delete my account).

I haven’t done much in the way of art so far. I had a brief return to the sketch book and prepared some canvases for painting but haven’t started anything yet. I’m having a hard time really getting into anything and working consistently on my art practice. So apart from one pencil sketch and a couple of ink drawings there’s not much to show for 2025 so far. All of which sounds a bit negative but I retain hope that things will pickup soon. Maybe I just needed this time out.

In the meantime, here’s a drawing I did last week. At some point I hope to realise it as a painting, part of the Dark Discoveries series and inspired by The Twilight Zone….

16th November 2024

in

A couple of weeks after my trip to the Tate Modern to see the Expressionists exhibition I made another visit just to see the general collection. My anxiety levels about going out have been pretty high and I have to make a concentrated effort to make the journey to St. Pauls on the central line, across the bridge and into the gallery. I set myself a task of only visiting the first floor rooms this visit and leaving the next floor for another day. That way it took some of the pressure off. I managed to enjoy most of the works and get round the first three themed galleries - a bit rushed but good to see some familiar favourites and some that I haven’t seen before. I managed a quick look in the shop and the latest work in the Turbine Hall, Open Wounds by Mire Lee. Here are some images from the day.

Lee Krasner

Jackson Pollock

Giorgio de Chirico

22nd September 2024

in

Apologies for the poor photography. I remember this painting from one of my favourite artists, Edvard Munch, hanging in a show at The British Museum in 2019. The exhibition was called ‘Edvard Munch: Love and Angst’ and the painting ‘The Sick Child’ (1907). It was dark and unsettling, yet beautiful and inspiring at the same time. An experience I’ve never forgot.

12th September 2024

in

The last days of the Window Gallery and with it my residency there with Rosetta Art Centre. 2012. Just in time too because that’s when we got hit with plumbing issues from the toilets next door flooding mine and the studio next to mine. Also the very last day after the closing show stinking of both vomit and a heavy dumping session in the toilet that gave up the ghost and stopped flushing altogether. The glamour of the artistic life.

4th September 2024

in

This was a mixed media work I made around 2009/10 for an exhibition exploring the theme of celebrity culture, depicted here as a kind of nightmarish Frankenstein’s monster, with camera lenses where the eyes should be and hair made up torn and ripped pages from celebrity magazines. Even now I feel that exposing myself to the content of those magazines showed an extraordinary dedication to my art practice and the exhibition itself.