I was born and trained as a painter in England but the imagery in my painting has undoubtedly been influenced by my move to the Caribbean in 1970. My aesthetic inspiration has been drawn from the visual richness of the Jamaican environment and people and reflects the abundance of the land and the sharp contrasts of light.
For nearly three decades I worked diligently with the model creating works that seem to have cemented my name with portraiture. However these portraits, mostly of women, were often juxtaposed with still-life and gradually my focus shifted away from the model and the still-life became my subject.
In Jamaica I am presently involved with a series of large format canvases inspired in part, by the lush vegetation that surrounds my studio in the hills of St Andrew and incorporated in this is the still life.
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However I maintain two studios, the second one in the U.K. and when I’m working in my studio in England I create smaller more intimate still- lives. The china, glass and silverware are usually arranged with fruit and flowers. This work concentrates on looking at the small, everyday things in life, which speak to me of the history of the familiar- the domestic rather than the outside world. Composing and painting these arrangements, is, for me, a contemplative exercise, and one that never ceases to hold my attention.
I love the seasons and the fruits that each season brings and the possibility it offers me to include them in a new piece. I use acrylic paint because of its speed in drying (and because it’s environmentally friendlier), on a ground of primed extra fine linen canvas. I usually have more than one piece on the go at a time because it’s a good practice to ‘stand back’ and let a painting ‘sit’ for a while as this enables one to see the piece of work more clearly and resolve any problems that it may have.
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