I’m a relative newcomer to art, having started life drawing in 2014 and, in 2016, I enrolled on a part-time painting course at The Art Academy in London, graduating in 2018. I retired from my job as a scientist in the Environment Agency at the end of 2020 to spend more time developing my art interests in my small studio in Crowmarsh Gifford, where I live. I’ve recently enrolled on a year-long course at Newlyn Art School which involves frequent train journeys to Cornwall – always a pleasure.

I use photographs and drawings as a starting point for studio paintings but I also enjoy the immediacy of ‘plein air’ painting. I’m drawn to bold geometric shapes or a dramatic play of light. I tend to use an earthy palette, reflecting my interest in painters like Paul Nash and Peter Lanyon but recently I have been trying to be more adventurous with my palette. Pure abstraction has eluded me so far so most of my work is figurative, but I like to introduce some sort of narrative to go beyond simply depicting people or places.

I enjoy exhibiting locally through Reading Guild of Artists and Oxford Art Society. In 2019 my painting ‘Watching, Waiting’ was accepted into a NEAC exhibition at Mall Galleries in London and was also my submission painting for Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year in 2021. I was subsequently selected to take part and my heat – at the Eden Project in Cornwall – was aired in February 2022.