Maybe this is where my aesthetic comes from? Why I like the ambiguity of blurriness organic forms, horizons and light? Why I feel happiest in a constant dreamlike state with my head turned towards the sun like a sunflower. Why I want to shatter the screen and illusions of ‘reality’ and run back to the natural world from where we all came - and are still part of, despite humanity’s best efforts to deny it.

There is a place. A forgotten, hidden and ancient place nestled between Victorian terraces, a busy main road and a sprawling 1930s suburban housing estate. If you look closely you can see the signs of the people that came before. Long before the dog walkers. Long before the people taking a short cut to Big Tesco. Long before it became the place (in covid lockdown) where my daughter learned to walk and explore. And yet here she walked in other one-year old’s footsteps. A walk stretching back millennia. But all that visibly remains are the earth works of their dwellings. It’s not agreed whether the remains are Bronze Age or Iron Age, but to me they are ageless. Timeless. They are still with us in the trees, in the annual show of bluebells, in the foxes, in the squirrels, the acorns and, yes, even in the parakeets. In the universe’s constant cycle of life, death and rebirth. The cycle that works it’s way through my art, never resting, always changing. Re-forming. Breaking down. Emerging.

It really is beautiful, this constant cycle of creativity.

If I’d have kept every drawing from my birth to now there is one motif that would reoccur again and again (okay maybe two and a half but that’s for a later post). They may go through different themes - princesses, fashion models, fairies, alter egos, characters for some dark gothic film I created in my head - or - just no one. Anyone. But women - especially their faces have been everything to me. I would draw them while watching TV, listening to music, on the covers of my school books, in the telephone book (remember them?) while listening to my friends go on about some boy in class that they imagined looked their way. I would always find these unknown women appeared while I was in some kind of absent minded state. A trance where time disappeared. I didn’t have the words ‘intuition’ or ‘creative flow’ then - to me they were just doodles: a way to fill in time when you only had four tv channels and no internet.

The problem with sketchbooks is that they hold secrets.

And that can be a beautiful thing. But being very dominant in external intuition, I need my whole creative universe in front of me so I can see the connections, and pull on threads to tell stories. I’m the type of person that goes to the big picture before the detail. So it was only natural that my practice has evolved into working on multiple things at once. Whether that’s gouache, oil, film, digital or embroidery, all parts of my practice weave and feed into each other without conscious instruction - and that is why the walls of my studio become so important.

During lockdown (with a non sleeping one-year old) , my Royal Talens Art Creation sketchbook became my best friend. I documented the monotony of the days, finding myself lost in the magic of gouache and soft pastel which made even the greyest and sleepiest of days seem joyful world. In fact, the creative act, regenerated me. It gave me energy and recharged me with only a couple of hours sleep. I became obsessed with capturing light and romanticising moments in my daughter’s life. But as the everyday returned to normality, my love for the practice waned. I stopped drawing the places I loved and longed for. And as my daughter grew, so did I, and I returned to my art being about something more than getting through the every day.

It’s funny that creativity is like a spiral. You go on a journey of discovery only to find yourself back to where you started but with a different perspective. The same but different. Transformed.

What can I say, being selected for Sunny Bank Mills 'One's to Watch 2024' exhibition has been pretty much a dream come true.

Thanks to a pioneering decision to recognise the skills and creativity found in creatives from 'non-traditional' arts education background, the team at Sunny Bank Mills opened up this years showcase of Yorkshire creative talent to those with 'alternative' backgrounds (i.e. non-formal art school). Considering how many people have found creativity as a second career (because schools historically push academia over arts - as in my case) or simply cannot afford or able to take up formal education, this is a truly inspired decision. I hope that this signals a wider change and it would be great to see grants, galleries and residencies be open to non-traditional or later-in-life emerging artists.

Thanks to everyone that came to the private view of the Essential School of Painting end of year show ‘Art Matters 2’ at the gorgeous Art Pavilion, Mile End, London.

Divide/Unite is a bit if a watershed series. Superficially it is very striking in it’s use of colour. For anyone familiar with my work - it’s a significant departure from the soft, tertiary colours I’d normally use - and deliberately so. It’s ground zero in my realisation - and commitment- to face my shadows and say no to the conformity and obedience that has been put on me - and others, especially females - from birth. So it’s a not so silent scream borne out around the times of protest again abuse towards women in early 2023.