Despite being a biodynamic gardener, practicing yoga, having cats and sometimes being labelled a hippy I am actually a logical thinker. I am on the side of science and yet also realise it doesn’t know it all. I have an interest in facts and am keen for my musings and language not to be taken as fantastical clap trap. I am very open to the multitude of greys in life where facts and imagination cross.
Some words are laden with misunderstanding and cliche driven perceptions; energy, connection, intuition and spiritual – words like these turn logical people off in an instant yet how to describe rich visceral feelings that come from within when you experience something transcendental?
What I am trying to describe in words is what is easy for me to describe in painting. I create work that makes me feel and explains how I feel when experiencing a landscape or a memory, witnessing the dispersion of energy through nature and the elements. How to describe the feeling with words is where I come unstuck. Painting allows me to move through a landscape again and again, drawing on everything I know, delving into my subconscious allowing it to surface. Yes I make defined decisions when painting but a lot of it happens when I’m seemingly not concentrating, when I daydream my way around the surface, essentially playing. Doodling probably describes that feeling best to non painters; automatically letting your mind produce without conscious thought. It’s not a skill, it isn’t learned it feels ancient and instinctive.
You can’t control or guide instinct. You can however choose to ignore it but it’ll still be there calling from the depths telling you things you things you’re consciously unaware of. It is eternally true and beautiful. It is the unquantifiable and some are stuck on the idea of if you can’t see it and prove it in fact, it doesn’t exist.
Travelling through the landscapes of climate change I am painting is sometimes really difficult. I have recently been unwell and have a lot of painting to catch up on now I’m well. I’m working hard and I have to keep an eye on my mental capacity to take all this information on board. It isn’t easy and it has changed my life, my habits and my perspective irreversibly.