PROFILE

My work has been entirely based within two walled gardens over many years and has always been practiced outside, so that the walled gardens have been my studios in North Yorkshire.

I work on daily, animated studies through each of the seasons. That constant, moment by moment change in light, through the earth in winter, the first shoots in spring, then blossom, fruit and leaf fall, stimulates a natural curiosity to search for ever more fresh observation.

And so I record blossom for its white, and for its reflection of the sky, and of the leaves. Buds are noted as they open to full bloom and become fragile stamens in the wind and rain of early summer.

The studies shown here are in watercolour and in graphite, and have been completed during the last two years.

The watercolours I make during early spring catch the hues of white framed in saturated colour and always I search for a balance that will be an accurate reflection of natural shapes in the garden.

My studies in the white light of spring are at the root of my work throughout the rest of the year as I move on to the intense colours of summer and autumn. 

Working in graphite gives me an opportunity to search for a different kind of precision, also to do with shape and light, but emphasizing line, rhythm and repetition.

Graphite enables me to work with immediacy and with conscious, direct marks, like carving light on the paper.  

For me, a direct correlation has evolved between my practice of drawing and painting, and my practice of mindfulness. Increasingly, my ability to be in the moment has developed and intensified my awareness of the processes I use, and the subject material chosen.