Welcome.  You can use this website to find out more about me, commission a unique original oil painting of your very own, and view and purchase from the gallery. 

I am a self-representing artist based near Winchester, in Hampshire, England. 

I am generally drawn to the sea and light, so you will see many of my paintings are from various beautiful places along the English coast.  I also take a number of commissions - anything from places to portraits and pets.

About me

I have been painting from a very early age, taking every opportunity at school and then college. Against my art teacher's advice (!) I went on to university and gained a BSc and PhD in geography.  I think that is where my love of landscape and the natural world really became my inspiration. 

I love the outdoors.  I am always hiking, camping or sailing, with my trusted camera and sketch book at my side.  I decided to return to painting in a big way following serious ill health.  I returned to work part time in environmental PR and part time as an artist.  I feel very lucky to be able to do so. 

I am always studying those artists I admire.  The old masters, the impressionists, and the scottish colourists, to more contemporary inspirations like John Singer Sargent, Richard Schmid, Tony Pro, Bruno Tinucci and Colley Whisson, and British artists David Curtis, Ken Howard and Tony Williams.

I exhibit a small selection of my work at the Pop Atelier Everyman Studio in Winchester, England, but in the main sell through my website, facebook and recommendation.  

I was shortlisted for the one competition I have entered - the West Sussex Stride Open Art competition.  I know many say I should enter more! One day I promise!

About my art

I am often asked what inspires me to paint.  It is often spontaneous.  A scene or moment will capture me.  I stop myself and I look into what caught my eye.  It is almost always how light is playing over something that just lifts it to a special level.  

My aim in each painting is to successfully reproduce that moment. My paintings are about tone and light first, and then colour.  I want people to enjoy my paintings for the natural beauty and light they portray.  I want to make people smile!

People are often interested in HOW I paint.  I prepare my own canvases. I fix primed canvas to sealed 6mm plywood, and then paint a textured 'ground' of acrylic gesso.  I then work either 'alla prima' (direct method), painting in one sitting 'wet on wet' which generally gives a lovely buttery 'impasto' textured feel to the painting (see 'A winters walk'). Or I begin by further prep'ing the canvas by laying in a dark tone and pushing this out with a cotton rag to reveal a monochrome painting.  I then return to the painting many times over and apply layers of colour over this base (see 'Hurst I and II'). I work with a fairly 'limited palette' (between five and ten colours).

Whichever method I use, I often leave my paintings for several days, and even weeks or months, reviewing and returning to them until I feel I have captured the sense of what drew me to the subject in the first instance. 

Oil paintings take between six and twelve months to fully dry, so I always advise varnishing at twelve months minimum.  They are dry enough to the touch after three months for commissions, but I always advise care in framing and transporting in their younger months!