At the very roots of my practice lies a subconscious attraction to plants and their placement, idea of ‘ownership’ and the attachment we grow to them. This is a concept which has usually presented through painting and installation. A continuous juxtaposition between the manmade and the more natural is prevalent in domesticated arrangements, a quality which has manifested through the internal to where it currently resides, on the boundary between the inside and out. Current work teeters this line with more sensitive approaches to emotion, arrangement and context.

Earlier, more colourful acrylic transcripts of preliminary photographs were a solid foundation on which to begin. They provided the ability to experiment with form and colour as well as room to ponder how this may be contextualised within the contemporary art scene. Their most solid attributes have been brought forward and expanded on. As can be seen in most recent work, subject remains more consistent and the emotional connection to the artist is better executed and intelligently entwined without the use of a block of text next to a piece in order to make up for what the painting was failing to do. Instead, it is quite often the name of said piece which offers this insight to the viewer through snippets of emails exchanged with a loved one.

The process and space in which pieces are produced is equally important to the outcomes themselves. It begins with spontaneous adoration of a certain colour, light or arrangement. These are often caught via photograph due to the uncertainty of external influences, including time restraints in terms of natural lighting, weather and growth. These are gathered and those which I find myself continually searching for within the space are those I believe hold the best representation of the moment. These are chosen to paint. The paintings vary, always focused on structure and palette, but painted using emotional sense rather than literal reproduction, and now always with the original view under surveillance.  

I intend for it to work as a tool. A record of a space and a series of exact factors which simultaneously exist to create these specific outcomes. Drawing on certain elements of pastoral value which play a large role in the works overall appeal. I can see it working in a domestic setting equally to that of a white cube. The works simplistic and recognisable elements along with its soft palette make it functional at both levels. Part of this construction comes from previous focus on full landscapes which have now developed into smaller sections of internal/external arrangements. Where my focus used to be on the same two plants, it has shifted to the space which I have created for myself. A greenhouse of paintings nor a studio filled with plants, rather a co-existing harmony of growth; vegetables and fine art. As well as a place to sit, sing and escape external responsibilities. With such a dominantly green environment comes great change particularly through the spring and summer months. The same references are repeated throughout my creative process, they grow marginally between photographs (between glances even) creating for subtly different scenes, an oil-based record of that moment in time, through the hands of its resident artist. 

There are contemporary impressionistic notes throughout due to the colourful segments with inconspicuous identities, an almost recalibration of value, of place and objects. Where there was once an emerging split between painting and installation there now resides a harmonious pairing of expression. The work is situated at home within the space. It currently belongs, like its artist, in no better place. Familiarity, simplicity and a window into a garden in East Yorkshire coexist to create a practice which comforts in what could be viewed as the most traditional of ways. An 18 year preparation and accumulation of objects, gardening and idea of value have coincided within these 4 glass walls to create not only a frantic record of this point in time through the art of oil painting and e-mail, but through the care and affection for 33 lettuces and 10 strawberry plants.  

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