Painting What I Never Said

Why I Paint What Can't Be Said (or What I Never Said at the Time)

People often ask me what my paintings are about. The honest answer is that they began long before the first brush touches the canvas. They're all thoughts that were hidden in my subconscious (see my painting titled 'Cranial Vault'); I often don't know they're there until I pick up a palette knife or brush. My paintings are rarely, if ever planned. I just like to play and see what happens.

My work isn't an attempt to recreate the world as it appears. It's an attempt to capture the things we all experience but struggle to explain: memory, trauma, joy, loss, identity, loss of identity, and the constant movement of thought. The constant thrum of an unquiet mind.

I work with multiple layers of acrylic, fluorescent and phosphorescent paints, inks, metallic leaf, spray paint and markers plus a multitude of other materials that create a texture I find appealing. I love texture and neon. I love how colours shift as the light changes, revealing details that weren't visible before. I love this transformation because it mirrors us as people. We are never exactly the same from one moment to the next.

Growing up as part of Generation X, I was shaped by contrasts: the energy and excess of rave culture alongside deep angst and rage of grunge. Both brought me opportunity to express coiled up feelings. This soundtrack was the background to everyday responsibility, optimism alongside uncertainty, freedom alongside expectation. Those influences continue to find their way into my work through bold colour, texture and symbolism.

Many of my paintings contain masks of some description, fractured forms, circle or skull motifs. They aren't intended as symbols of darkness. For me, they represent the identities we wear, the versions of ourselves we've outgrown, and the process of letting go while still carrying our history with us.

As someone who works full-time in the highly structured and regulated world of clinical research quality assurance, painting provides a completely different language, it brings me equal chance to experience euphoria, clear my mind of frustration, and process lived experiences. It is a place where childish curiosity, and questions matter more than the actual answers; emotion matters more than perfection, and my intuition is allowed to lead.

This blog will be a space to share the stories behind my paintings, the experiments that succeed, and those that don't, the inspirations that shape each collection, and reflections on creativity, colour and contemporary life.

Thank you for visiting. Whether you've arrived because you're curious about abstract and textured pop art, searching for something that resonates, or simply exploring, I hope you'll find something here that makes you pause, think, or see the world a little differently.

Welcome to my journey.