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How do you start your artworks?
My paintings are often informed by smaller pieces of work, collages and pencil studies that I do along the way. These studies combined with my walks in nature and some mental visual imagery are all in mind when I begin to paint. But I don’t ever map the work out, so the composition can have certain intuitive freedom. In terms of my colours, I might mix one or two hues to begin with, but as I go the work dictates to me the decisions that need to be made along the way.
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What inspires your practice?
I’m really inspired by nature’s cyclical constancy, and in particular the hopefulness of Spring. In the same way my painting restores me, so does being outside and among trees and flowers. I think my practice is ultimately inspired by the ability to grow, heal and evolve. Painting allows me to explore this on a deeply personal level and nature is a beautiful mirror to this process.
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What would you identify as the best part of being an artist?
It’s got to be the freedom of it and the allure of always creating something new and not ever knowing exactly what that might be. It’s a great privilege to be able to come to understand your own visual language and manifest in paint things that are hidden inside me. It’s a thrilling and meaningful life long endeavour. I also love that I don’t have to abide by other peoples schedules!
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Your works feature floral motifs, what is the symbolism behind that?
Flowers are to me an endless resource as their forms are so diverse. I love them for their romance and certain irreverence in a world that can sometimes feel a bit gloomy. Not only this, they’ve come to be symbolic of motherhood and the female spirit. The women in my family, especially my late grandmother, are great flower lovers, so they carry an inherited symbolism to me and symbolise the own self-nurturing in my practice.
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How would you describe your artistic practice, what do you want to communicate to the viewer?
I often think about this idea that once the works leave my studio they’re no longer ‘mine’ - so it’s down to what the viewer projects or perceives. Which I think is very liberating, I don’t want too much control over that. However, I hope for a certain energetic exchange and like to think of each painting almost like a living form, fizzing with delight. Joy is what I seek when I paint, so yes I do hope they feel that.