RECAP BEFORE TEMPORARY STUDIO CLOSURE

Due to the coronavirus, I have moved my workspace to my house and it will take a different direction.  As I will be in a different environment which is less spacious and where I cannot have my current work to hand, I shall be focussing on working…

Portrait painting from life with Alan McGowan March 2020

This was the first time I have worked from life for some time.  I am still in a place where I am experimenting with materials and getting confidence with the oil painting, so also thinking about the drawing and colour in a real life model is…

Making art – what I have learned so far

As an artist who has worked for many years in several different media, I have realised that for me making art is a dialogue between artist, subject/idea and medium.  Each has its own dimension and language.  The subject can simply be an idea,…

Animals at Play BBC Two

  I am loving this series about the benefits and purposes of play.  We can all learn from the young animals!Professor Ben Garrod is one of the main contributors to explain the defining characteristics of play:Relaxed…

The painting game – more

I am so determined to go beyond figurative painting.  I worked for months analysing and deconstructing this image and then reconstructing it on a large scale (1200 x 900 mm).I wanted to do an abstract version.  I took a large canvas…

Deborah Hay – ways of making art

"Dance became a way to learn without thinking" I am fascinated by Hay's radical and non linear thinking about the body and movement.  It resonates with my personal way of making visual art, an approach which seems entirely intuitive and directly…

Movement journal

   HERE ARE SOME NOTES TO KEEP TRACK OF WHERE I AM AND TO HELP ME FOCUS AND FIND DIRECTION 7th November  Dance Base - Monica de Ioanni - lovely intro to contact impro16th November Weekend  Jam Festival   Classes People  Ideas…

Venice Biennale 2019

26th October 2019 I was in Venice to visit the Biennale at the weekend.  It was hot beautiful weather, but it was also a Saturday and it seemed the whole of Venice was enjoying the show before it closes in a few weeks. I took…

Nottdance 2019

 It is much too soon (about a week) to write very much about the experience of joining Nottdance for a day. I would just like to thank the organisers and everyone involved for a very special experience.  Here are a few prelim…

The Painting Game the latest

Oh what a struggle to move from looking to something else.  That something could be analysing shapes back to their limits, somehow finding the essence of the image, expressing emotions, or something as yet unrealised.Reading about…