Nature, The Landscape & Me

If I was asked to define my paintings, I would loosely describe them as ‘representational’, because you can clearly see what they are meant to represent. Photography does form the basis of many of my paintings, but only as an initial starting point. I am less concerned with a purely photographic representation, preferring to let my own thoughts and imagination move things forward. My work is influenced by nature itself: light, shade, colour and texture, the ever changing sky and clouds, flowing rivers and dramatic waterfalls. The landscape is my inspiration, driving me on to improve as a painter.
I have been a designer all my working life and because graphic design is very precise, with close attention to detail needed, I am constantly battling against my paintings becoming too detailed. In many respects I have to come to terms with it (it’s part of me), but I feel my later work has shifted from the ‘representational’, to finding differing dramatic outcomes through a more ‘expressionistic’ use of colour and composition – a reaction, maybe, to the more precise disciplines of my working life as a graphic designer.

For more information visit http://n-y-a.co.uk/unit-9-gallery/