I live by the sea which leaks into all aspects of my work - a broad symphonic influence close to my heart and rolled out beyond and forever across all our years.
Things collected and gathered to me are all at hand on shelves and ledges and tables - objects take on significance - books, African masks and carvings, flotsam and jetsam, pebbles tumbled from the waves, evidence of corrosion and relentless change picked from this transient life. Studios and workshops become an extension of the artist’s personality and mine is also my home - a place that creaks and whispers with secrets as I go about my daily rituals and habits like some old alchemist.
I have been drawing with pens ( steel nib dip pens/quills/found sticks/markers and biros ) for as long as I can remember, it's my preferred choice of instrument. Over the years the Black Bic Biro especially has become an extension of my hand. There is a stockpile of them in my studio - fifty or more at any given time, any less and I begin to feel a twitch of anxiety.
I like the progress and finality of the ink pen mark which allows me to work into deep blacks, either with line or wash or both. And of course there is no rubbing out, no going back - you can only go on until the work is ruined... somewhere along the way..
Fragment from Venice notebook 2009
