I've always loved to draw and spent much of my childhood drawing and colouring. I developed a strong sense of shape in my drawing from an early age and had a strong confident line. Through a traditional art education I learnt to draw in a realistic way and render light and shade, shape and tone. Drawing in a way that was purely about how the world looked took away all the enjoyment. It was later that I realised that my enjoyment of drawing is about story and narrative. It is as much about how the world feels as about how it looks. I gained confidence in expressing my world with my own visual language. I am inspired by naive and folk art.
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When I started to run workshops to share my mixed media techniques I realised that lots of people have lost a joy of drawing because of all the 'shoulds' attached to it. In my workshops I try to liberate your inner artist to play, explore and find a personal, visual way of expressing your relationship to that which we see.
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Drawing in a sketchbook creates a space to collect ideas and to make images without worrying about a final outcome. My mantra is 'Real not perfect'!
I have published my seasons sketchbooks with images from my sketchbooks and archive. Each one is a beautiful 15cm x 15cm full colour, 80 page book filled with sketches, photos, studio shots, text, and images of my originals.
Each season has a different feel and colour palette to capture the energy of the season.
I hope the books inspire you to create and to notice the miracles of life.
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You can buy them here.
My Garden Studio is where I create my art. I sketch out and about in the landscape and take memories back to the studio to work from. It is where I am surrounded by my favourite books, art materials, music and draws and draws of collected papers. It is rarely tidy but is full of soul! It looks out onto my garden and through the window I see the coming and going of local cats, the neighbourhood fox and the birds that come to collect seed from my vegetable plot. In the summer the doors are open and the light floods in. In winter it gets cold and you'll find me cosy in a hat and scarf. My studio is my workplace, but also my spirit space. Time flies when I'm in the studio - I find it a restorative space.
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