portfolio
portraits/life drawings
I love to tell stories; to whittle away at people's
lives and try to capture a moment of their life, a brief glimpse of another
world. Over the last two years I have developed a great fascination with
traveling Circus performers, specifically the strange voyeuristic connection we
develop as a member of the audience, circuses are a strange and magical arena
whereby you are encouraged to temporary live vicariously through a stranger
death defining acts.
Over the years I have developed a complex and
indecisive painting process, I enjoy playing with my subject much like a cat
and mouse. I always start by applying multiple metallic/florescent acrylic layers with a
palette knife, until I can see the images erupting through the canvas (much
like using an intuitive Rorschach Ink Blot Test to formulate my composition and
flow). Once I know where the painting is going, I can begin to pin down a
linear drawing in Ink, before I can then move onto completing the painting by
building up highlights/shadows through multiple dry stiff brush marks,
gradually moving towards a thick juicy oil paint.