My first University degree was English Literature, the second Teaching and the third Illustration. The final one was probably the one I should have done in the first place, but sometimes you have to go down the wrong path to find your way to the right one, as my mum says "You can get to anywhere from anywhere". In between there was also a lot of fun and travelling and somewhere along that wiggly path I met my husband and we had our wonderful, amazing daughter so I wouldn't change anything!
I've always loved drawing and A Level Art was all painting and life drawing. However it was only when I discovered printmaking at college that I felt I began to develop a style of work I felt confident presenting to other people as something they might enjoy looking at, or even like enough to want to buy to put on their own walls. Most of my work these days is made using hand cut rubber stamps and paper collage. I love the magic moment when a drawing, carved into rubber is printed for the for the first time and its new lines and shapes are revealed, that is when they come alive. There is a freedom to using my technique, involving many printing blocks and lots of cutting and sticking. I can arrange all the elements and move them around selecting positions and colours until I am happy with the composition.
My favourite subjects are flowers, mushrooms, vintage toys, fairytales, dogs, cats, birds, fish, butterflies, bees and of course beetles. Pretty varied but maybe what they all have in common is a connection to a nostalgic, colourful world of happy memories.