This exhibition is nearly – but not quite – exclusively based on local scenes in and around Abingdon. To find the “special spots” which capture different essences of the current season requires looking hard and long for unique renditions of colour, design or even just nature with something special to say. It is these spots that I try to capture in my paintings.
Other paintings comprise scenes from different countries of the world of human geography - capturing something of their climates, landforms, land-use, culture or archaeological history.
Just so you know, I have seen 99.9% of anything that I ever paint!
I grew up surrounded by art and artists which, perhaps surprisingly, kept me from painting! I got to know about art and art history and was always interested to seek it out. I particularly liked art which was connected to place, and always looked for indigenous art when I started to travel for business, which eventually took me to over 40 countries. Only late in my career did I even contemplate painting myself and then because I realised that to escape the rigours of business for “play” might be helpful! But that play needed to include colour! I had studied geography at university as I was passionate about the big, wild landscapes that I grew up with in Southern Africa. When I started to paint, I combined architectural forms with nature, but later dropped man’s contribution! I sought quiet, undeveloped terrain where nature dominates – and this remains this that I seek to paint.
Since lockdown I have travelled little, so local scenes dominate what I paint. Probably because the land itself matters to me, I have never wanted to completely “leave” the world of representation for abstraction, hoping instead to capture some of the mysteriousness and beauty of lonely, natural havens through colour, form and line.