Biography

Life is an evolution and as we travel through life, our outlook changes and is tempered by our life experiences.  Life is also like a circle, and we often get back to where we began!

Born and raised in South London, but now based in Devon, I have always been arty and crafty.  Yet despite regular art classes at Goldsmiths College and the Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts, I chose a craft career, which quickly progressed into technical drawing and management.

These last 10 years I have regressed back to pure art, and I believe that the common denominator to all my life experiences is one of observation, an appreciation of beauty, communication and maintaining the “common touch”.

I have experimented with watercolour, dallied with the acrylic, but caressed pastel over the last 7 years and this I find is the ideal medium for me in contemporary portraiture. 

Blending the colour pigments on the actual picture enables me to achieve superb skin tones and I like to embrace the vast differences between light and shade.

Generally, all my pictures are original studies, I don’t go in for multiple versions and I plan each picture as the finished image, a one off, even down to the colours I use and the backing paper.

I rarely add detail to the background and prefer the portrait to stand out.  Hence the importance I give to the paper colour and the colour palette used.

I particularly like to paint the female form and many of my pictures are like posed fashion images.  My recent “women of colour” series is particularly successful in the pastel medium and highlights the beauty and ethereal charm of the model and the skin tones.

I produce pictures that I want to hang on my own wall.  I hope that you like them too.

The self portrait used for my Biography Profile image was part of my submission for Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year 2023.  

I do undertake commissions and in my own inimitable style.