ORIENTATION

Updated from 1st June 2016

I was recently between projects, and decided to do some quick postcard-sized pieces. There's something very satisfying when you can do several pieces of art over a couple of days, as opposed to take months over a single piece.

I've always loved the beauty and simplicity of classical Japanese illustration. It's amazing how the art can look incredibly contemporary to our modern eyes, when in fact some of it is five hundred years old.

What's strange, is that the smallness of each panel kept prompting my mind to think up a linking narrative, as if they were shots from a movie storyboard, or panels in a graphic novel. I never did come up with a story.

Medium: Graphite Pencil on Watercolour Postcard

Below: Extreme Closeup, showing surface texture

POLITICAL ABSTRACTION

'OUT' Digital Drawing, 24 June, 2016

DISTURBANCES IN THE MATRIX

Please tell me this cannot happen.

BREXIT WOUND

FRIED BREXIT

Up all night watching the Brexit results with growing incredulity, and then resignation. Now it's time for breakfast!

IN-INGS

SOUND AND VISION: GETTING INSPIRED

If you've seen my Twitter feed, you'll probably notice that I spend more time talking about music than I do about my own art. That's because, like a lot of creatives who work in a solitary environment, music is part of what inspires us and therefore somehow finds its way into what we actually produce.

A lot of abstract art is musical, and if you do abstraction for long enough, you might start to experience some form of synaesthesia, where a sound will trigger a sensation, and prompt you to use a certain colour or brush stroke. Kandinsky was a good example of a 'musical' painter, an artist who translates something intangible into imagery.

So of course, visiting a niche vinyl emporium, you get the best of both worlds. Effectively its an exhibition that's carefully curated; the cover art plus the music conveys the tastes and sensibilities of the owner. These non-generic stores are a very rare delight, and if you are a music enthusiast and have one in your town you should not only be a patron, you should let other people know about them - because they keep your town's musical heritage and culture alive.

Thanks to Nathan at Birmingham's Milque & Muhle.