Speechless

I have written regularly over the last few weeks but I have been unable to share it publicly. These times are incredibly difficult to speak about and I know for sure that it is not my place to write officially on such extreme matters. My voice has always been through my artwork and the tension and turbulence in many of my paintings echoes much of the pain in both the world and in my heart. My voice may be a somewhat silent one yet it is still there. I do not wish my silence to be construed as complacency and I am aware that hardly anyone reads my blog anyway!

Since submitting my portfolio and dissertation, I have stated painting again in various ways. As Covid-19 has meant I have been unable to find work, I have been able to continue working on my art and have started painting a few oil paintings which will likely not be finished for some weeks at least. I had originally decided not to paint until I move at the end of the month however, I had begun to feel rather restless and my mind had started deteriorating. It would seem that I am totally addicted to painting. Along side my oil painting I have spent a lot of time preparing prints on canvas for my shop page on my website. After all the time and money I have spent on pursuing art, it is good to start making some money for the fruit of my labours. 

Due to Covid-19 I have decided not to contact any galleries with the hope of them exhibiting my work. It is not easy also as most of my work from this term is locked in my university studio and there is no way of knowing when I will be able to access it! I am now focussing on producing a body of work that I might be able to exhibit when this pandemic has subsided enough for large gatherings of people to safely attend art galleries. My make-shift home studio arrangement that I share with my fiancé Dot is very limited for space. I have therefore been forced to work on smaller images. Near the beginning of lockdown I purchased a number of small laser-cut MDF squares to paint on. Just before the lockdown I took a number of macro photos of my paintings, each image covering only about 1cm of the images. The level of detail I had achieved on my degree show paintings inspired me to try painting on that tiny scale. So my MDF boards measure between 1x1cm and 5x5cm. I look forward to seeing the outcome sometime in the next few weeks!