My Practice

“Exploring Structure”

Piet Mondrian wrote that the purest expression of the human mind is achieved through abstraction.

I agree with this, which is why I choose to work in the abstract. I do not depict the external world so much as investigate the frameworks through which we understand it. Structure, order and geography are recurrent themes, increasingly informed by Derridean concerns with deconstruction and the contingency of meaning, realised mainly through the motif of the “grid”.

Note that the Grid has been a common theme in modernist visual art practice since the early 1900’s, as it is the most logical way to decompose or articulate the two-dimensional picture surface, without compromising its essential dimensional characteristic of “flatness”.

I consider many of my pieces as windows onto a much larger world – which continues beyond the bounds of the picture frame, much as the “windows” we use on our computer screens. For this reason, my work is rarely symmetrical, reflecting the realities of the external world.

I work in the traditional disciplines of painting and drawing – mainly using acrylics or oil on canvas or paper. For drawing, I prefer Copic markers on paper, often prepared with a coloured ground. My process is quite straight-forward, relying on brushes and draughting tape.

My work varies in scale, ranging from A4 drawings up 180x120cm paintings.