The focus of this display of work is recent ‘lockdown’ paintings: views from and around my house, looking at the textures and colours of brick, stone, earth, foliage and so on.
The current situation has led me to return to the solid matter of real things – walls, houses, roofs, gardens – the environment around my fixed ‘self-isolated’ point.
Given so much time to set my imagination free, I have found it has deserted me – for the time being I trust. So I have resorted to what a tutor of mine (Anwar Schemza) said many years ago that he did in such a case: he shut himself up in his house and drew everything as objectively and laboriously as possible, from the attic down to the basement.
In the glorious weather we had in April – July, I preferred to look from my window, or the garden gate, over the garden wall, or down the back lane. The result is not necessarily the recognizable face of Bethesda. Having more space to exhibit than I first realized, I have added some earlier works of a similar nature, but straying out into the wider landscape as well (where I have been able to relieve some stress on daily walks) – and I have included some etchings already seen recently on these walls that occupied me from January to March.