"My work explores the shifting emotional and atmospheric landscapes of the Cornish coast, where sea, sky and land meet in a constant state of flux. These paintings are not direct representations of place, but responses to it, expressive interpretations shaped by memory, sensation, and the changing moods of light and weather. Drawing on the turbulence and luminosity of Turner, the sensitivity to light and atmosphere of Monet, and the meditative colour fields of Rothko, I seek to dissolve the boundary between observation and emotion. Layers of paint are built, obscured and reworked, echoing the way coastal weather rolls in and recedes, sometimes quietly, sometimes with force."
"The exhibition title, Behind Dark Clouds, reflects an underlying thread that runs through the work: the persistence of light beyond obscurity. The Cornish coastline, often marked by sudden storms and heavy skies, becomes a metaphor for human experience, periods of uncertainty, emotional weight and introspection that are nonetheless permeated by the possibility of clarity and renewal. I am drawn specifically to Cornwall's beaches and cliffs during storms, moments when the elements converge with heightened intensity. Wet sand becomes a mirror, holding fleeting reflections of the sky above: dark, heavy clouds fractured by sudden light. These reflective surfaces create a natural doubling, where the boundary between above and below dissolves, amplifying both drama and stillness. In these works, the beach becomes a site of quiet tension where movement and pause, depth and surface, are held in balance. Stormy sunsets play a central role in this new body of work, those brief, dramatic intervals when sunlight breaks through dense cloud, igniting the horizon with deep oranges, reds, and burning golds. These moments, reflected across the slick surface of the sand and sea, reveal light that feels both powerful and ephemeral. These paintings evoke a sense of place that is both external and internal: horizons blur, forms dissolve, and colour and mark making become the primary language through which feeling is conveyed. Dark tonalities are not endpoints but passages, spaces through which light emerges, however subtly.
At its core, this body of work is about resilience. It acknowledges difficulty without being defined by it. Like the landscape that inspires it, the work holds tension between darkness and illumination, suggesting that even within the most turbulent conditions, there remains an enduring presence of light."