Stolen Time 64

Stolen Time relates to many things: the lockdown as well as the gift of time, as the whole world was forced to pause. The pandemic itself was and still is stealing its way through humanity, person by person. Some it passed through quickly, some it killed and some it has left very ill indeed – time taken, life shortened. But there was an upside to this time in the focused privacy and the haven which the studio became. Painting itself is a bringing down; creating, one throws oneself forward into the future, away from habit and conditioning. There is an ecstasy to this series, a sense of drama and otherworldly visits – uncanny and essential.

I experienced these paintings like visitors - their presence was there with me rolling in like the rhythms of a great tide.

This is a small piece, acrylic on mdf panel. Again I tried to make a painting which had a certain courageous aspect of light holding its own in the darkness. Working on a firm substrate, as opposed to canvas, allows one to be more controlled as one builds intense colour, layer and texture. The structure of the painting is created through the body of the paint, and not through the weave and spring of the canvas.

Image credit: Richard Heys