Blue Hat

I've always been a portrait artist, both drawing and painting, and as such I aim to achieve a good likeness. I always try to get the essence of the person, going beyond what a photograph can catch. But I found my work was tighter than I liked it to be while painting, so I left the paint brush behind and started to paint with palette knives in my quest to paint more freely. I even left behind painting faces in my quest for freedom of expression by painting only abstracts for a while. But I found that I could not keep away from faces for long.
My latest paintings are of no-one in particular, and so I am totally free in the actual painting of them, as I am not focused on pursuing a likeness, just a feeling.
I originally trained in graphics and find this expressing itself in my paintings more and more recently - as I enjoy the design of the shapes, lines and colours, as well as the actual face. I'm still searching for absolute freedom in the relationship I have with paint, palette knife and myself - while creating satisfactory work, but that remains an ongoing quest.