The Hunter, 2024

This painting started with a drawing from a model. That’s usually how I work. I draw someone first and then, afterwards, I see if the pose connects to something I’ve been reading or thinking about. In this case, the connection came after the drawing.

The model I was working with had a slightly nervous energy. They’ve posed many times before, so it wasn’t inexperience, but they would shuffle, adjust themselves, and never really settle. I actually like that. They’re very expressive, and that movement gives the body a kind of tension.

When I started redrawing the figure in paint, the pose reminded me of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, particularly Simon Armitage’s translation, which I had been reading at the time. I kept thinking about the section in the castle, especially the kissing game and the way the hunt runs alongside those scenes. The link wasn’t intentional at the beginning. It just started to feel familiar as I worked.

Around the figure, I was beginning to look more at medieval decoration and framing. The patterns, flowers and stylised landscape come from that interest. This was a point where I was allowing those references to become more visible in the paintings.

At the same time, I had seen exhibitions by Emii Alrai and Georg Wilson that were also engaging with the idea of the hunt, although in very different ways. Those shows were in my mind somewhere while I was working, even if they weren’t direct references.

The poem itself feels strange and slightly psychedelic, but also romantic and awkward. Something about that tone felt close to the pose. So the painting ended up circling ideas of love, pursuit, unease and playfulness. I wasn’t trying to illustrate the story. It was more that parts of it stayed with me while I was painting.