Artist's Statement

           Why do I paint? Because it is as essential to me as breathing and I wouldn't survive without it.

           Painting is a way of connecting to an inner world - a world that is full of colour and light and holds a reservoir of a lifetime's worth of memorable impressions and experiences based in nature. Painting is an essential outlet for expressing these images and combining them with the beauty I see all around me, be that at the beach, in the forest or when walking past the lush gardens of our neighborhoods.

          Over the years my paintings have become increasingly more abstract and are now almost completely so because I feel, that this is the way that I can best express my feelings for the beauty I see without being distracted by a traditional subject matter. And for me the essence of nature really is abstract in its jumble of colours, textures, and patterns - and the way the light plays on these. The process of painting can then become an intuitive and exciting exploration and dialog with the canvas, the colours, the textures, and myself, where one part of the painting will speak to the others as well as telling me what is needed next.

           This way it becomes a synthesis of these stored memories and all the details and moods observed during my long daily walks and instances of quiet contemplation and restoration.

           It is a slow process with many changes, detours and layers and the painting has not found its final form until I feel, that a certain balance and emotion expresses some of my love of colour and nature - until it rests in itself.