'HIGH DAYS' - 27th May to the 11th June 2026
The year was possibly 1986, and the school holidays were about to begin. Six whole weeks of larking about in the Norfolk and Suffolk landscape, swimming and fishing in rivers, climbing majestic oak trees and stomping across mustard and corn fields, collecting and pressing wild flowers. The six weeks punctuated by the annual family holiday by the North Norfolk coast that offered up a different set of adventures. Boat trips, hiding in sand dunes and end of pier shows that, even then, were nostalgic.
Time passes... and forty odd years later a discovery of a flower press in my attic, brings it all back. Flowers, daisies, forget-me-nots, all survivors from the mid eighties. It is these that have inspired my latest collection of paintings that will go on show at the Osborne Studio Gallery. The same flowers are now incorporated into the surface of some of the oil paintings on display.
Without exception, each one of these paintings this time started on location. While some being finished back at my studio, others were made entirely in situ. It's important that these paintings were made this way and reminiscent of going out to play, and I'm still 'back in time for tea'.
This collection of paintings are all oil. Some are on canvas, whereas others incorporate reclaimed artefacts that I have collected from various boat yards, antique centres, derelict houses and so on. I have given up my old location painting box to house a piece of work, alongside my old fishing box, again from the 1980's. It seemed fitting enough!
I hope that you enjoy looking at these paintings and my hope is also that they bring on a lovely warm summer.
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I've been painting professionally for around thirty years. My subject and inspiration have always been British land and seascapes, and what goes on in those rural areas. I have over the years exhibited in international exhibitions, in Europe, Asia, North America and Australasia.
My paintings are essentially made on location and remain places that are very special to me. In order to paint these I need to have some form of connection to them. I try to capture the complexities and beauty of the changing seasons. As well as being on dry land, I also paint on trawlers.
I try to step back from the modern world, instead concentrating on a more traditional approach to painting and my environment. My small studio, an ex alms house, heated by open fires and limited technology makes it the ideal retreat to step back and concentrate on making my paintings.
