Five Bird Farm (detail)

Five bird farm, detail, watercolour

Five Bird Farm

This is a farm atop the cliff down the road from me. I love the sense of perspective you get looking across fields - a real sense of depth. It's very like waves, I think, on the sea.

Five bird farm, watercolour

On Crow's Wings

On Crow's Wings, watercolour

Originally this started out as a landscape idea, but sitting drawing in the dunes I became fascinted by the crows. Then I knew what it was really about.

Fishing boat at Old Saltburn

Fishing boat at old Saltburn, watercolour

A Collection of Dog Portraits

Over the past few months I've been commissioned to draw portraits of people's dogs. I thought I'd post a few on here. It's something I take seriously. For me, my work has to be a marriage of the physical and the spiritual (a deeply unfashionable notion in some circles on both counts): it is about recording the physical with accuracy and intelligence but also about recording more than that; a living being's response to another, I suppose, and the complexity of empathetic understanding that entails. I like to spend time to get to know my subject (whatever it is); a response that functions on a physical level only - merely 'looks like' - isn't enough.

I particularly enjoyed drawing Zac. He was an old dog and a lovely chap.

Zac, graphite

Mollie, graphite

Alfie, graphite

Luna, graphite

Inca, graphite

Esmerelda, graphite