Friday 26th December
2025 has been a year of returning, reassessing, and re-energising my practice whilst juggling home life, dog walks, family and loss. Much of my focus has circled back to the landscapes that shaped me, especially the Lakeland fells, the coastline of Northumberland and the landscapes and seascapes of Scotland, but with a renewed sense of purpose. The new Lakeland paintings I’ve been working on this year and the other work for Galleries, are not simply depictions of place; they are meditations on space, solitude, and emotional weather. They reflect the quiet moments between visitors, the shifting light before a storm, and the stillness you only notice when your mind finally stops racing, a moment in time based on memory and experience.
I’ve spent this year juggling commissions, gallery commitments, and my own need to explore. Selling work through galleries, commissions and events like “Art in the Garden” remains vital, but so does the freedom to experiment, to loosen the brushwork, push colour further, or shift a landscape into something half-real, half-imagined. Holding those pressures and possibilities in balance is the daily challenge of being a working artist.
Trips to the Lakes, Scarborough and the brief escape to Anglesey reminded me how essential it is to refill the well. Travel, friendship, and the generosity of the people around me continue to shape the art as much as the views themselves. And as the art world grows noisier, with debates about value, originality, and authenticity, my instinct is to go quieter, deeper. To paint honestly, rather than cleverly.
This year, I’ve thought a lot about why I make art. The truth is simple: painting is the way I stay connected, to landscape, to memory, to the people who follow and collect my work, and to the part of myself that still feels wonder when colour hits paper or canvas in just the right way. I paint because it’s how I make sense of things. And because, even after all these years, there is still more to say.
As I move into 2026, I hope to keep building on this year’s energy: larger work, more texture, more work in oils, more space for imagination. A clearer voice, a bolder hand. Whatever comes next, I want the work to feel alive — rooted in the real world, but always reaching beyond it. I’m not decrepit yet but as I get older I begin to feel the pressures of age and realise that my painting life will be finite. I need to make the most of the time. I can’t wait for 2026.
Happy Christmas and New Year to all my readers and anyone who has purchased from me this year Let’s hope 2026 is a peaceful and successful one.