Philosophy Underpinning Work

I am interested in the soul of things, and seek to encapsulate within my art the underlying living essence within all form and circumstance, giving voice to the unitive matrix of energy that infuses all life existence. My life has been informed at times by visions and clairsentient insight, the angelic and elemental world shaping my pathway; an innate sensitivity to the subtle worlds part of my everyday reality. Ongoing esoteric and mystical studies, along with my work in creation-based spiritual practice as an educator, celebrant, and transpersonal-therapist, have consolidated and affirmed this lived experience. This has long been underpinned by dedicated meditation and contemplative practices. My artwork therefore, is spiritual in nature, presenting a metaphysical world view.

I am drawn to the passages of birth, dying and rebirth, and to the inevitable eternality of life cycles, their movement, and propelling force. The complex patterns and textures within nature, the constant changing tones of climate and landscape of both the objective and subjective world, and all that resides within this elemental tapestry, influence and inspire my work. I am curious about the multi-layered realities, both gross and subtle, that interpenetrate, and impact the human experience, shaping and informing personal identity and the inner dimensions of the psyche. I endeavour to give expression to the myriad of life forms existent within the subjective worlds; to energetically articulate the significance of their existence and relationship to us as human beings. This involves the delicate and robust, the shadow and the darkness, the juxtaposed relationship to light, and the renewal of life on the evolutionary path. 

My images largely concern my interpretations and imagining of the Feminine Spirit; the She known within all world religions – and all indigenous cosmologies. The Feminine Spirit that ensouls all existence, that inhabits and interpenetrates all life. That births life, manifesting through nature, within all animate and inanimate form. This Divine Intelligence is sacred and divine. It is both gritty and dark; it is potent and is of light. It builds and it destroys. It concerns all that it is to be human, in its passions, strivings and behaviours. It is ultimately a fundamental Universal Presence, providing the evolutionary, embodying vehicle for all existence. Some of the images provide visual form to initiatory, evolutionary processes that we are all involved within which we may, or may not, be conscious; that we tread in ways particular to our person, our culture, the environment in which we live, and most essentially, to our soul’s impulse and our place upon the path. 

Painting in this way pulls deeply upon my psyche often disturbing my dreams, waking me in the small hours of the morning. It propels me to explore beyond the veils which exists between the worlds, to portray these ideas within two-dimensional, contemporary forms. Many people who view my art may know little if anything about the esoteric world, yet maybe intuitively drawn to an image, the image speaking to them on some level of perception. The viewer may not fully understand the work - I myself do not always understand the images that emerge. People make their own relationship with a work; create their own meaning, their own insights and aesthetic connections. This is rewarding for me as an artist. Very often the title of a painting emerges soon after beginning the work, indisputable, insistent. I may not always cognitively recognise the word but on research, discover it always provides a key to the core meaning of the work. And intuitively, it fits. When close to completion, it is as though I hear the work ‘sing,’ a silent resonance moving through the recesses of my mind, indicating the painting is reaching its final stage. It is a magical process. 

My works are invocational images. It is my hope that they reach out and have you experience, something of the existence of the more subjective realities of this world. Creativity is the cornerstone of all Life. The very nature or being of the Divine Spirit (whatever name you place to Universal Consciousness, to That we call God), is fundamentally creative: endlessly diverse, inclusive and unitive. And all art forms, I consider, a mere reflection, a shadow or filament, a reaching into the spectrum of dark and light, an attempt on behalf of the artist to encapsulate something of the profundity of the human condition, and the Mystery existent within the One Life of which we are an integral part and expression.