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I was busy with my studio / gallery space I have in Stockbridge Edinburgh and planning for future exhibitions, travelling more around the world and exploring my love for Scotland too.

Then in  2020 a time of rapid change, Covid came along and to me, time slowed down.

 

 

After a few weeks I found myself in a place where I could allow myself to have precious studio time. Time to experiment and try things I have been wanting to paint for months but something else, well life, would get in the way.  I knew I wanted to approach this work a little differently to my normal method of painting so I began painting these landscapes I had in my memory onto paper. I painted a dozen  or so and then started working from ideas I had liked on the paper directly onto the glass. 

 

Lockdown gave me time to learn the art of letting go and trusting my intuition to delve into techniques and the freedom to express my thoughts and ideas through experimentation. The Time Slows Down paintings grew out of this precious time I had and from start to finish became an all encompassing constant throughout the work.

 

I always initially work from memories and I try to capture that feeling I had when I experienced that landscape.  I am always  finding ways to incorporate that into my art so the viewer can  hopefully share the same or some element of the same experience. With these new paintings I was editing down to hone into the  beautiful rawness of the textures and atmosphere of these  moody landscapes.

 

I frame most of my work in the conventional way but with these new pieces throughout lockdown I wanted to find another way to express the paintings in a more abstract, infinite way to associate them with a sense of freedom and infinite possibilities, no borders and an ease of  timelessness. Working directly onto cradled plywood boards I found the ideal surface to incorporate my paintings and add other layers of painted wooden panels to extend the possibilities of the landscape to the mind of the viewer.

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Tommy.