Reality is incomprehensible.
So we live through Symbolic Reality
Remember Symbolic Reality is always moving and changing - whereas the Reality it symbolises never changes.
Art is the illusion by which we understand reality
Cecil Colins
Representation; Exhibitions Gallery Wellington
Beginnings.
I was born in the English Lake District, a place of mists, lakes, mountains, Druidic Groves, absolutely gorgeous light and rain; lots of rain. I've never particularly liked sunny days even now.
In the 60's my parents moved to London for better work opportunities. Both were artists, my mother graduating from Leeds and my father self taught in theatre. It was some time before I too, succumbed to what my father described as the contagious disease of life.
Below - Childhood in 1950's. The English Lake District. Windermere.
My father became a scenic artist at the BBC before going freelance mainly at Shepperton Studios and then an Art Director. Once he was arrested as a suspected communist spy for sketching a police box for the Tardis in the debut of Doctor Who, later I managed to crash one.
Meanwhile, my first career as a scientist in the Meteorological Office looking into the high atmosphere.
During the 1970's, Shepperton saw the emergence of a new wave of directors like Ridley and Tony Scott, Hugh Hudson, Lester Bookbinder and Howard Guard. It was home for commercials like Cadbury's Smash Martians, P G Tips Chimpanzees, Heineken, Frys Turkish Delight, along with the films like the River Queen, Elephant Man, Alien, Superman and Flash Gordon. The Who leased the Old House and stored their road gear in "I" Stage. They also frequented Shepperton Recording Studios, along with The Who, Moody Blues and Genesis. In hindsight, it was an incredibly exciting time with every commercial trying to break new ground and creating trends. These days we seem to follow them.
Not sure who this is. Turned up one day for a music promo and didn't want a set, just a white cyc.
Some weekends I went to the studios drawn by the music from the recording studios visiting my parents working on the sets. I started helping out, washing brushes, leaning how to box colours and best of all helping Steve Symonds, a brilliant sculpture, I really enjoyed sculpting. You can see his work on A Company of Wolves, the whole forest! It all changed when I was invited to a Friday barbeque. I was struck seeing everyone valued, paid well and striving to create the best. The sum being greater than the parts. On Monday I resigned and started my new job starting sweeping stage floors "the Shepperton Shuffle". In hindsight it was the halcyon days. I learned it's not the idea, but fidelity to the idea that matters and quality is the first casualty in the hands of the inexperienced.
I've been sailing since 11 when my father built a small Mermaid dinghy sailing on the South Coast and a myriad of ponds, rivers and estuaries that make sailing such a wonderful, and sometimes exasperating experience. Sailing encourages striving for difficult goals, learning from failure and key to development since most of our learning is through experiences. After a failed Olympic campaign I took up windsurfing and loved it, it was like skiing and motorcycling all in one. Later I was privileged to coach sailors on two campaigns, giving something back to the sport. These days I now realise the victory of defeat is prefered to the truth of victory. An insight belatedly provided by Cecil Collins.
Like sailing, motorcycling has been a passion since the mid 70's and I ride now. It does wonders for the mind and after riding I feel mentally invigorated. Back in the 80's the biz dropped off so I took up dispatch riding. The film biz can be tough but DRing was on a whole new level and one hell of an experience.
In 1990 I came to New Zealand with my then New Zealand wife and young child continuing in film and theater. One of many highlights was designing a series of successful operas for the German opera director Bernd Benthaak. Our first meeting didn't go well for either of us, but we resolved a major design issue becoming a solid partnership. His great depth of experience across all the great Opera Houses was a joy to behold.
Advances in digital cameras along with lower entry costs opened up new opportunities so I moved into photography and video.
First video and instigator of so many adventures.
The most recent video filmed in Stewart BC 2024
In 2023 painting for myself became a renewed focus, the highs and lows of scenic painting now suitably distant.
In September 2023 I attended a masterclass by Sir Graham Sydney, one of New Zealand's foremost living artists. We had to submit a few works either finished or unfinished, I only just managed to complete one the day before with severe doubts showing it. He went straight to the finished work and making a brief comment, changed my life.
I admire 19th Century poets and philosophers for their elegance and insight during rapidly developing times.
The likes of Baudelaire, Hugo, Diderot, Shelly, Swinburne, Gautier, Dickenson and Keats are constant inspirers.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, one of the Lake Poets inspired a new format of poetry.
This insight often drives my work.
"And when I woke it rained
And was the blessed ghost
It was not dark
It was not light
glorious night thou wert not made for slumber"