Blue Lotus

Legendary London life model Barrie, sadly no longer with us, appears in this painting, whose start point was a drawing from 2018.

This painting’s protagonist, Poseidon, was widely credited with the creation of the horse, but Rhea claimed she first spat a foal into existence and fed it to Kronos to fool him into thinking he was eating one of her offspring. Poseidon’s claim of the invention of horse racing, however, is not disputed.

Loosely inspired by imagery from a passage in Greek myth where an island of people is wiped out before they are repopulated in numbers after a plea to Zeus, with the transformation of ants as they fell from a tree.

Informed by the inversion of a life drawing to give the appearance of a half-bird, half-man creature with wings spread.
Inspired by traditional North American art, the Phoenix rising, and the pull of an Egyptian sun.

Another in the Harvest series recalling memories of nature, the inevitable cycle of growth and death, and endless toil on the land.

The last and largest piece completed for Blue Lotus, this painting is all about creation and downfall. It is meant to be read anti-clockwise from the eggs in the hand at the bottom of the composition, through self-realisation/corruption, deification and ego, before finishing with the tarot figures being taken to the next world by the dolphins.
Tangata manu (Bird-man) is the winner of a traditional competition by the inhabitants of Rapa Nui (Easter Island), where competitors would swim out to a nearby island to retrieve the first sooty tern’s eggs of the season. The winner was the first one back with the eggs in tact, who would be crowned bird-man. The figure in the painting is my version of the cult’s deity, Make-Make. In its hand is held a nest of eggs and a chick, a copy of a wood and ivory sculpture which was found in King Tutankhamun’s tomb.

Large scale oil and ink painting.

Preserver of life in the form of boats, and vessel for which to take the body to the next life, as casket back into the soil.