I always have a vague image in my mind when approaching a blank, primed canvas. The image has no clarity and the colour hues alternate, akin to a vaguely remembered dream or memory. So, I start with the desire to make tangible this intangible, authoritative image. As I mix the pigments and arrange them on the canvas via a process of intuitive decisions, there is always an element of surprise; it's never what I expect and hardly ever resembles the image in my mind. As I progress, the image in my mind disseminates, and instead, the image on the canvas becomes the authoritative source of inspiration.

I contemplate each move carefully, trying to anticipate the final outcome (which can never be fully predicted). The painting is complete when I can no longer contemplate a next move, which would enhance the entirety of the work, rather than damage the work as a whole. This is the integral final decision, to resist the false temptation to continue, and intuitively know the painting is complete.

There is an ambiguous nature to the images in my paintings; an avoidance of recognisable object, space and time. Although the indistinct forms are a solid surface i.e., a two-dimensional object, I attempt to make them appear to dematerialise into space and atmosphere. The paint being worked in, with minimum quantities but with laborious scumbling technique, so that the nub of the canvas can still be seen and felt. The scumbled layer applied thinly, with a touch of titanium white to make it semi-opaque, creates a delicate 'veil' of colour which partially obscures the underlying colour, adding a sense of depth. There is, also, an unintentional architectural element (an inherited influence) which can imply space even as it denotes form, and form as it denotes space, just as the solid dripped on lines of some of works create a sense of two spaces; one behind or within another. The solid lines stand proud of the surface (1:1 part pigment, part PVA) adding a textural component which interplays with the non-textual painterly effects.