Artist Statement 2008

One of the most frustrating things I find in life is being told what to paint by people who claim they know best. Take my dentist for example, recently I went to him and he sighed saying 'I see you are still painting valleys'. Then he goes off into this elaborate preamble on what he thinks I should paint, using bright orange and yellows. Another individual, who has been a wonderful support to me over the years, has recently made me feel very uneasy over painting valleys. The effect was I stopped painting for several months. I tried my hand at painting other things, and was not happy with anything I did. I felt guilty painting what I wanted to paint. Then I thought maybe I was being too sensitive. So I asked the doctor if she had a cure for me being so sensitive and she told me to keep doing what I do. I wish people would lay off telling me what to paint and let me do what I want. I paint what comes out of my soul, my mind, I never paint from photographs (unless it is a commission and I have to get details correct) and I never ever paint in front of the scenery. I paint solely from what is in my mind and I rarely know what I am going to paint before I approach the canvas. So please, you people who think you are trying to help me, back off and leave me to do as I please.

My paintings come straight out of my mind onto the canvas, and I paint fast. My oils take 30 minutes or less to do. I need to feel that energy pouring out of me through my veins down through my brushes to come alive on the canvas. If my oils take longer than 30 minutes then they usually become boring pretty scenes. I have never liked pretty scenes, neither as a painter or as a photographer. It has to be dramatic, punchy, all in the moment.

I live beside the sea, live and breathe it. The moods, sunlight breaking through for a fleeting moment. I rarely think about what I am going to paint before I approach a canvas. All my favourite paintings are spur of the moment happenings that develop on ther canvas as I paint. I need this freedom to fully express myself. I never go out into the field and set myself up to paint a specific scene, everything I do is from memory which enables me total movement in any direction the painting decides to take me and then they become my own work.

My childhood was largely spent here in West Cork during the Sixties. I absorbed the life and images became embedded in my mind. People like the sadly missed Dan Murphy, the harbour master, who cared for the boats. Each Winter he would tar my mother's boat to protect it against the elements. I well remember listening to him. One of the things he was once heard to say to the local fishermen was 'go after the fish before they die of old age'. Dan smoked a pipe and often soon after puffing it a few times he would tuck it away under the peak of his cap. I suppose as a child I wondered if his hair would ever catch fire!
Through my paintings I want you to absorb my love for the slow time that Ireland is famous for, when people stopped to chat. There was always the smell of turf burning in the villages, that gorgeous aroma that made you know you were home. Listen to tales to pass away the long Winter nights before television took over. A time when there was never any hurry to get anywhere.
When men rowed their boats out to sea, with sticks inserted in the boat sides before rowlocks came into being. Catching mackerel on a line of coloured feathers, risking all to go after the wild salmon in the moonlight. Cutting the turf, sadly now a rare sight. When a horse and cart was frequently used, to take the churn to the creamery stand at dawn, bring home the turf and hay which was always heaped on the cart, secured with a sack and ropes. Even the villages are becoming victims, as holiday home housing estates are being built in them or on their outskirts. I am just so glad I saw Ireland before all this modernisation took over and can recall it here in my oils.
Lanes, paths and streams feature strongly in my paintings for they take you in to the worlds I want you to see. Up to the traditional farmhouses tucked away in the valleys, sheltered from the storms and outside world
I hope you enjoy visiting my view of Ireland