Location: Italy
I’ve been painting and drawing all my life and studied glass design and art history at the now sadly defunct Stourbridge College of Art in the West Midlands, UK.
Initially I ran a stained glass studio in South Wales but now make a living painting, writing and teaching in central Italy and surprise to say I am a happier man for it (on a good day).
While never using it as an excuse, I am blind in one eye and colour blind, as well as being left handed. This is not mentioned for any other reason than to explain the deliberately strange perspectives and occasionally mis-placed colours as I show the world as I often see it.
The work draws on the landscapes of the Late Byzantine and early Renaissance painters and uses their discoveries in perspective and colour as a way of exploring current themes. I’m lucky to live in the back garden where many great masters worked and this provides constant inspiration to my own endeavours.
Read more at http;//umbriartgallery.wordpress.com
This project mainly concentrates on the hill towns that populate the Italian province of Umbria. A forested, verdant part of the world covered in hills and mountains. On top of many of these outcrops are towns, villages, monestaries and castles all giving the landscape a magical feel. The fact that the area is a central feature of the Renaissance artists such as Perugino, Raffaello, Pinturicchio adds to the regions charm. In churches and museums throughout you can find examples of the grand masters works and it is this that drives my own painting.
70 x 32 cm. Watercolour and ink on paper
The Valtiberina stretches from Monte Santa Maria Tiberina, following a winding, circuitous route past Lippiano to the fortified towns of Monterchi and Citerna. High up the valley it is all woodland but as you get nearer its mouth there are increasing crops of sunflowers, corn and tobacco and you can also pick out olive groves and grape vines.
70 x 32 cm Watercolour and ink on paper
Monte Corona, just outside Umbertide in Umbria, from a distance, is a large, green, tree covered mountain. Once you get close you realise just how much it is made up of little hills, fascinating mini landscapes of oak clusters, olive groves and shaped pine trees. Potted throughout this landscape are the houses, villas, churches and village of Santa Giuliana.
“Umbertide on the Tiber”
“Citta di Castello”
“Fabbrecce and Canoscio”
“St Francis' Hermitage at La Verna”
“Montone on the Hill”
“Assisi”
“Border town, Lippiano”
“The Gates of Spello”
“Hill town of Trevi”
“Monte Santa Maria Tiberina”
“Positano by the Sea”
“Giro Down the Valtiberina”
“Journey to Sanctuary”
