signature moves…
A Collage of Mark-Making
“Go outside and paint something from life. Don’t think too hard...just respond. Let go and let your marks fly. These marks will be your own unique marks...personal to you. Embrace them.”
Embracing what’s happening on the paper is a large part of my process. After experimenting with composition and colour palette, the initial washes and marks are so important. To be honest, I have been known to throw away a piece of paper (or at the least, add it to my collage pile) if I didn’t like the very first brush mark…
My work is extremely intuitive; if the initial marks don’t resonate with me, no matter how much I fiddle, ten to one, I won’t ever like it!
Yes, I look at and admire others’ work; the way they make marks, the washes etc. But, much as I think, ooh ‘that’s interesting, I wish I could do that’, in reality, I know I wouldn’t ‘do’ that because then the work wouldn’t be mine… It wouldn’t have my signature moves… After all, they’re what makes the work uniquely mine!! So embrace your marks, the way you move the pencil, or brush or pen…. Create art the way that only you can, create the way that makes your heart sing!
“The one thing that you have that nobody else has is you. Your voice, your mind, your story, your vision. So write and draw and build and play and dance and live as only you can.”