I graduated in 1990 then did two years post grad specialising in painting and sculpture, my sculptures were awful and dangerous so I stuck to painting.

Then I was off hitch-hiking around Europe, trekking in South America and having a ball in South East Asia. I met so many exciting artists and learnt much. Lo Angel a painter, contemporary and friend of Andy Warhol in Cusco, let me help in his studio and told me tales of life in the Factory, an artist and architect in France took me to see carved troglodyte caves and showed me Picasso sketches he’d received in lieu of payment for a barn conversion- he kept them in a paper tube… I even tried traditional taxidermy methods with artisans on the floating reed villages of Lake Titicaca but was so ill afterwards, that I decided to stick with just painting.

I have worked in lots of galleries around the country, honing skills in picture framing, marketing, events management and buying, but my favourite was Spectrum Gallery in Machynlleth working for artists Paul Martinez Frias and Pam Taylor, these really were golden days and I learnt so much including how to swear in Spanish, but not a decent grasp of Welsh, still learning – dipyn bach….

In 2007 I moved to Richmond and with Arts Council funding set up my business The Pop-Up Gallery. It ran from 2010-2018 taking artists, workshops and creative happenings to isolated areas of The Dales, running networking sessions, organising collaborations, project managing Art Festivals, Veterans’ Art Challenges, Art Trails and even a pop-up Sculpture Park, some more successful than others but all great fun.

In 2014 I realised that I wasn’t painting as much as I wanted so switched direction and shared a gallery space for a year in Ripon where I developed my ‘barn series’ in direct response to the change in planning laws of the local ‘Cow ‘husses’- cow houses the stone barns of the Yorkshire Dales. My intention was to paint a barn in every Dale, this is ongoing there are hundreds of Dales that I didn’t know about.

2016 saw another venture into Community Arts when as one of the Artists in Residence for North Yorkshire County Libraries, I revisited my time at a Veteran’s homeless unit and worked again at Older People’s housing units. Alongside actress and writer Irene Lofthouse we explored themes of identity and social history, producing modern day ‘icons’ celebrating the residents’ histories and stories.

In 2018 my long suffering other half Dave announced that I could have the veg plot to build a ‘proper studio,’and get out of his hair. It is now established and a great space. I am still working on those barns but now developing a new range – ‘Owd Lasses celebrating the glamour pusses of yesteryear as they live out their dotage, making sense of Modern Britain, silent-tutting at the youth of today, donning wrinkly stockings and reminiscing about their misspent youth behind the bike shed. Beware inspiration strikes in the most unlikely of places so one of these feisty, ‘old dears’ could be based on you….