Why do I paint?

I have always wanted to be an artist, but it is only recently that I have really delved in to why.

When I was an art student in Croydon, South London, I was creating paintings that were about how too many people in society were more interested in themselves and their appearances, whilst the natural world was being destroyed. The paintings were dark, ugly and made viewers cringe but it was a way of telling others how I felt.

A few years on, whilst studying for a fine art degree at Nottingham, I ditched the dark colours, using a lighter palette of creams and hazy browns, but I was still trying to tell the viewer about my feelings concerning the environment.

I have never wanted to create a painting that is a direct depiction of a scene. I create to express my feelings and I want the viewer to be moved too.

Unfortunately my path as a professional artist took a detour, as I became a primary teacher, just painting whenever I had time.

But it was in those times that I realized how I needed to create. It was a release of something inside of me that was stifled. For all those years when my creativity took a back seat, I was living a life that I, and others, thought I should have… having a proper job with a regular wage where I could pay the bills, living in a detached house in a very nice area, having a child and a husband. And I became depressed. I had been pressed down into a place that I didn’t want to be or become.

I wasn’t living my own authentic life.

So, I created a space in a tiny room that could just about fit a table and an easel, but in which was a dedicated place where I could go and paint and I tried to find my way back to who I wanted to be again.

  It took a good few years. I had a rusty technique. I had forgotten everything about composition, colour balances, tonal values etc. and it took a while to find my unique style.

 I was still very much influenced by the environment, but as I was now living in the west of Scotland, I was in awe of the landscape around me.

The huge mountains that I enjoyed walking up, taking in the views from on top of, or of the vast lochs as well as the huge moody ever changing skies. I was exhilarated and needed to tell the world how incredible this landscape was!

However, it wasn’t until February 2022 that a dramatic change happened, both mentally and creatively thanks to the British artist Louise Fletcher and then the American Nicholas Wilton. They were both advocating that I could paint from the soul. To really look inward and notice what moved me both in the landscape that I loved as well as when I was painting in the studio.

For the first time I was making decisions about my art work that were about what I loved, not what I thought others would like, or what would sell.

I was finally in charge!

I wasn’t constrained by pleasing others. I was free. My creativity finally found me…. The real me that had been suppressed. And I have never been happier, nor has my mental health been so calm and contented.

So that’s why I paint, to feel great! To be authentic and live the life where I get to make the decisions of what I like or don’t like and in doing so I have found joy. Isn’t that a wonderful reason to paint? I urge you to try it, be creative in any way that you can and live more authentically!