"Originally from the North East of England, I moved to the Highlands just over 15 years ago. Since doing my GCSE’s I haven’t really done a lot of art, I come from a very artistic family and despite their encouragement I felt somewhat scared of putting pencil to paper. It wasn’t until after lockdown, when I realised how insular I had become I decided to pick up one of the many “how to…” books my family had sent me. I wasn’t any more pleased with the flat, childlike results but what had changed was my loss of fear. I quickly realised that working on paper wasn’t for me and picked up my sewing machine. I’ve made up for a lot of lost time since then!
I take my inspiration from nature and have two main topics that I find myself returning to again and again - birds and lichen. When I moved up to the Highlands over 15 years ago I started to study birds and found myself feeling deeply connected to them. My love of lichen came from viewing things with a more artistic eye; it was like I had been walking around blind. I have come to see the absolute and spell binding beauty of lichen. I enjoy studying the subject matters and was delighted to be asked by the British Lichen Society to display my work at the Natural History Museum, not only that, but I got to attend the lectures too."