I came late to jewellery making and I am self-taught. After spending most of the 60’s till early 70’s as a seaman in the Merchant Navy, I was determined, with the money I had saved, to paint. Visits to St Ives, Cornwell where artists like Alfred Wallis, Ben Nicholson, Roger Hilton, Bob Law, Breon O’Casey and Bryan Illsley, have lived and influenced my thinking. Abstraction, with a leaning towards simplified figuration, where birds, boats and sea are not far away. In my work, jewellery methods are simple, scraps of gold or silver are melted and beaten out; stones are cut and ground.

“I love the workability and colour of gold and silver and prefer to use semi-precious stones that I often rough-cut myself. My methods are simple, forging and shaping and often the work has surface textures and marks. I am influenced by the Minoan, Cycladic and Celtic cultures as well as the modern artists, Brancusi, Picasso, Giacometti and Marini.” 

Boat series

‘Although no longer at sea, I carry it with me to the shed in the garden where I make and paint my boats.  I have some Alfred Wallis postcards on the wall, a lighthouse from Sete and bits of driftwood and pebbles from Kakanui where we have a bach.
I was a seaman in the British Merchant Navy as a boy from '63 - '72 and was determined to paint when I came ashore in 1972.  I have painted ever since and the last 12 years I have been painting ships on tin.’