Original artwork description:

Recently I have made a return to painting with oil on canvas after spending time working with collage and mixed media.

I painted 'Ash field' because I am interested in prehistory and the development of humankind. What was our earliest ancestry?
The footprints reference the tracks made by two individuals on a soft bed of clay which were shortly afterwards filled in by fine volcanic ash and lay undisturbed until they were unearthed 3.5 million years later. It is not impossible that those hands and those feet could have contained a blueprint for you and me.

My technique was simply the traditional application of oil paint onto canvas, two coats in the case of the upper half of the work, which I then sanded down to give a textured effect. I added the footprints by first standing in a tray of oil paint and then transferring to the canvas, then blotting the wet paint to get an impression. The painted circle could be seen as a moon or a sun or the curve of space time - or maybe just as a circle. The canvas is painted around the edges and ready to hang. 61x91x4cm

Materials used:

Oil paint on canvas

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