Painting on mass produced, printed, usually photographic images is fundamental to my practice. Taking what already exists as my starting point, I then appropriate the image by painting directly on top of it to reinvent it.

The printed surface is usually glossy, a perfect even finish, but the paint disrupts this surface, leaving only a shadow of what was previously there. By carefully obliterating areas of the original printed image, I zoom in on key elements, directing the attention of the viewer to areas I find compelling, and in doing so, a new narrative evolves.

For example, Two Moons from 2011, is a reworking of an Elliot Erwitt photograph of an elderly couple at a nudist camp. When viewing his original photograph, the viewer’s eye is drawn to the bottoms of his subjects, and so was I! In highlighting my chosen elements, however, I not only paint out areas of the image, and reinvent what was concealed in the original, but in doing so, I am excited by the playful connections that I can make – a rock wall for example begins to morph into additional bottoms, inserted clouds are painted as charicatures of clouds, which suggest stylised tree-tops, or displaced fig leaves.

I originally started working on Old Masters, which were such iconic panitings, that the viewer inevitably brought a knowledge of the original when viewing my version. The latest works however are not so well known and therefore I feel more free to experiment to a greater extent. I have found myself drawn to earlier photography because of its inventiveness and originality of capturing a new world. By working in black and white or a limited palette similarly allows me to be more inventive with how I rework the image.

Please refer to my blog to see some of the original images I have used and my investigation in to appropriation art.