Why I keep a journal
It's early morning, the light only just coming up outside. I'm sitting in the kitchen in my robe, still half asleep. The whole house is asleep, and so is the whole island around me. This is the quiet I'm writing my first entry in – and honestly, it's one of my favourite moments, when I have myself to myself.
I express myself in two ways. Painting is for when there's something to feel and live through as sensation. Writing is for when there's something to say and put into words. The paintings already live on the site, this journal is the other half – the place where you see not just the images, but the person thinking behind them. It matters to me that anyone who wanders in understands this isn't just pretty pictures.
For years I've worked with structure – discipline, order, seeing a thing through to something solid. And alongside that there's painting, where everything rests on feeling and rhythm. I don't choose between them; there's room in me for both. One makes me more focused, the other more alive, and they don't get in each other's way – they feed each other. I'm at ease in that balance.
Right now I'm in a particular phase. For a long time I painted quietly, barely showing up online, and now I'm becoming visible again and working out afresh what's going on out there. In painting I'm in a stage of experiment: looking for a steadier hand, because the old one stopped speaking to me at some point. In drawing, everything settled into place long ago; in painting I'm still searching. So part of this journal will be written from inside that search, not by someone who's already figured it all out. I like that right now I get to try. I just want to do my own work.
What I'll write about here: myself and my work, and thoughts on all kinds of things, creativity among them. What won't be here: lists like "ten tips" – not my thing. If the blog has a goal, it's trust – so that someone can see the side of me that, beyond the paintings, can think and speak.
Outside it's still quiet; the island hasn't woken up. I love this time – early, before everyone, alone with myself.
