Green

All of the best photos of me have been of my back. There is one that was entitled by the photographer 'the state of the nation' because that was what we were almost certainly talking about. The two distant figures walking away from the camera are an important part of the picture, but the dominant theme is the green. It was high summer, the braken was chest high and the nettles even higher; the leaves were full and even the light was green. The only exception was the river, flowing fast and very, very cold, just beneath us. Even in July it was not a place to swim, not even for me.

I paint what is around me, the light and the form, yet whenever I start to paint a green stole a part of my mind and memory returns to that valley on that day.

Within the church year green is the colour of growth and development, of change and stability. It is organic and creative.

And so I return to the valley.