ICE AND WATER In early September, unprecedented rainfall left a third of Pakistan under water. The video clips of huge surges of brown water sweeping away bridges, houses and livelihoods demonstrated, again, that the climate emergency is happening right now and its...
If you’ve read my book The Clearing you’ll know I’m a big fan of the artist Agnes Martin. I’ve been thinking about her work and life a lot recently. When the world is falling to bits and it feels ridiculous to spend my time drawing pictures I remind myself of what...
Laura Drever is an Orcadian painter whose work grows out of her deep love of Orkney’s undulating landscapes and shifting light. Her paintings are steeped in engagement with this place and the experience of walking these particular landscapes. “Teebro” is the title of...
When I was a student at the Slade School of Art we used to make a weekly study visit to the print rooms in the basement of the British Museum. The Museum holds one of the world’s greatest collections of works on paper; about 50,000 drawings and more than...
I’m delighted to share with you an exploration of this and other questions with the artist Tania Kovats. I met Tania over 20 years ago when we were both on the same artist residency programme in Rome. Although our paths have only crossed once, and briefly at...
Paper, 84cm x 2200cm, 2013. This work on paper was created for an exhibition in Tasmania in 2013. ‘Felt Presence’ explored artists responses to the stories of female convicts transported to the penal colony of Van Diemens’ Land in the 19th...