Biography

1982

Early Years

I have had a passion for the arts from a very young age. As with most kids in the UK, wax crayons were a personal favourite, before graduating to felt-tip pens than seeped through the pages of cheap colouring books.

1982

1994

Secondary Education

My interest in art developed further thanks to Mrs. Clarke, at the Royal Latin School in Buckingham. She introduced me to many new techniques and taught us about several artists that sparked an interest in broadening my knowledge of modern art.

By the time I finished at the Royal Latin, I had developed a fascination with Cubism and Futurism, and wished to delve deeper into 20th century art. That is when I decided to continue my studies at Oxford College of Further Education (now City of Oxford College).

1994

1998

College

Having access to a whole new array of workshops, equipment and highly knowledgeable lecturers, including our course leader Peter Child, opened up a whole new world of creative media. Painting suddenly became a thing of the past and printmaking and photography took up most of my studio time.

I’ll never forget the first time I was in the darkroom, and seeing the image appear in the developer tray – it was like magic. From then on, I was hooked, but I still couldn’t put down the other media and entirely surrender to the camera.

1998

2000

Huddesrfield

Knowing how passionate I was about photography, how camera-centric my portfolio had become, and how little painting I had done while at college, I often look back and wonder why I decided to enrol on a drawing and painting degree at Huddersfield University. It didn’t work. I had a table and a wall but no inspiration. Life was messy. I left after the first year.

2000

2001

Lost Years

I spent the following three years working various jobs as a graphic designer and credit controller, while still producing artwork. I completed several small commissions and decided to apply for a place to re-enter higher education at Northampton University.

2001

2004

Northampton University

I was presented with an abundance of materials, equipment, studio space and course leaders with fantastic knowledge of the professional art world. In my first year, I thrived, using a lot of the creative energy that had been bottled up at office jobs. I experimented with motor-winds and film cameras, creating images inspired by photography pioneers Eadweard Muybridge and Jules Etienne-Marey. These crude motion captures were transferred into digital format and manipulated further so that by the end of the first year I had a solid body of work.

Year 1

2004

2005

During my second year, I struggled to develop a constant subject and theme that tied my body of work together. I had been experimenting a lot with video and collage, without really defining a style, or demonstrating consistency in the quality of work being produced. I was easily distracted away from the core of my work and didn’t feel the work was true to what I felt was ‘my art’. I spent the majority of the summer between my second and third year developing my skills, planning my dissertation and refining a collage style that I had found success in with the help of lecturer John Harper.

Year 2

2005

2006

By the time my third year began, I was approaching my work with a new perspective and level of organisation. I forced myself to work within ‘lens-based media’, giving me creative options with both video and photography, but not so broad as to dilute the overall body of work that was being produced.

For our university final degree show, I exhibited a mixture of photographic collages and video collages that tied the body of work I had produced together nicely. I was awarded a prize for one of my video pieces, Moulding Myself and ready to move on to the next part of my life.

Year 3

2006

2007

Korea

Shortly after graduation, I moved to South Korea, where I established relationships with several galleries. This provided me with a platform to exhibit and curate several exhibitions in the years I spent there.

The first event I held in Korea was a group exhibition in Yongsan, Central Seoul, entitled Art 4 Love; a collaboration between Myeongdong Art Gallery and the International Artists Community (IAC). I was fortunate enough to meet Mike Stewart and Richard Beaumont who had founded the IAC and began to establish a network with other artists and models. During the exhibition, I was fortunate enough to sell all four pieces on exhibition.

2007

2011

Exhibitions

In September 2011, I held my first white wall gallery exhibition at Gallery I in the popular art district of Insadong in Seoul. Over the year, I developed a great relationship between Cha Eun Young, the owner and have been represented by in several exhibitions across the peninsula by Gallery I. With few opportunities available for foreign artists, I formed a successful artist network ANKR (Art Network Korea) which provided support and opportunities to other foreign artists living in the region.

2011

2014

Press

During my nine years in Korea, I held 8 solo exhibitions and took part in over 30 group shows as well as having curated and co-curated many more exhibits. There are numerous publications about the exhibitions in both English and Korean including Groove, Photographers in Korea (PIK) and [b]racket magazines. The Korea Herald, Mokpo Today and other Korean newspapers have also written articles about my work, especially for the Sewol exhibition. I have appeared twice on EBS FM radio and was interviewed on KBS about the process for creating stroboscopic work.

2014

2016

Return to the UK

Since moving back to the UK in 2016, I have held one international solo exhibition in Seattle, US and have been planning a retrospective of my Korean work to exhibit in the UK in late 2020 or early 2021.

2016