Yesterday I was with my recently-got-back-together partner, up in the mountains behind our town - the Matese range, reaching up to the north-west from the Sannio/ Telesino valley, in south Italy...
I paint intuitively from the landscape, and rarely from live landscape in front of me in that moment... My relationship with the sacredness of mountains, wildness, the elements and our meeting with all of that, is rooted in where I grew up on a hillside below dramatic monros (High Corrie, Isle of Arran, Scotland).
The mountains up behind us here in Italy are wooded, laked, dotted with fortressed settlements and incredible camping spots... Being able to step out of daily life and into the wilds is an enormous privilege and freedom - a meditation and means of realigning and revitalising the spirit.