I was commissioned in September 2010 to make a piece for the entrance to a new radiotherapy unit at Aintree near Liverpool through Rob Vale a senior Art Consultant at Lime Art Consultancy. A further journey related to trees of a very British nature. This was installed in March 2011 and is entitled "Gust" .

Following my trip to Mexico in March/April 2010, see below, I spent time exploring new ideas in the studio that I showed in our annual Open Studios in June 2010.

From these explorations I worked on a new hanging sculpture to be part of our Jamaica Street Artists exhibition called "Inside Out" alongside a small exhibition of the Matisse paper cut outs that was held at the Royal West of England Academy this January 2011

The resulting piece "Out of The Box" was quite a curious departure for me.
I felt like a bird building a nest.
How does a cardboard box become translucent ?  I love the illusion of it !
The comments both overheard and written were intriguing.
Also included were three paintings of a new series entitled Mexican Pavements. (See more images on the "Journeys" page.)

A six week trip returning to Mexico in March/April 2010 was a wonderful boost of sun and magic stimulating my creativity.
These are a few highlights of the trip shared with my friend and fellow artist Penny Downes, who lives in Guadalajara.
We went on our own pilgrimage to Talpa at Easter across the Sierra Madre from Mascota where we later completed a week’s residency with another six artists from Mexico. With only a few hidden signs of Talpa scratched onto a scrap of rusty metal it was with some amazement and a certain kind of relief that we came upon the other pilgrims walking wearily along the last part of the trail to Talpa. The walk across the mountains on our own was a memorable one.

Near Mascota there are petroglyphs on the rocks .... a well kept secret ..... we were guided to them by the local archaeologist as it is not a tourist site YET. These Neolithic signs and symbols are scattered in clusters over the rocks, clasped by tree roots that stop them crashing to ground in high eroded places and capturing strange shadows from the trees that shade them. Nobody knows what the symbols, carved into the granite rocks, represent for sure.

From the province of Jalisco we went to Michoacan a neighbouring province to find the youngest volcano in the world. It started to grow in a farmer’s field in 1942 and reaching an incredible size in 1953 it erupted burying the village of Paricutin (also the name of the volcano) and San Juan Parangaricutiro leaving just the bell tower of the church standing.
Travelling up the mountain on horseback was an extraordinary experience into another space where time stood still. The volcano however was still steaming and we listened to the earth, hissing and heaving with gases.

It just happened to be the same day that the volcano erupted in Iceland !
This image I painted on my return to Guadalajara. Such a powerful experience, I was compelled to put pen to paper and the images are still erupting in my mind.

The other aspect of city life in Guadalajara that returns to me in my work is the effect of the light and movement through trees onto pavements and buildings. The light has such a quality of heightening colour that there seem to be more colours. (See more images on the "Journeys" page.)

And, of course, my eyes were ever alert for pods. One of my constant long term sources of inspiration.