I made a cushion for my friend Mark Hearld's birthday. One side is applique and embroidery on printed Kente fabric and the other side is calico with butterflies drawn with fabric pens. It was fun to make!  

As a reaction against many bland patterns I see being produced here is a new pattern called "Revolt".

This one is a bit of a higgledy-piggledy, postmodern, do what you like kinda pattern. No rules to break - which is where I like to reside with pattern making. 

I inverted the colours and tada! A much better looking pattern turned out. I  love it when that happens. It makes me feel cleverer than I actually am. 

Top pattern inverted

Bottom original made with felt tips yeh!

Dorian Concept - 'Draft Culture'

Kaleidoscopes make everything better.

Sufjan Stevens, "Year of the Tiger"

Plenty of pattern here- I knew Sufjan could do it!

Sweet Baboo - Let's Go Swimming Wild

Sweet Baboo does great patterns too. I just saw him this past week. Love his song writing!

soul junk vesuvius

Patterns in music videos - that's what i'm thinking about here :) hope you are good sorry I not been posting for a while - more patterns soon

Composer Nico Muhly mentioning an issue that has affected me lately. I spotted some of my ideas in the work of a fellow artist who follows me on social media. I suppose I'm divided about the issue. I'd be happier about it if I was getting paid or some sort of recognition for this pattern/ illustration lark- and this artist seems to have a higher profile than me (because I am basically unknown). Anyway here is to original ideas- I still believe in those! :)

Now for some FUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Some time in the near future I will be giving an artists talk about my work to college students as the artist Christopher P Wood got in touch to tell me he thinks my latest work is tremendous! So I'm just bragging! :)  Well it means so much to me for him to let me know this. It's nice to get some outside affirmation that thinks my work is relevant. I've always admired Chris as a painter who is unafraid to follow his own artistic vision. "Imaginative freedom" was the term Chris used to describe my work and that resonates with me as that is something I have always been striving for. Let freedom ring! Apologies for spelling transcendence wrong :)

The Escape Artist, oil on board

Transform, oil on canvas

Lovely Machinery, oil on canvas

Untitled, oil on canvas

Sixteen full moons for you, oil on canvas

Liberation: Care of the soul after Jan Patocka

Wild combinations, oil on canvas

Five reflections on water for you, oil on canvas

Structure and sensation, oil on canvas

Structure and sensation, oil on canvas

Untitled, acrylic and felt tip on paper

untitled, acrylic and felt tip on paper

Untitled, acrylic, water-colour and collage on board

Some new work here today. These were inspired by seeing bad bands, Patti Smith drawing in her bookshop, reading David Hockney's autobiography, people making the world a better place and other general oddities about life the universe and everything. Hope you enjoy. 

Art therapy with David Hockney. Here's a great quote from his autobiography, "It's love that counts in everything. Love is the only serious subject. The absence of love is fear of anything unknown. I think if you can love fully, in the full sense of the word you have less fear. I think that is even a Christian belief. Loving fully may mean even loving the world, loving life itself, seeing it as a marvellous gift.... If one understands love, one can, to a certain extent, be fearless. Then even death becomes something else. I have a curiosity about it, I admit.... I've thought and even played games about it, with the idea of nothingness, absolute nothingness, which is as difficult an idea to grasp as the idea of God.... What does one see to be one's duty as an artist? ... There is always everywhere, an enormous amount of suffering, but I believe that my duty as an artist is to overcome the sterility of despair."

Currently I'm just about to hang another exhibition of my paintings - so i'll shortly post about that. Have a great day wherever it takes you XXXX