An intrinsic part of the creative life is to challenge things. To challenge existing norms, preconceived notions, behaviours and expectations, as well as a whole host of other aspects of our existence. One of the most rewarding is when we challenge ourselves. Sometimes it is not important wether we succeed in this endeavour, but more so that we engage in the process as a learning experience. Developing new skills and learning new approaches is a key goal behind moving forward.

Last year was the year of the biro pen and I pushed myself as far as I could in finding and developing a technique that allowed me to express myself fully with that particular medium. I pretty much reached my limit and some of the resultant drawings, particularly the Cafe Racer series, were very rewarding to complete. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not about to turn my back on all that work and take off in a new direction. Investing so much time and effort would be wasted if that were the case, and anyway doing these things is like playing a musical instrument, you have to keep your hand in shape through practice, so more will undoubtedly follow.

What is driving a fresh desire to push some other personal artistic boundaries this year showed its hand a bit towards the end of last year with the advent of more colour images. Again it was kind of pleasing to do them that way, essentially refining the biro pen technique and applying watercolour, but I couldn’t escape the fact that they were taking an enormous amount of time to complete. This year I want colour to play a larger part, but I also want to be more productive in the time available, to see more of the many ideas generated become finished pictures rather than footnotes in a pile of loose paper.

So the first approach is to work smaller and work faster, still incorporating many of the things like boxing and cropping explored last year, and to develop a punchy technique which works well with these new format images.

The Dirt Rider above is my first attempt. It is smaller, about 19cm across. I’ll be posting some more very soon and will tell you how I’m making them then. I sincerely hope you enjoy this one and those that are to come.