Works

Recent Works:

Fuck You, Your Whole Wall Blew Down  
Oil on canvas with reclaimed bed spring frame
120 x 100 cm
2023
Once upon a time a man slightly wronged me. He critcised my choice of a Yale Lock when I was trying to improve the security of our backyard door.  I had not asked his opinion. He grumbled as he left. A few days later a great storm blew across the hills of Bensham. Not only backyard door, but his entire backyard wall blew down in the squalls. What a perfectly pretty petty view.
The Shadow in the Rose Garden
Oil on carved family table with gold leaf and paper frame containing short story
140 x 190 cm
2024
Katherine and John Astely Cooper had an older brother called Archibald.  He was a soldier and fought in the Boer War. He came back from his service with shell shock and lived with his family in Robin Hood's Bay until his death in his 40's. Simultaneously a young D H Lawerence wrote a short story about Archibald and the grand Victorian garden his father maintained at his vicarage.  It's called 'The Shadow in the Rose Garden'.
My Dad built a treehouse in the woods at the bottom of our garden where the Victorian garden once extended too. This painting is a celebration of happy childhood memories co-exisiting amongst deeper and more obscure historic ghosts.

Scottish Histories:

"Life is but a day at most"
Oil on found table top
20x 110 cm

2024

This is my local shop. It's a Co-op and it's expensive. It sits on the site of a former house which was once occupied by Robert Burn's eldest child, Elizabeth 'Betty' Burns.  Ooooo ahhhhhh. Who you can see floating through the clouds. My oh my.
In Queen's Park, the corner of which you can see all green and resplendent down the road, there is a Poet's Memorial rose garden - a poorly planted one in my view. Amazingly, the council have created memorial bins for this garden. Above you can see a painting of Robert Burns' own bin.
Fame and fortune forever fades I guess.
Digging from/for Mars
Oil on carved pine
30 x 20cm

2023

The top circle shows a small drilling site named ‘Glasgow’ made by the Curiosity rover on the planet Mars. The depth of the carving on this panel gradually increases from top to bottom and therefore seems perfect to feature paintings linked to drilling/excavation. The Huntarian Museum features a three-foot tall Roman sculpture of Mars, the Roman God of War, which was excavated near Balmuildy Fort on the outskirts of Glasgow. I thought the two images conceptually worked well together. I used a bloody red glaze to simultaneously allude to the red planet and the violence of the Mars the god and it looks cool.
445 Years After After Nicholas Hilliard
Oil on wood
35cm diameter

2023

Looking further into the Battle of Langside (which took place in the southeast corner of todays Queen’s Park) and Mary Queen of Scots I found a contemporaneous painting of the monarch on the National Portrait Gallery website. If you zoom close into the eyes a shocking web of ultramarine cracks have developed over the years. Romantically I thought this looked a bit like the Scottish Flag bleeding through the canvas.
I enjoy the pursuit of personification.
Crossmyloof
Oil on wood
35cm diameter

2023

I have moved just west of Queen’s Park on the Southside of Glasgow in the brilliantly named area of Crossmyloof. Curious about the origins of this strange place name I found that local lore speculates the area got its name after a crucifix was placed into Mary Queen of Scots hand just before her final battle at nearby Langside. My nearest pub, the Corona, boasts an aged mosaic of this legend and I wanted a graphic element incorporated into my larger The Battle of Langside: Union Table. The copy is much more vivid than the original and I like the feeling or restoration that comes with that.
Langside Table
Oil on wood
160 x 110cm

2023

This reclaimed table extension mechanism was the last panel I worked on for the larger The Battle of Langside: Union Table and provides all the structure for the larger work. I wanted to show the function of the folding mechanism so butterfly-printed the primer from one half of the board onto the other. This resulted in an attractive ridged pattern throughout the white areas which looked topographical to me. Following that first lead I painted a quick abstract ‘map’ of the current green spaces in and around Langside as seen by Google Earth. I wanted this final panel to be abstract, unlike the other three panels, to show visual variety. I painted a Scottish flag on top to highlight the ridges on the surface, allude to printing through the ultramarine hue and further reference the historical basis of the work.
Mary Queens of Scots Departing for England, After Lavery
Oil on diameter front
27 x 46cm

2023

In researching history paintings about the Battle of Langside I found a great melancholic image by Irishman John Lavery, a former alumni of Glasgow School of Art. In my reproduction Mary rides a unicorn (the national animal of Scotland) away from her final battle and towards an inevitable unification of the Scottish and English crowns given her later imprisonment and the succession of her protestant son James VI & I. I am happy with the work and in particular the bold black lines which denote movement and give the work a better sense of depth than there was before
The Battle of Langside, Union Table
Oil on found table, plates and drawer front
170 x 110cm

2023

I wanted to include an eye to personfiy the painting as a whole. I think its fairly attention grabbing and looks pretty good from a distance as you register an abstract, very bug-eyed, creature nailed to the wall. Hopefully?

Different Histories:

Treason Pillow
Oil on canvas on wooden box
70 x 75 cm
2022

This is my interpretation of a pillow embroidered by Mary Queen of Scots during her imprisonment under Queen Elizabeth I. The original image of a divine hand chopping the fruitless branch of a fruit tree contained a lot more animal characters and the bannered latin script 'VIRESCIT VVLNERE VIRTVS' (virtue grows with a wound). The pillow was siezed by Elizabeth's people and used sucessfully as evidence of treason in the trial of the 4th Duke of Norfolk. Mary Queen of Scots wasn't implicated enough in this case, but would be executed herself in another treason trial 15 years later.

The painting is composed in two halves, divided along the line of the descending divine hand. Elizabeth's fruitless line to the left, and Mary's fruitful line (her son James I and VI would later assume both the English and Scottish thrones). The multicoloured thread pattern is an illustration of a twill weave pattern, used to make tweed. The thread colour deteriorates into single brushstrokes as you move from left to right. Symbolically alluding to the ultimately deadly struggle between these cousin monarchs.

'Copy of a Copy of the Painted Chamber, Palace of Westminster. 1226-1834.'
Oil on canvas with shou sugi ban poplar frame.
46cm x 66cm x 10cm
2020-21

The Painted Chamber was part of the medieval Palace of Westminster. Henry III commissioned dozens of murals, primarily of old testament stories, to decorate the very room in which Edward the Confessor died. Over time the Painted Chamber was damaged by fire and angry mobs, supplemented with commissions from later monarchs and eventually forgotten and white washed. Only to be rediscovered in 1819. The white wash was slowly stripped back, revealing the colourful and complex scenes beneath. Two artist's made detailed watercolour copies of thr paintings in watercolour. I copied a small part of Edward Crocker's version which can be found in the Ashmolean, Oxford. In 1834 the Palace of Westminster burnt down, finally destroying a treasure of historic British painting in the process.
This fiery loss was the inspiration behind the shou sugi ban (A Japanese method of scorching and waxing wood) poplar frame I have made for the painting. Thanks @handmadebyadamhowarth for all your help in making it.

The Queer History Painting: The Executions of Antonio Salomón and Antonio Ginovés/Baresa/Varesa.
Oil on canvas with gold wire frame
190 x 125 cm

History:

April 27th 2021 marks the 500th anniversary of the death of Ferdinand Magellan, who organised the first circumnavigation of the globe. He died during the Battle of Mactan, a failed offensive against native Filipinos who refused to give tribute to the Spanish king.

This April 27th 2021 also marks the 501st anniversary of disappearance/death/murder of the ‘grumete’ (common seaman) Antonio Ginovés/Baresa/Varesa, his surname is unknown and variable. He was aboard the Victoria, the only ship from the original fleet of five, to complete the historic circumnavigation. Five months previous, whilst drifting in the Atlantic doldrums, the Master of the Victoria Antonio Salomón was caught sodomizing Ginovés. Magellan presided over the trial hasty conducted at sea and sentenced Salomón to death by strangulation on the shores of what would later become Rio de Janeiro. His execution was carried out on December 20th 1519, in the shadow of Sugarloaf mountain, and was the first of many ordered by Magellan, who struggled desperately with mutiny throughout his expedition. Ginovés is thought to have been too young to stand trial and was himself initially spared. However, after months of ridicule Ginovés went overboard off the coast of San Julián, Argentina. It may have been suicide or murder.

Seven months later Magellan would find and name the Pacific Ocean.

On September 6th 1522 the Victoria returned to Spain, having completed her momentous pioneering journey. Only 35 of the original 270 crew lived to return to Spain.

Painting:

The painting is divided into three distinct panels.

On the left we can see the execution of Antonio Salomón on the shores of Rio de Janeiro. Salomón is kneeling on the sand, his neck wrapped in a lurid yellow rope which is held by two figures. One stands on the beach with Salomón. The other, in the top left, floats above the scene and has strange looking legs. His legs are a copy of the Ain Sakhri Lovers, the oldest known depiction of two people having sex, an Epipalaeolithic stone carving found in a cave near Bethlehem. His face is heavily abstracted, covered in a heavy green mask, an illustration of the hood which is often worn by an executioner. To the left of Salomón you find Rio de Janeiro Bay in which the Victoria is anchored, crowned by Sugarloaf Mountain. In the immediate foreground the sands part to reveal a hellish portal, through which a skeletal hand reaches and grabs the condemn Salomón.

In the central panel, we find a female figure facing to the right. She emerges from the shadows of the panels either side of her and is heavily patterned in cream and green. On closer inspection, you may notice that her patterning mimics the ex-mattress wire frame that surround the painting. One of her hands carries over onto the right-side panel and holds a ribbon onto which the details of this history is recorded. I have described her previously as a personification of either justice or the sea.

The right-side panel contains the ribbon and one obscured figure, our Antonio Ginovés/Baresa/Varesa. The lower half of the figure is consumed in blue water in reference to his death by drowning. Whilst the top half of the figure is partial obscured by a literal white wash. A receding pink/sandy pattern carry the eye up and away, creating one of the many distorted perspectives on this canvas which help create a dynamic composition that never decides whether it is coming or going.

The White Ship Disaster
Oil on canvas
150 x 180cm

On November 25th 1120, 901 years ago, a Norman ship sank off the coast of France killing approximately 300 passengers from every level of society. The White Ship, similar in design to a Viking long boat, hit a well known tidal hazard in the early hours of the winter morning because her captain, crew and many guests were drunk. Prior to boarding Prince William Æthling, King Henry I's heir, had ordered a wine fuelled party on the beach to celebrate his recently granted lordship over Normandy. As the boat first took on water William was bundled in the only life raft by his bodyguards. They got clear of the sinking wreck only to turn back around on William's orders to save his half-sister Matilda, who allegedly screamed insults at her brother as he rowed away. In no time William's ship was over run by desperate bodies fighting to float in the sea water whilst wearing heavy winter clothing. By morning only Berold, a butcher from Rouen survived by clinging to a rock. He recalled how the ships captain, Thomas FitzStephen, who initially survived by clinging to the ships mast, let himself drown on hearing that Prince William Æthling was dead, rather than face the wrath of his father King Henry I. The disaster directly resulted in a succession crisis and a period of English history known as the Anarchy, as William's sister Empress Matilda and his uncle King Stephen fought an 18 year civil war for England's throne.

The centre of the painting is composed like an hourglass. On the bottom half a blue seascape reaches out towards the viewer. Carved into the paint you spot two sinking ships, the larger one with a billowing white sail. Around the vessel agitated brush marks and smaller scratches illustrate humans, who are dwarfed into insignificance by the ocean. The muddy top half of the hourglass bleeds into the scene like inclement winter weather. The frame was designed to draw your eye to just above the centre of the hourglass motif, to hopefully then be pulled down/forward again across the tumultuous seascape. In response to a rainbow I photographed over the North Sea, during a walk from Seaham to Hartlepool, I completed the frame with a variety of high key colours. The lack of variety within the hourglass motif contrasts with the excited background, drawing further attention to the bleak sea tragedy taking place on the canvas.

https://thehistoryofengland.co.uk/blog/2021/07/04/320-justice-and-the-state/

I first heard of this particular history through my favourite podcast: 'The History of England'. I sent an email of my work to David, writer/voice of 'The History of England', and he gave me a shout out on episode 320. Which I very much appreciated and made me smile.

North East History Paintings:

Fuck You, Your Whole Wall Blew Down  
Oil on canvas with reclaimed bed spring frame
120 x 100 cm
2023
Once upon a time a man slightly wronged me. He critcised my choice of a Yale Lock when I was trying to improve the security of our backyard door.  I had not asked his opinion. He grumbled as he left. A few days later a great storm blew across the hills of Bensham. Not only backyard door, but his entire backyard wall blew down in the squalls. What a perfectly pretty petty view.
Cooper's Dahlias
Oil on carved pine
44 x 31 cm
2023
Another copy of a floral painting by Katherine Constance Cooper's, who lived in my family home for 48 years from 1868. The least faithful copy I've made so far this work is more graphic and brightly coloured than the original. Please note how the painting 'drips' into a small knot in the pine in the bottom right hand corner. I like that bit.
Details from 'The Shadow in the Rose Garden'
Cooper's Dahlias
Oil on carved pine
44 x 31 cm
2023
Another copy of a floral painting by Katherine Constance Cooper's, who lived in my family home for 48 years from 1868. The least faithful copy I've made so far this work is more graphic and brightly coloured than the original. Please note how the painting 'drips' into a small knot in the pine in the bottom right hand corner. I like that bit.
'John Astley Cooper's Grave, Western Australia' 
Oil on carved pine with gold leaf
36 x 22 cm
2022
John Astley Cooper was born in my house in 1867, the second son of the Reverend R Cooper, and sister to the painter Kats Cooper. After being raised in Robin Hood's Bay John Astley found himself working as a registrar for a gold mining venture in the Western Australian outback. One Friday lunchtime he left camp to find his wayward horse when he became disoriented and lost in the hot, vast and harsh landscape. For two days he tried to find his way back to his mine, as evidenced by two camp fires found later, before he sucummbed to thirst and died a very long way from home on the 31st January 1898. Rev Cooper
Amazingly, I was able to find images of his grave on the remarkable website https://lonelygraveswa.wags.org.au which hosts a visual catalogue of various isolated graves found across Western Australia. The pine board was recycled from my childhood kitchen worktops, which fits.
Cooper's Anemones
Oil on carved pine with gold leaf
50 x 31 cm
2023
Another copy of a floral painting by Katherine Constance Cooper.
TBC
Oil on canvas
50 x  150 cm each
2024
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TBC
Oil on canvas
50 x  150 cm
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TBC
Oil on canvas
50 x  150 cm each
2024{yummy words inbound}

TBC
Oil on canvas
50 x  150 cm
2024

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Kat Cooper's Yellow Tulips
Oil on canvas
68 x 50cm
2022
Kat Cooper was born in my house in 1868 and lived there for the next 48 years until 1916. She was a painter, having studied during the inaugural years of the Herkomer School of Art starting in 1898, and left behind a small collection of paintings in Bushey Museum and Art Gallery including the original to the above.
Her father, the Reverend R Cooper, was a huge character in the history of Robin Hood's Bay where he led the church for 56 years. He had 5 children, who all died childless, most of whom lead remarkable and sometimes tragic lives of their own. This is the first of a series of works looking into this Victorian family who grew up within the exact same walls I grew up in.
How great to find out that I wasn't the only painter fostered within these walls.

Thorpe Lane, Robin Hood's Bay (1920's)
Oil on canvas over board
50 x 70 cm
2023

Inspired by an old sepia photo this was an experiment in colouration and trying to create depth in a landscape. I initially thought the figure in the foreground was carrying two pails of milk. However, when I shared this painting and its source image on a local Facebook page someone suggested that they could be pails of paraffin which I guess would have been used for lighting.

Venerable Bede's account of the conversion of King Edwin of Northumbria, 627 AD
Oil on canvas
120 x 150 cm
2021

Venerable Bede was a monk, historian, author and teacher who lived near Jarrow in around the start of the 8th century. He wrote the Ecclesiastical History of the English People, the first account of Anglo-Saxon people ever written. Bede is nicknamed the 'Father of English History'. He wrote the following when describing the conversion of Edwin King of Northumbria to Christianity in 627. Bede writes from the perspective of one of Edwin's chief advisors:

"The present life of man upon earth, O king, seems to me, in comparison with that time which is unknown to us, like to the swift flight of a sparrow through the house wherein you sit at supper in winter, with your ealdormen and thegns, while the fire blazes in the midst, and the hall is warmed, but the wintry storms of rain or snow are raging abroad. The sparrow, flying in at one door and immediately out at another, whilst he is within, is safe from the wintry tempest; but after a short space of fair weather, he immediately vanishes out of your sight, passing from winter into winter again. So this life of man appears for a little while, but of what is to follow or what went before we know nothing at all. If, therefore, this new doctrine tells us something more certain, it seems justly to deserve to be followed."

The flight of a house sparrow becomes a metaphor for life itself. We, as historians or artists, peer from the afterlife back through a luminous Anglo-Saxon hall. Tiling inspired by Tintoretto's 'Washing of the Disciple's Feet' found in the Shipley Gallery, Gateshead.

Gateshead History Painting: The Murder of Price Bishop William Walcher. The Second Harrying.
Oil on canvas
120 x 170 cm
2021

On the fourteenth of May 1080 William Walcher, the Prince Bishop of Durham, was chased into a Anglo-Saxon Gateshead church by a mob of vengeful locals. Accompanied by a retinue of one hundred men, close to the site of St Mary’s visitor centre, Walcher’s refuge was soon set ablaze. Many men were burnt to death inside and Walcher himself was cut down as he attempted to flee. In response, William the Conquerer sent an army to harry the north for a second time.

Newall's Telescope
Oil on found table top
96 x 1700 x 12.5 cm
2021
150 years ago the world's largest refracting telescope was built at the other end of my street by a man called Robert Stirling Newall. Dundee born, he made his fortune inventing, manufacturing and laying underwater telegraph cabling and was also a mayor of Gateshead. In fact, he built/lay the English half of the first successful transatlantic telegraph cable.
I kept this cool story in my head.
I then found this disguarded table on the street near my house and thought the flaking blue paint on it looked cool. I read up about the telescope and found some images of it online. Fun fact: After WW2 Cambridge University donated Newall's Telescope to Greece, where it is still in use near Athens today.
So when you look at the painting you have a copy of the outside of the telescope in the top left. (I found source photography from an online archive linked to Cambridge.) Two skeletal figures who are star gazing in wonder and horror (I added these cause I like star gazing and spend a lot of time doing it) and on the left you have a close up of the telescope inside a classical building (connection to Greece where it lives today) which I copied from one of my favourite paintings by Piero della Francesca. The remainder of the wood/blue table becomes an abstracted night sky, full of patterns and shapes for the imagination to tease out.

Macbeth, William, Malcolm
Oil and oil pastel on canvas and printed acrylic silkscreen on lightbox
185 x 155 cm each

Macbeth, William and Malcolm' is a triptych. I made the central panel some birthday celebrations- which I am happy about because I get to remember the Dingle whiskey Mum bought me forever more when I see this painting. It is just an abstracted battle scene (quite messy and drippy and evocative of chaos and violence). To give the work structure I penciled in the neat bright yellow frame. Which I set against a pink-black-white-translucentgreen background because I like those colours. I finished it by writing the title of painting across the painting. Subtly though. It's quite effective.
Anyways, the panel on the left is inspired by Macbeth. I decided on him after we went to his burial place in Iona. The heath scene works by providing the setting of 'Gateshead Fell'. I like some of the big brush strokes as they are satisfying to see - but I also like the purply-blue palette cause I have never really worked in those colours before.
On the other side I had an image in mind:

When I was at university I came across The Palace of Westminister's 13th century 'Painted Chamber'. Commissioned by Henry III, the chamber was said to be known across Europe thanks to its beauty. But they faded over time and got whitewashed over. Then were rediscovered and partially restored. Then the Burning of Parliament happened, so they're gone gone. 🙁
But,
Fortunately, two artists got in there to copy. And I managed to find one set in the Ashmolean, the others are in the British Museum. I arranged to view the watercolours in the private library and managed to take some pictures - however, I should have taken more..
Anyway, I digress.
The panel on the right is a copy of one of the scenes that used to hang in the Painted Chamber. A quick, fun, bright, expressive copy. Cause thats the fun bit. I later found out that Malcolm III - heir to murdered King Duncan (Macbeth) - also the Scottish King who was defeated by William the Conqueor on Gateshead Fell in 1068 (central panel) - was buried in Tynemouth Priory, near Helen's house, near my studio. So I decided that the right side panel could be about that. I am going write a little sign saying 'Malcolm III was buried at Tynemouth Priory', that'll do the job.

Source: E-mail to Beryl Pollard.

The Lambton Worm
Oil on canvas
75 x 60 cm
2020

This is a painterly landscape, focused on a black drawing of Penshaw Monument, an iconic early Victorian folly found near Washington, County Durham. The painting is playful and abstract and shows a variety of worm-like brush strokes converging on the elevated monument. The painting references local folklore which recounts a grotesque giant worm that once wrapped itself around the iconic monument, only to be vanquished by a local hero. I cannot elaborate much more. This is a fun image.

Gateshead History Painting: The Murder of Price Bishop William Walcher
Oil, spray paint, oil primer and wax on canvas
80 x 100 cm
2020

On the fourteenth of May 1080 William Walcher, the Prince Bishop of Durham, was chased into a medieval Gateshead church by a mob of vengeful locals. Accompanied by a retinue of one hundred men, close to the site of St Mary’s visitor centre, Walcher’s refuge was soon set ablaze. Many men were burnt to death inside and Walcher himself was cut down as he attempted to flee. In response, William the Conquerer sent an army to harry the north for a second time.

Gateshead History Painting: Murder of Prince Bishop William Walcher illustrates Walcher’s final moments within a hectic and fractious composition. Outside of a central figurative panel the painting ruptures and decomposes into abstracted gestures and plains. For me this alludes to the confusion and inherent corruption our histories undergo over time. Walcher’s life and death has been largely forgotten in the last millennia, not even making it onto the history section on Gateshead’s Wikipedia page.

Within the central panel the audience can see a startled Walcher fleeing from flames wearing a bright red tunic covered in a repeated motif of goat’s heads. Through this dress, the figure of Walcher becomes emblematic of Gateshead. The town was first mentioned in Latin translation in the Venerable Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People as “ad caput caprae” (“at the goat’s head”) and this symbol is still widely used today. Whilst history is constantly eroded by time it is also reborn through document creation and re-representation. William Walcher and the history Gateshead are forever intertwined. This is his/story.

Accompanying text to an unsuccessful submission of this painting to an Open Call exhibition 2020.

The Great Fire of Gateshead and Newcastle
Oil on canvas
200 x 167 cm

The Great Fire of Gateshead and Newcastle was caused by a massive explosion on the Gateshead Quayside. The precedeing fire had brought thousands of local spectators onto the shores of the Tyne. 53 people were killed. Miners in Monkwearmouth colliery, the deepest in the country and 11 miles away, heard the explosion and came to the surface, concerned as to the cause. Trains ran to Stephenson's new High Level brigde direct from London for days afterwards, just to catch a glimpse of the carnage. This all happened where the Sage stands today.

You can find:

St Mary Church, Gateshead; the Georgian Tyne bridge; th High Level, St Nicholas Cathedral, All Saints’ Church, Grey’s Monument.
Source material: handcoloured woodblock engraving from Illustrated London News, 14th October 1854: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_fire_of_Newcastle_and_Gateshead#/media/File:Newcastle_and_Gateshead_Great_Fire_1854_-_Illustrated_London_News.jpg.

Gateshead History Painting: The Gibbeting of Highwayman Robert Hazlett
Oil, acrylic and oil pastel on canvas. Framed with copper piping and black fringe
130 x 210 cm

“The other attachments you received, instead of the goaty Portrait of Joseph Swan, is called: Gateshead History Painting: The Gibbeting of Robert Hazlett, which also has a good story.

(This one, and the central panel of the triptych are in my bedroom, which makes it very decadent. I also found a nice dark wardrobe in the back alley the other day which had been left for scrap. So I have that now aswell. I am writing this sat in my bed next to a massive pile of washing I really don't want to fold)
Robert Hazlett was a highwayman who was executed and placed in a ceremonial gibbet for six years. Again, this happened in the local area, it all took place by the hospital I volunteer at actually. Hazlett hung there for so long that a small marshy pond that was by the sight was renamed informally as Hazlett's Pond. This all happened 250 years ago. Not that long ago. The pond has since been drained and a children's playground sits on the former site. Isn't that so ghostly and brilliant. When it rains, does the playground flood, reforming a small pond? Yes. Someone told me that after I posted a picture of the painting on the internet. I first made that the background painting in first year at uni. It's a nice pattern. I just added a corpse and some words to push the audience towards that particular story - which I think is fascinating. Which is why I am starting to write them down in an easy to read way on my website. I think the story compliment the paintings. It was already unstretched so I turned it into a flag because I couldn't afford the wood to stretch it at the time. And it's just easier to store and own in the long run.”

Source: e-mail to Beryl Pollard:

 

A Portrait of Joseph Swan
Oil, oil primer, emulsion, thread and pheasant
feathers on canvas. With two copper horns
190 x 150 cm

A Portrait of Joesph Swan is still in the works. Alex bought me some canvas for my birthday because he is a great big brother. I was a little anxious about what I was going to put on it, because I had no idea. So I just started to chop it up with some scissors because I had recently watched a documentary about Alexander McQueen. And he was so great with scissors, I felt I might as well give it a bash. I know this is a bit eccentric, but I try to have fun when I make paintings, it entertains me. What emerged kind of looked like a goat, which is good, because Gateshead may have been named Gateshead because of the bastardisation of the place name 'goat's head' in the early 8th century. So its good to get a goat in the picture. I whited out an area and left it. I went on a walk to visit Joseph Swan's house just up the road from my house. That house was the first house in the world to be illuminated by electric light because Swan invented all that. At exactly the same time as Edison actually.
I think that is an extraordinary history to live around and I make history paintings. Conveniently swans are white and I had just put white on this goat. Before you know it you've made some copper horns and bought hundreds of peacock feathers (another McQueen reference) and made what you can see here in this email today. It is a bit weird. But it is good fun - Helen likes this one. It's not finished yet, still got a little way to go.

There is also something Stubbsian about the swan.

Irish History Paintings:

Irish History Painting: The Death of Turgesius
Oil and pencil on canvas
70 x 80 cm

Turgesius was an Viking Chief active in Ireland in the 9th-century. He also credited by many as founding the city of Dublin. He was killed in 845. There are conflicting reports into his death. Under the order of Máel Sechnaill I, King of Meath, Turgesius was either drowned or  assassinated by 12 beardless young male warriors disguised as a wedding party. Abbreviated here to the "Twelve Killer Drag Queens".

This painting evades resolutions. Like the history itself, the central plain is a murky wash. Muddy water? Couple with the curved text the viewer is reminded of theatrical posters.  graphical advertisement to a distant, lost history. I remember thinking a lot about the function of contemporary history painting acting as historical signage, seminar-inspired. Which I still occasionally Wikipedia. (I later had stimulating conversations with Samson about intentional composing paintings that don't centralise. Is there an anarchic quality to that perhaps?)

Outside this barren central panel I make reference the graphic design of Tadanori Yokoo: in particular his macabre 'A Climax at the age of 29'. A vibrant Japanese sunburst motif centres on a floating reclining figure. On closer inspection he is supported by three golden threads. The figure is based upon Jacque Louis David's 'The Death of Marat'. David: the father of history painting. Turgesius is dead, so a body hangs at the bottom of the frame. As it says, this is Michael J McCormack painting.

Irish History Painting Curran Cross-Examining Armstrong

Irish History Painting: Curran Cross-Examining Armstrong
Oil, oil primer and pencil on canvas. With pine frame and walnut wood dye
80 x 60 cm

The title refers to a controversial court case in Irish history. A case that ended in the execution of the John and Henry Sheares, both former barristers, both United Irishmen in 1798.

The title is important in this one and it is Irish History Painting: Curran Cross-Examining Armstrong. The imagery stays very close to those words. In the background you can see a large textured green Ireland. It is surrounded by swirling mass of teal(?) brush strokes. Above Mayo and Galway there is a dark shadowy figure. A humanoid character. Spreading SE two crisp white lines lead to another predominately white object. On second glance you recognise this as a large arm, with an upturned palm, cradling the Irish south coast. This is Armstrong. There is a bicep there. Being examined by the other figure. The painting has been reduced to pun. Which hopefully still generates a vague sense of narrative and maybe action. Providing structure across the canvas there are many sharp narrow white lines. They both frame the who piece and etch out an impression of a punching figure. Northern Ireland is the fist. Overlaid, on top of it all, are two large pink symbols. One floating above centre, one floating below. They are from a map that I can no longer find. But I am quietly confident that they are symbols from a Cromwellian map of Ireland that I found in the Bodlein collection. One, I think the lower one, was the symbol for a town razed to the ground. I roughly marked then out in pencil on the map. I forget what the top one is – perhaps a rebel controlled town? There is also another dark smudge on the right-side of the canvas, providing a buddy to the shadowy Curran, and providing a visual counter-balance. It's all about making good looking and compelling images at the end of the day. Always. The frame is partially stained with walnut oil.

Irish History Painting: Kildare “On the Necks of the Butlers”
Oil on canvas. Pine frame with walnut dye
100 x 75cm

This one is another pun-based composition. Quickly done. There is a sketch of some butlers, white gloves, bowties, and there is a crude figure standing on their necks. The torso of which contains an oak tree, which refers to the next painting in the series: Irish History Painting: The Oak of Kildare. Again, another pun painting. The framing is also quick and experimental. Both the internal transparent blue border, and the single splinter of wood hanging off the bottom right hand corner of the canvas. I think it is clean and sharp next to the pink smudging it sits alongside. I seem to think that the neat contrasts can be useful for good viewing. I no longer have this painting.
I never uncovered the related histories.

Irish History Painting: The Oak of Kildare
Oil and board. Glitter plastic frame with plasticine
33 x 23cm.

This is a quick sketch of an oak tree surrounded by a sheeney glittery plastic frame. A laptop casing that didn’t fit and was repurposed. I enjoying experimenting with framing. Again, this is a reductive and very neutral and symbolic history painting. This series generally sees me gently prod at the boundaries of what could constitute a history painting – I was thinking about concepts around signage/documentation after a chat with Anthony. Always a great tutorial. I gave it a little black modelling clay frame that was never going to last.

Again, I never uncovered the related histories.

Irish History Painting: Nial and his Nine Hostages
Oil on canvas with oak and walnut through-wedge mortice and tenon frame
125 x 95cm
2018-21

History:

This work draws from the folkloric figure of king Niall Noígíallach. Legend has it that Nial succeeded in becoming one of the first High Kings of Ireland when he conquered all nine provinces. He held a high-born hostage from each territory to ensure fidelity towards his crown. Further to this Nial was allegedly the invading pirate king who stole and enslaved the young Welshman who later became St. Patrick. And his son, Loégaire, was the same wicked druid who St Patrick converted during a supernatural/miraculous battle on Tara hillside. I'm not sure I ever exhibited those painting together?

Artwork:

The larger Irish History Painting series explores how a contemporarily-made history painting could/should/would function and present today. In Irish History Painting: Nial and his Nine Hostages the artist reduces the fable of king Niall Noígíallach to its bare bones in an abstracted infographic manner. Nine flesh toned circles crowd around a larger crowned circle in the centre of the canvas. Composed around this central motif nine arrows project outwards in various directions: alluding graphically to escape. Celtic motifs can also be found capping bold horizontal brushstrokes in the background.

 

Irish History Painting: The Burial of King Dathy in the Alps, his thinned troops lay stones on his grave.
Pigment, oil, hard pastel, charcoal and pencil on canvas. Pine and plywood stand with walnut wood dye, polyester, pin nails and pen.
137 x 38 cm

I built a stand for this painting to bring it to a human scale, trying to facilitate a more personal viewing experience believe it or not. At the top of the canvas there is a sketched Alpine landscape, grey purple mountains in the background, rolling green fields in the foreground. Within this scene we see small stickmen laying funerary stones, like ants around a pair of exposed feet. There are small white flowers, and a shallow sense of depth, created by the receding stack of warm stones. Under this panel is a huge red swirl. Bright, vibrant and possibly violent. Uniform sky blue brush strokes button above the red swash creating depth and structure. This is accentuate by a thin white ribbon, that runs centrally throughout the who painting, foregrounded by a central crest. With Daffy duck in it. When you read ‘Dathy’, in an English accent you might sound out ‘daffy’, like I initially did. The Irish read the same word as ‘Dah-hee’. Read into that what you will? Sometimes it’s good to be off the mark.

Legend has it King Dathy was killed by a lightning strike.

Irish History Painting: Ormond refusing to give up his sword
Acrylic, oil, poster paint, soft pastel and pencil on linen
80x60cm

History:

This work focuses around James Butler, 1st Marquess of Ormond. Ormond was a fierce royalist and stood on the side of the crown against Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell’s bloody invasion of Ireland in 1649-50. Earlier in his career Ormond was summoned to parliament to speak about bubbling unrest in Ireland circa 1634. Due to the unrest peers were ordered to relieve themselves of their arms prior to session. Ormond famously refused, seeing the request as a slight on both his honour and the honour of his Irish subjects, and kept his sword on his person always.

Artwork:
Irish History Painting: Ormond refusing to give up his sword explore the role of story-telling and humour in contemporary history painting. Ormond is represented as a large middle finger defiantly opposing two pencil-drawn agents who have been ordered by a bearded figure (right-side of the canvas) to collect his sword, found near centre. The action all takes place behind a theatrical curtain border heightening the humorous pantomime of this bizarre history. Narrative is followed simply as the viewer is encouraged to follow a soft blue arrow which loops from the bearded figure round to the central sword.

Irish History Painting: James' Entry into Dublin
Oil and soft pastel on canvas
144 x 92 cm.

James II was the King of England and Ireland for three years in the 1680's. He was the last Catholic monarch of England, Scotland and Ireland and was deposed during the Glorious Revolution. He was replaced by his daughter Mary II and her Dutch husband William of Orange. Shortly after the revolution James entered Dublin with a small retinue of men, under two thousand. The Irish remained loyal to James and supported him in his upcoming Battle of the Boyne. Which he lost.
James fled back to exile in France shortly afterwards, abandoning the Irish to fight on against William of Orange without there king. James II became known as Seamus an Chaca, which apparently translates to James the Shit. (If any Irish speaking friends could fact-check this for me I'd appreciate it).

James' entry to Dublin was a vapid/hollow affair. You can see bland grey bunting, a barren featureless landscape and an arrow pointing to a shit stain on the horizon

Irish History Painting: The Death of St Ruth.
Oil on canvas
130 x 66 cm

This painting marks the moment Charles Chalmot de Sainte-Ruhe (St Ruth) was decapitated by a rogue cannon ball. On the 12th July 1691 St Ruth was leading the Jacobite army at the battle of Aughrim, Co. Galway. He fought successfully against the Williamite forces for several hours, inflicting heavy damage, helping make this one of the bloodiest battles ever fought in the British Isles. That was until a stray cannonball found its perfect target. After St Ruth's explosive death, the Jacobite forces become disordered and the tides turned. Soon thousands of their forces were also dead, and the Jacobites lost the pivotal battle. Another one.
The painting was partly inspired by Quentin Tarantino's 'Kill Bill' films which I was watching at the time. Violent and theatrically bloody I wondered if I could achieve similar results in painting. On the top half of the canvas a green sketch of the reconstructed battlefield of Aughrim is inudated with a wash of blood. On closer inspection a faceless outline of a figure falling, just below the green battle scene, is the source of the flood. This figure floats above two white copies of the Irish map. Scanning further down you find the reminents of a book motif from a previous composition. And a series of pastel columns that were added to provide a calmer contrast with the action above. In the centre of this column you can see a white cockade, a fashionable ribbon that was worn by those in favour of a Jacobite restoration.

Figurations:

Loch Lomond Self-portrait
Oil on canvas
55 x 85 cm
2022
lunching.refills.seabirds (what3words)

Smile
Oil on mirror
80 x 65 cm

Originally a sketch of the inside of a mattress. Animated with a faint smile.

Janus
Oil and spray paint on canvas
70 x 100 cm

Janus was a Roman God with two faces who has been painted/sculpted/cast/drawn countless time over millennia. He gave his name to our first month January. He was the god of transitions, time, beginning and endings, frames, gates and doorways and duality. With that in mind I made this.

Landscapes:

Ravenscar from Sunnyside farm during winter
Oil on carved board with gold leaf
40 x 22 cm
2022
crackling.questions.essays (what3words)
'John Astley Cooper's Grave, Western Australia' 
Oil on carved pine with gold leaf
36 x 22 cm
2022
John Astley Cooper was born in my house in 1867, the second son of the Reverend R Cooper, and sister to the painter Kats Cooper. After being raised in Robin Hood's Bay John Astley found himself working as a registrar for a gold mining venture in the Western Australian outback. One Friday lunchtime he left camp to find his wayward horse when he became disoriented and lost in the hot, vast and harsh landscape. For two days he tried to find his way back to his mine, as evidenced by two camp fires found later, before he sucummbed to thirst and died a very long way from home on the 31st January 1898. Rev Cooper
Amazingly, I was able to find images of his grave on the remarkable website https://lonelygraveswa.wags.org.au which hosts a visual catalogue of various isolated graves found across Western Australia. The pine board was recycled from my childhood kitchen worktops, which fits.
April snowstorm
Oil on canvas
120 x 80 cm
2022
Work based on a photo taken by a friend, near Robin Hood's Bay, during her walk in April.