“In February 2020 I headed for Wexford and a place facing the Irish Sea, where I had worked on many previous occasions. My intention was to start a new body of work to show, maybe later that year, or in 2021. Shortly after, the pandemic intervened and my stay was cut short. I returned to my studio in the Visual Arts Centre on Dublin’s northside.

In turn the studios were also forced to close and I was reduced to working on my dining table at home. Eventually I managed to arrange a two month fellowship in the Ballinglen Arts Foundation. Their studios are in the village of Ballycastle, on the north coast of County Mayo.

For the first time since Wexford I was able to come to grips with my work. Working in the studio in the morning I spent the afternoon and evenings exploring the beaches, the sea margins and the rugged coast line. I experienced the deserted lanes, hedgerows, fields of flag irises and rushes and the yellow of recently cut meadows. The Atlantic featured at every turn.

I paint the sea but the sea is a pretext to make a piece of work. It is more than just a vista or space for me. It is an opening, an opportunity to create work that is about colour, pigment and surface.”