‘Trees of Life’ Exhibition in Chicago

This collection of work highlights my interaction with trees over a period of 12 years.
For me a tree exists in two simultaneous dimensions – the physical observable world and the inner world of the imagination. When I am painting trees, I am trying to capture both of these aspects together, on the canvas.
Nor do these trees exist in isolation. They are an integrated part of any landscape and culture, and as a landscape painter I am profoundly influenced by what is going on in and around the tree. These cultural, spiritual and historical resonances find their way into the work – whether the landscape is Celtic or Christian or, as is more usual, a blend of the two.
The imaginative dimension acts a portal for the spiritual, just as God appeard to Moses withing the burning bush, so I often see my trees as being imbued, almost on fire, with the presence of the higher, holy energies.
Whatever your own spiritual standpoint, I urge you to look at these paintings and to see both the outward form of the tree itself, but also, travel from the roots in the ground up to the branches in the sky, and experience the imaginative and spiritual essence of the tree which suffuses and intermingles with the external subject.