ABOUT
Born in London in 1969, I have also lived in Sussex, Somerset, Mid Wales and Shropshire. Sheffield has been my home since 1990. I grew up around art with artists in the family, and was always encouraged with books and materials. I loved binoculars, microscopes, magnifying glasses etc, and would constantly seek what I call "visual wows" - little details, textures or the play of light, almost always found in nature.
It wasn't until my teens I realised I had an aptitude for drawing. I enjoyed O level art and wanted to do A level, but not being academic I couldn't settle on the other subjects I had to study alongside it. It was around this time that I was also really into bands and music, and that side of my creativity took over. I taught myself to play bass, and had a fun few years in a couple of bands playing gigs and recording. Gradually I became more interested in the dance scene and djing- an unlikely lifestyle for an introvert like me, but my enthusiasm for the music and dancing was something I was driven to share.
By the end of my twenties life had calmed down and I had my children. When they were very young I started going to an informal art class, just two hours a week. It was a way to socialise as they had a creche and my friends went- the art was almost secondary, but it felt good to rekindle my interest. Twenty years later I was still a regular and only stopped due to the covid crisis when the class shut down. I tried many different styles and techniques, mostly painting, gradually using more and more colour pencil in the final stages of my work. In 2016 I did a piece that was almost all colour pencil and that was it, I fell in love with the medium and it completely changed the course of my life - though little did I know it at the time. It was an exciting stage of my journey, finally I had found the medium that allowed me to recreate the visual wows that inspired me in my childhood.
These days I live with my two sons and two cats. I still love my music, and have recently taken a tentative step back into djing, and really enjoy a game of Pool, which is another love of mine that involves wielding a wooden stick, and I play or practice every day.
In 2024 I got a formal diagnosis of Autism - suddenly my life made sense - there is a reason for the intensity of my interests, my sensory differences, and my determination to do things my own way, plus all the difficulties I have socially, and knowing all that has brought a lot of peace. The paradoxes I couldn't understand make perfect sense now, such as being the girl who struggled to talk in a group setting with friends, yet happily going out on my own to dance for hours with strangers.
