I have discussed the primary, most important reasons for adopting this particular style of painting. A new, refreshing and liberating approach for me, and one which thus far has yielded a degree of success in addressing and fulfiling the criteria set out. I am enjoying making these paintings. I am actually making them! And I am pleased with the results. However there are other aspects born of the strictly prescribed ‘production formula’ and the context in which they are made (i.e. by me) that address concerns I have about contemporary art and its wider associations.

I work in the art world and as such I see a fair bit of contemporary art. Acquaintancs of mine will not be surprisd to hear that for the most part I am not particularly impressed with the quality of what I see. I don’t intend to go into specifics on this point because doing so serves no purpose so to put it briefly I think things could and should be quite a lot better than they currently are.

Whilst there are some welcome exceptions, the volume of sub standard art is vast and to the detriment of all those associated, ever expanding. There is a general lack of technical quality and aesthetic value. So many things are poorly constructed or just very ugly and a good deal is so dense with impenetrable layers of supposed meaning and reference as

to make it incomprehensible to most viewers. When I encounter art I hope to be presented with something I find good to look at. After all it is primarily a visual medium. There may well be more going on than meets the eye, and I have no problem with that per se, but if the artist does not have the ability to construct or present work of techincal quality, I’m afraid whatever complex or poigniant message they’re trying to communicate will suffer because of it. Clearly I am generalising fairly widely and I’m well aware that there will be examples that fulfil my rather basic criteria for appreciation, however I’m confident there will be more that validate my criticism and that I’m not unique in holding this viewpoint.

So what's this crap that I’m making then? These new paintings I’m touting look more like the pretentious twaddle I find so irritating than anything I’ve done previously. It's an appreciated irony, however I will attempt an explanation. As I have detailed, by largely removing the potential for error I am also setting aside a great deal of the need for skill or refined ability in many areas; composition, drawing, use of colour, brushwork and so on. The quality of these paintings lies in the physical attributes of paint and support - the way the paint itself behaves and the qualities it possesses when pushed around, irrespective

of the nuanced dexterity or oafish clumsiness of the pusher. I address the issue of technical quality not by trying and failing to make brilliant paintings but by eliminating technique as necessary for success, meaning the resultant works should be more or less as good as they can be.

In terms of artworld doublespeak, weighty political poigniance, uber trendy hipster reference or deeply meanigful gesture, there’s nothing there. To put it simply (clichedly), what you see is what you get. It’s a canvas painted purple. It’s got a funny title. Done. You can base your opinion of the painting entirely upon what’s in front of you – nothing hidden, no further knowledge required. It’s all black and white (and purple).

I can see that adopting this approach could be considered a kind of failure in itself – a regretable resignation to inability. I’m not sure I can honestly argue against that. Of course I’d love to be a supremely talented painter, but given that I’m not, pursuit of a skill that I will likely never develop to a satisfactory, let alone advanced level seems something of a fool’s errand. And given that the overarching goal is enjoyment of the practice, to suffer struggle and fail seems counterproductive. I think these new paintings are possibly the most worthy of any I've done as they are the most enjoyable to make and by default the results are the least bad. It's not a particularly clever way to address the things that annoy me, but a straightforward and honest one I’d like to think. Initially it probably wasn't even conscious, but perhaps in developing the ‘painting formula’ I was unwittingy influenced by the concerns detailed in the paragraphs above.

"They’re a bit boring though aren’t they?"

Well, again hard to deny, but as a subjective critique that’s for the individual to decide. My personal response; no they’re not boring. They’re actually very exciting but for everyone who isn’t me (quite a lot of you) there’s a lot less to base judgement on. I readily concede that the consensus of opinion is likely to be that these are not particularly interesting paintings, but I hope that anyone who likes paint and painting may be able to derive some pleasure from looking at them.

"But don't I need to know all this garbage to understand what's going on? I won't get it otherwise"

Of course many won't ‘get it', but thinking that there’s anything to get is part of the problem. I would suggest that it stems more from an ingrained assumption that contemporary art is conceptually unfathomable and that it all needs to be spelt out for us rather than anything I have or haven't done to the paintings themselves. I appreciate that as much as I explain to you that you don't need anything more than the information going in your eyes, you still need me to tell you that in the first place.

If I were a high flying gallerist and was presented with these paintings I probably wouldn't exhibit them. Irrespective of the fact that they are better than quite a lot of the stuff I see (ego? Of course, but also partly the truth), they certainly aren’t good enough to be held up as an example of the best that contemporary art has to offer, which is exactly what we should be seeing when we go into a gallery. No exceptions.

Touch the sun or die trying. Or not. Whatever.