I live and work on Sanday, one of the northern isles of Orkney. I’ve been here with my partner, Maz, since 2005 when we moved here from Staithes on the North Yorkshire coast. Here I paint, print and design and make all sorts of stuff and, after 15 years part time at our island school, have retired from teaching.
I was born in 1958 and spent an uneventful childhood in the Midlands. After dropping out of university at 19 I worked in low paid manual jobs for a few years before returning to education, graduating from Loughborough in Design and Technology and Education Studies. I taught in Sheffield secondary schools, moved into curriculum development and then, after completing a D.Phil at University Sheffield, did Post Doctoral research at University of Teesside.
While living on the North Yorkshire coast I started to paint and draw more regularly and to exhibit locally and regionally, exploring the same social processes and concerns of my academic work – the relationship between identity and place – but through a different medium to writing – the medium of the visual image.
Work that is available is in the ‘Work’ section. ‘Archive’ shows some older stuff. ‘Projects’ might vary. If there is anything you would like to know more about, please email me.
‘Stuff’ is a good word – you can surely work out what things are…