As a painter, I am wholly self-taught and the learning is on-going. In 2019, I made the decision to retire early to give my compulsion to paint more time and space.

I owe a debt of gratitude to a handful of independent galleries in Wales who provided the opportunity for my work to be seen and am relieved when their belief in me is occasionally rewarded in sales. That there are people who are prepared to invest their money in order to live with my work in their homes gives me great pride and acts as an antidote to times of frustration and the self-doubt that occasionally creeps in.

The outcome of my efforts is for others to judge and comment on, the process of painting is what I find compelling. The subjects arise from a lifetime of absorption in the landscape of Wales, my hope is that I can create an image that conveys my emotional response to the scene. The preparation tends to involve a period of reflection – sometimes hours, maybe days – when I ponder an inner idea of what I want to achieve and scribble and make notes.

Then there is the routine work – the stretching of the paper, the preliminary drawing, the selection of the palette, the initial wash or two and maybe a bit of masking and fiddling. Yet when the process of painting takes over and goes well there is often a short intense period of almost frenzied activity when risks are taken and pigment is applied spontaneously and maybe washed off or manipulated to achieve an effect. The process of painting works best when it leads into making discoveries: remaining open to suggestions thrown up by the substance itself: its liquidity, its density, its luminosity and translucence. (Sue Hubbard - Art critic). Issues arise unexpectedly and have to be impulsively resolved; there is no element of certainty and always the likelihood of “failing” with past experience offering little in the way of a safety net and for me this is the excitement of watercolour painting.

Since 2000, I have exhibited widely across Wales and in Ireland and I am a member of the North Wales Society of Fine Art. In 2023 I was elected as a member of the Royal Watercolour Society of Wales.

www.garygriffithsartist.com