Since completing the MA in October, the last couple of months of 2011 were spent in an enjoyable rediscovery of acrylic on canvas. As the MA was focusing on Three Dimensional Design, I couldn’t justify the time to work on 2D pieces for a couple of years but have completed two painted portraits since the end of the course. The first of these, titled ‘Lainee’ is from a photograph of the God Daughter of a colleague and was commissioned following a series of sketches and negotiations. The second (with a working title of ‘Hexagons’, which seems to have appropriately stuck) is a personal impression of someone with a background in colour chemistry and was generated as a low cost (but high labour) Christmas present! It’s been a refreshing change to get back to painting, and it’s reminded me how much value I place in having a broad skill set with regard to my practice. Though I’m not planning to focus exclusively on painting, I’m certainly pleased to have the time to pick it up again and will now continue working to complete a series of paintings I started 3 years ago. One of these, ‘Bear’, can be seen on the Older Work section of this site and is developed from a series of sketches and photographs of Graffiti as recorded at the bottom of the Sketchbook Page.

In addition to the paintings, I have now managed (thanks to a friend still studying at MMU!) to cut a third series of boards in relation to the I Remember and This Place Is workshops. The I Hope To See boards have been made with younger participants in mind and I hope soon to use them with young people in Hulme to finish off a project which will in essence have generated a multiple perspective portrait of the area from the points of view of those who regularly use it. The daughter of another friend kindly trialled them for me when I visited just before Christmas and her enthusiasm for the idea has given me a fresh boost of confidence with which to pursue the project, as well as a few images to use for illustrative purposes when submitting proposals.

_I have learnt from experience that aside from access to facilities, the thing one misses most upon completion of a programme of study is the feedback and support of peers. With this in mind, I have been taking steps to set up a small group of people to regularly meet with the aim of facilitating a pooling of professional skills and knowledge which would provide motivation, support and social contact for those pursuing a creative practice in Manchester. There has been one meeting so far in November which went well enough for the second to have been organised for the end of January. The meeting will take place at MadLab, Manchester and details can be found on their website.

While I have at least been keeping practical work ‘ticking over’ since the end of the MA, the biggest cognitive challenge I have faced may come as something of a surprise, at least to those who know me. I have enrolled on an evening course to revisit and re sit GCSE Maths. Thankfully, it is with some relief that I have found myself actually quite enjoying the content and though it is not without apprehension that I look forward to the memory test of exams in the summer, it has certainly given me an opportunity to exercise a different part of my brain, albeit a rather underdeveloped part! Though the decision to sit the course is not completely random, the long term reasons for it are as yet not well enough confirmed to justify any further details at this stage and so for now I shall be content just to mention that I’m doing it!