A hot summer day on Oxford Street Swansea finds this old dude, sharply dressed for the summer heat.
The title again has two meanings – the man has bought a certain something for a precious loved one or he has a certain something as in presence or charisma, something not easily defined.
This is a signature type of painting for me – painting people walking around in their everyday lives. Painting moods, anticipations and atmospheres. Creating presence and pathos.
“Emma’s paintings paintings are lively and capture the fleeting moments of day and night in the Swansea streets. A very strong visual impact is derived from bold blocks of colours and an expressive palette that is widely used in modern art and pop art. The cinematic compositions and dramatic use of light and dark in her artworks, particularly in those night scenes where I observe some tranquility and alienation in a busy city, almost draw a subtle connection to the pieces of Edward Hopper.
I particularly like the figurative works which I think capture the everyday nuances of normal people going about their daily life”
“A jaunty elderly man, all dressed and booted on his way to the shops in Uplands, Swansea.
I loved his cheerful sense of purpose and his 1970s sunglasses, that slightly look at odds with the rest of his clothing.
The title of the painting has a double meaning as in still time to get to the shop and a moment of time frozen in time, made still. Still time.
This is a signature type of painting for me – painting people walking around in their everyday lives. Painting moods, anticipations and atmospheres. Creating presence and pathos.
“Emma’s paintings are lively and capture the fleeting moments of day and night in the Swansea streets. A very strong visual impact is derived from bold blocks of colours and an expressive palette that is widely used in modern art and pop art. The cinematic compositions and dramatic use of light and dark in her artworks, particularly in those night scenes where I observe some tranquility and alienation in a busy city, almost draw a subtle connection to the pieces of Edward Hopper.
I particularly like the figurative works which I think capture the everyday nuances of normal people going about their daily life”
I have a mental health condition that I have had to learn to live with, which I can forget about for days at an end when things are going well, but it continues to limit my life and my career both as an artist and as a teacher. I face difficulties because I look and sound reasonably normal in conversation, I can do a lot, like teach 5 lessons in a day or paint a picture over three days. However, I suffer anxiety and I have difficulties with fear-based thoughts. I can also run into “brick walls” energy-wise. I have to have “rest days” in the middle of the week.
I need to sit at home and paint to restore my energies and spirits. The repetitive movement of the hand somehow calms me, as does familiar actions. I have met others who are going through traumas who cut up magazines for collages or build structures to occupy and calm their frayed nerves. I have always painted so this soothes me.
“Passive Smoking”
I am usually pretty shattered by the end of my third day of teaching. I cannot travel far because of limited energy levels and this has limited me to do exhibitions to within a 2 hours driving limit on A roads (I can’t do motorways because of panic attacks).
When I first developed PTSD 4 years ago, I was totally bewildered by the experience. I had been involved in a minor car accident and had briefly lost consciousness. This was the “straw that broke the camel’s back” and over a matter of weeks I came apart at the seams in way that that seemed as comprehensive as it was unexpected. Looking back I can see that I had lived under enormous stress in my personal and professional life for many years and an earlier traumatic incident when my dog had been killed on a busy main road provided the “crack in my psyche.”
At different times I shook like a leaf, cried most days, experienced the blackest despair, experienced flashbacks, had nightmares, and became very emotional at anything to do with death or war. I could not bear horror on TV and “The Walking Dead” gave me nightmares after I watched it once. Never again.
I was hyperviligient, I no longer felt safe; every car on the road was coming directly towards me. I flinched at minor accidents (I remember leaping out of my chair when someone dropped a cup on the floor in the staff room), and mis-saw things out the corner of my eyes (I mistook a hoverfly for a zeppelin in the sky).
I also felt utterly and completely exhausted.
Social interactions were very difficult, except with the kindest and most sympathetic people. I avoided people. I remember panicking when I saw a work colleague out in town and hid under a table in a cafe to avoid them!
I found it extremely difficult to trust people and felt very alienated from people who had been friends.
Painting was the only thing that gave me hope. I felt like such a failure and it gave me a tiny measure of achievement. It has been a Godsend and I can honestly say that I cannot live without it.
I remember experiencing utter exhaustion for about a year after I’d had EMDR therapy (which was extremely tiring in itself but thankfully it helped “plug in” the wire in my head that had become unplugged”). The following year I was just exhausted all the time, in the third year I improved to tired all the time and now I have days when I am not tired but I have to careful to marshal my energies wisely.
I went back to teaching after counselling but I could only cope with working three days a week. It has been a tremendous struggle and I was very proud that I managed to keep my job, even if it was only part time.
I have been devastated, recently as I have recently been given notice of redundancy. My union is very helpful and supportive but the future remains very uncertain. Painting is helping me cope on a day-to-day basis.
The popular perception of PTSD is that you have to be in the army or the emergency services to develop it, but I think that its more common than people realise; years of bullying as a child, rape, domestic abuse, living with an addicted partner/parent, even the distress of nursing a loved through a terminal illness can trigger the condition.
However, that’s not to say that everyone who has had trauma in their life will develop PTSD, I think it depends on how long they have endured stress and their sensitivity as a person. Two people may experience the same event and react differently.
This is the second in a series of urbanscapes in which I paint cities other than my home city of Swansea. Here we start with the first painting of a busy street in New York There will be urban cityscapes to follow of London and more of New York, among others. I love the brash, invigorating colours of New York streets, how they demand to be seen, noticed and paid attention to. The fluorescent and neon sign lights from banks of advertisements blend with a river of colour, awash in the rain soaked streets below. I love how the orange yellow taxi wheels spin up grey-green spray as they tear up the streets. How the garish orange-pinks compliment the deep greens, bible blacks and devil reds on the wet roads.
All the colours seem visually orchestrated by the elements and the street bustle in a chromatic symphony. Chaotic but in continual synchronicity.
“A Bar at Noah’s Yard” – a centre piece painting, painted especially for my art exhibition in Noah’s yard in two weeks time!
This painting of a well known bar in Uplands Swansea called Noah’s Yard, is modeled on the famous Manet painting “A Bar at the Folies-Bergère” but with two differences. The scene is now down town Swansea and the work is expressionist not impressionist. I love the use of expressionism in urban scenes as it can seem more vivid and dynamic, muscular and rhythmic, more funky even.
“This painting is of the straggling wisps of cloud left on the hills in the Black Mountains after a passing storm. It was an amazing scene, this steam-like vapour rising out of the backs and humps of the hills. It looked as if the hills had just had a shower and the appearing sun was drying them off. I loved how the low lying clouds combed the trees and hedges as they floated past. The sun, shining through to illuminate this effect, seemed also to grow patchworks of colours from the fields around the surrounding landscape, as if the light was a nurturing spectral beam. The colours in the Black Mountains after the weather breaks on the hills are heavenly and this is what I hoped to convey. ”
An expressionist oil painting of the world famous Rhossili Bay at the far end of Gower Peninsula, itself the first designated Area of Outstanding Beauty in Great Britain. Autumn has draped a coppery red blanket on the hillside and the windy waves have etched patterns of light mauve and blue in the sand.
Delighted to say I have just SOLD the original oil painting of “Langland Beach Huts” which will be going to the same loving home as “Pobbles Bay” – they will look lovely together in their vibrant hues!
Artist’s description: I love these cheerful summer colours, representative in their way of Swansea and the Gower coastline, painted across these quaint beach huts, looking onto the glorious bay at Langland, near Swansea, Wales. There is a touch of the 1930s postcards and tourist posters about this painting’s graphic feel and joyful colouring; unconsciously inspired by them no doubt.
Materials used: oil painting on linen canvas
Great feature in Walesonline and the Western Mail today on how art therapy is helping me to recover from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and how painting still helps me therapeutically today. I do not know where I would be if it was not for art and painting. Also I am thankful for my husband, Seamas, who runs all the art business side of things, as well as being my agent.
This frees me up and allows me the time to simply paint and nothing else. I paint when not teaching as I need to, it is an essential element of my therapeutic recovery from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. PTSD is a condition that can only be managed and is unlikely to ever return to “normal”. As the article states, it has left me with reduced energy levels and things can threaten to overwhelm me sometimes so I need time out with my oils!
As I paint so much the paintings obviously started stock piling so my husband decided to try and sell them. He contacted Artfinder and went online there. As we started selling from the start, we have kept going although I would paint regardless and I need to. So there you have it. That’s me. Thanks to you too for all your support, likes, comments, well wishes and friendship. It means a lot to us.
Lopsided Trees Professional quality signed mounted print £45
