For several decades now sheep skulls have appeared intermittently in my work. They have made a recent reappearance as the result of a trip to Mid Wales. Collecting my "find" on a walk I subsequently made a few studies which re kindled memories of a past interest in these forms.
I always enjoy the physicality and raw immediacy that these skulls have to offer as well as their inter connectedness with landscape, place and the seasons and cycles of nature and all that they have come to symbolise in that respect.
Back home in Cornwall I have continued to work from direct observation in addition to re -contextualising the skulls as "hedge finds." The drawing above demonstrates this very well.
Below are examples of how I have continued to develop this work. Fresh symbolism and new meaning has emerged from the process of gradually simplifying, distorting and abstracting the forms and letting go of the contextualised backgrounds. These contorted images off set against the starkness and heat of the orange ground are now suggestive of something quite sinister... signs perhaps of a burning planet and the resulting destruction and decay of the life that it supports.
