Where we were longing to be during lockdown

Porcelain plates with drawings etched into the clay. The images are from my sketchbooks which I keep when on holiday. This inlay technique is known as Mishima by the Japanese. Underglaze colours are added. All high fired under a clear glaze. A wall hanging disc is attached on the back as I conceive of these as porcelain pictures.

Turquoise and cerulean blue sea against sun lit white buildings. I long to return to the Greek Islands.

I wanted to be beside the seaside, but when I was eventually unlocked onto a beach on a sunny but very cold day, it was the feel of the sand on my feet that was so glorious rather than the water itself: hence my 'barefoot in the sand’ bowl.

All painted during Lockdown last year from photos taken on my last cruise with the family (10 of us). We started in Miami and went to various islands off the coast of Mexico and Honduras.

I would like to be strolling barefoot, along the shoreline of a deserted beach at sunset enjoying the sounds and senses of the waves gently breaking around my feet.

All painted during Lockdown last year from photos taken on my last cruise with the family (10 of us). We started in Miami and went to various islands off the coast of Mexico and Honduras.

All painted during Lockdown last year from photos taken on my last cruise with the family (10 of us). We started in Miami and went to various islands off the coast of Mexico and Honduras.

This year I have mostly wanted to be laying in the green fuse, in the quiet tangle of micro life, away from the Covid rules, utility bills, emotional isolation of the pandemic and merge with the simple healing pleasure of nature.

Accepting lockdown social limitations and simply longing to be away from the city and hugged by seas and swirling plants.

I am an all year round open water swimmer at the Highgate Men's Pond, and sorely missed swimming in the pond during all the lockdown closures. It is a magical place where people can relax in a green outdoor environment, meet friends and share the water with many different kinds of birds (and some big fish). Here I imagined swimming in the Pond in the summer. Even though the pond is open now, the threat of another Covid-driven lockdown closure hangs over us, and we have learned to value every day as it comes.

Always planning ahead but not really sure where we are going, where we want to be or who our fellow passengers are.

I live close to Highgate Woods and love to walk and run there; we can see the Woods from our house and garden. During the first lockdown I used to run in the Woods as part of my single daily permitted outdoors exercise. I painted this view of the Woods on some builders' hoarding by our garden during August 2020, in the interim between lockdowns 1 and 2. Then the lockdowns 2 and 3 kicked in and at the same time the woods shed their summer coat, snow came, but the mural still lit up the garden with a summer light. It reminds me of life, hope and recovery.

This painting is of swimmers at a waterfall in Ein Gedi, a miraculous oasis in the blistering heat of the Judean desert by the Dead Sea. This is one of the most intense and magical natural environments I've ever lived in. During the first lockdown in 2020, painting Ein Gedi waterfalls from photographs and memories helped me escape the frustration of being cooped up in London.

A spontaneous and uplifting moment in my life.

This print of East Finchley High Road on Valentine's Day 2019 encapsulates a time of pre-Covid innocence and a longing to return to an impossible past. Truly time seen through rose-tinted spectacles!

All these were painted immediately following my move to a new studio in the Seven Sisters Road in South Tottenham after a very difficult 12 months during which I experienced a number of quite difficult setbacks to my usual “comfortable” life. I caught the Covid-19 virus and fortunately managed to avoid hospitalisation. I experienced considerable pain in my knee which was resolved through knee replacement surgery and then I had to vacate my studio in Ponders End(Enfield) which I’d occupied for over 8 years. With the move to the new studio I seem to have found a slightly different style in my painting and I’m enjoying getting back to working in a new and bright environment after a lengthy break! This has coincided with the change of season as well as with major changes in the current national response to the Covid-19 pandemic and the gradual lifting of the Lockdown.

All these were painted immediately following my move to a new studio in the Seven Sisters Road in South Tottenham after a very difficult 12 months during which I experienced a number of quite difficult setbacks to my usual “comfortable” life. I caught the Covid-19 virus and fortunately managed to avoid hospitalisation. I experienced considerable pain in my knee which was resolved through knee replacement surgery and then I had to vacate my studio in Ponders End(Enfield) which I’d occupied for over 8 years. With the move to the new studio I seem to have found a slightly different style in my painting and I’m enjoying getting back to working in a new and bright environment after a lengthy break! This has coincided with the change of season as well as with major changes in the current national response to the Covid-19 pandemic and the gradual lifting of the Lockdown.

All these were painted immediately following my move to a new studio in the Seven Sisters Road in South Tottenham after a very difficult 12 months during which I experienced a number of quite difficult setbacks to my usual “comfortable” life. I caught the Covid-19 virus and fortunately managed to avoid hospitalisation. I experienced considerable pain in my knee which was resolved through knee replacement surgery and then I had to vacate my studio in Ponders End(Enfield) which I’d occupied for over 8 years. With the move to the new studio I seem to have found a slightly different style in my painting and I’m enjoying getting back to working in a new and bright environment after a lengthy break! This has coincided with the change of season as well as with major changes in the current national response to the Covid-19 pandemic and the gradual lifting of the Lockdown.

This sculptural ceramic has been made on the wheel cut, carved and join to create the desired design, and decorated with slips. The inspiration of this piece comes from the wonderful pink beach in Komodo Island, Indonesia a complete paradise.

I am fortunate to have a second home in Sahl Hasheesh on the Red Sea. It is my healing, happy place and I go every winter to recharge my tired batteries, however, not 2020/21 and missing it terribly.

During lockdown I have explored all my local park and I love them all. No amount of countryside, though, can stop me yearning for the buzz of London. I have missed its architecture, its shops, its restaurants and its galleries. My collage is a reminder of the city its culture and its vibrancy.

…on my trip I’d visit Frieda Kahlo’s Le Corbusier styled house, La Casa Azul in Coyoacan to breathe in the colour, design and political yearnings of a bygone era en route to seek the inevitable ‘Lucha libre’ for its energetic display of body language…

This painting was part of a series I made during the first lockdown on scraps of old watercolor paper.

Crete: memories of swimming in sparking Aegean waters.

Portugal: a long hot summer overlooking a lush valley in Cascais.

A trip to Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos is on my bucket list. This work references the deaths from corona virus in those countries and the devastating effect on their tourism. Now, at my age because I have already lost over year, I wonder if I will get there.

I have done an awful lot of work in America, and when not working I enjoy exploring all the interesting places I find myself in and photographing all things American - past and present.

During Lockdown I spent a lot of time exploring the local area and decided I am very happy to be where I am. This piece was inspired by winter sun catching one of the domes on Alexandra Palace.

During the long, cold and locked-down winter of short days and freezing nights, I dreamt of springtime and the English countryside. As the length of daylight increases and lockdown eases, it’s now time for us to enjoy nature, where wildflowers pop up in the woods and roadsides in a kaleidoscope of rich colour. A celebration of spring inspired by blossoms and bluebells, this painting bursts with colour and texture.

I have a fondness for European travel and usually do a few long weekends or holidays each year – but not this year. I remember lazy warm days in Provence just reading and eating, with a bit of culture thrown in! Maybe one day we can go again.

This dish is waiting to serve food in a summer of al fresco dining.

I dream one day of returning to the hustle and bustle of a reopened Venice with time to stand and stare at wonderful facades, churches and of course, canals.

I love being by the sea and have missed it so much while in lockdown. These pieces represent snippets of sea glimpses and turbulent seas.

Botswana - I could spend my lifetime in Game and Nature Parks.

I love being by the sea and have missed it so much while in lockdown. These pieces represent snippets of sea glimpses and turbulent seas.

During the long, cold and locked-down winter of short days and freezing nights, I dreamt of springtime and the English countryside. As the length of daylight increases and lockdown eases, it’s now time for us to enjoy nature, where wildflowers pop up in the woods and roadsides in a kaleidoscope of rich colour. A celebration of spring inspired by blossoms and bluebells, this painting bursts with colour and texture.

I’m missing being in Scotland, in the wild emptiness, amid fields of sheep and cows, and seeing the sea constantly changing colour. There’s a yearning to be up there again once Lockdown ends, hearing birdsong and seeing huge unpolluted night skies full of stars.

Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, the famous rainbow. A place to relax and steep yourself in nature.

Pyrénées lake in the snow.

Nothing more lovely than a western sky. Leaving is often tinged with sadness, especially when returning is uncertain.

Many years ago I travelled along the Karakoram Highway to the Hunza valley and discovered a small place called Karimabad - it's one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen, surrounded by snowcapped mountains.

Aumar lake, a perfect picnic place.

As the sun goes down in a blaze of glory over the Atlantic, in my mind's eye I return to gaze & wonder.

This represents the wonderful rock formations in Monument Valley and Canyon de Chelly in Arizona with the adobe houses in the foreground. The rocks are a wonderful mix of colours that change with the rising and setting sun. The sheep on the green cactus represents the leader of a flock of sheep I saw walking through Monument Valley. The leading sheep wore a turquoise blue t-shirt so that the others knew who to follow. Clever things, sheep.

This is on Derwentwater near Borrowdale in the Lake District and actually I will be there in June. A place of happy memories. I could call it ‘Where sheep may safely graze’ but I think that one’s been used before by a very illustrious painter Holman Hunt.

This is probably my favourite. Dorset has so many wonderful places and this is one of the best of them. I have spent many happy days with and without children beachcombing and fossiling. The best piece I have found there is part of the jaw bone and teeth of an ichthyosaurus. Golden Cap is in the distance and the fossils ammonites are happily playing in the sand.