Issue 40
Wintertide | The Primeval North
Come seedtime we toil
clearing, planting, watering
seeds of passion & sustenance
In a ray of light
we watch them
sprout and bloom
Come harvest-time we tally
the fruits & costs
of pestilence & fallow lands
Wintertide is time for reflecting
on nature’s bounty & scorn
on man’s greed & fear
The wheel of time turns
a new season beckons...
Ideas for the Creative mind
I
Long before I make an image, there is logistics: timing, access, weather, the unglamorous mechanics of being in the right place at all. What I rarely arrive with is a shot list. Instead, I carry a loose map of places I want to explore and people I hope to meet. It is an outline, not a prescription. I leave space for things to reveal themselves.
II
When I move through a place—and spend time with its people—my eye is quietly sorting: shapes, lines, textures, tones, colours, character. At some point, these elements cohere in my occipital lobe. Recognising the beginning of something worthwhile is rarely analytical. It arrives as an instinctive, unmistakable yes.
That moment, however, is only the beginning. Once an image shows itself, the work becomes deliberate.
III
It took me a long time to understand that straightforward documentation of a landscape is, for me, the least interesting part of the creative act. What matters more is dismantling a scene and rebuilding it in a way that reflects how it was experienced, not merely how it appeared.
Over time, I learned to linger. To experiment. To stay long enough. This often takes the form of working through focal lengths and planes, introducing deliberate blur, filters, or an altered point of view. These are not stylistic flourishes; they are ways of translating attention into form.
In the Spotlight
Working through Iceland’s early spring—navigating snowstorms, whiteouts, and fog—I learned that landscape art is shaped as much by patience as by dramatic light. Like many, I was drawn to the so-called golden hour, believing beauty lived only at the edges of the day.
But the Icelandic landscape, unpredictable and often inaccessible, forced a recalibration. The shifting weather revealed something quieter and more durable: subtle colour, restrained composition, and a continuity of daylight that carried mood rather than spectacle. I began to see the sun’s arc as a painter’s brush, working steadily across the land.
Rather than chase perfect conditions, I learned to remain attentive. To observe. To stay long enough. Inspiration, I realised, is unruly, and meaningful work resists formula. My practice changed accordingly. Less became more, and each encounter with the landscape became an exercise in quiet adaptation and discovery.
If this way of working resonates, the Iceland images—and related series—are available to view in the archive and print catalogue on my website. These are pieces made to live with you, not to be glanced at and forgotten.