An Icelandic Fisherman

Oil on canvas
100cm x 100cm

I am an artist working in academic  methods to continue the tradition of townscape, landscape, seascape and portraiture with contemporary subjects.

I trained at The Royal Academy School as a mature student after working in various manual jobs, and since my art training have continued to paint but also worked in a variety of jobs as a police officer, schoolteacher and market trader.

My chief interest is in the real, and my artistic heroes are usually the realist writers and painters of America, particularly Andrew Wyeth.

The painting is a recreation, since the model was disinclined to sit, of an Icelandic sailor I saw while waiting out a week-long storm sailing in the Western fjords of Iceland at a deep harbour in Patreksfjodur. This man was sat quietly drinking scalding hot coffee from an enamel mug and periodically cutting  tissue thin slices of smoked  reindeer  meat into the coffee which he then slurped down with relish! He was quite obviously a lifetime sailor, probably a trawlerman, and possessed a deep dignity and self composure that was extremely compelling.