I was born in Leicester in 1976 and started painting in 2006, inspired by a trip to Latin America where I saw naive and folk art for the first time. Since then I have developed my own distinctive style, which typically features vibrantly colourful landscapes brought to life by playful or magical details. Although my art is deliberately childlike and free of formal constraints, each painting is created with painstaking care, gaining a richness of colour built up during several layers of overpainting. I have exhibited across the UK and was one of 100 artists featured in the Schiffer book Contemporary Painters in 2012. I combine painting with a full-time job as a copywriter for a major children’s publisher, and have recently moved to East Kent after many years in London.