The Epiphany, 2026

Oil on Board with gold leaf on walnut moulded frame and engraved brass name plate.

Unframed 60 x 50 cm

Framed 82.5 x 67 x 7 cm (gold leaf on walnut moulding)

It was the Friday before Christmas when I had my epiphany.

I was sitting in St Bartholomew the Great in Smithfield, watching a private charity performance by Nick Cave, accompanied by Colin Greenwood. The atmosphere was biblical. The performance was solemn, heartbreaking, delivered like a sermon.

As I looked up at the chapel walls, it struck me like a bolt of lightning. There was a missing work in my forthcoming show. I had not yet painted my Ave Maria. Madonnas surrounded me, staring down accusingly.

I needed to paint my Madonna and child.

But I had run out of time. School had just broken up, the painful two week Christmas holidays loomed, and the exhibition install date was approaching.

That's when I noticed the cough. It wasn't much to begin with, nothing to write home about, I was just annoyed that I might be struggling to hold it together at the back of the church.

By the weekend it exploded into a serious chest infection. Come Monday, my blood pressure had dropped dangerously low and I was admitted to A&E, put on a drip of antibiotics and electrolytes, and told to cancel my Christmas travel plans.

I was ordered to stay at home for two weeks.

Home, where my studio is. In the basement.

The Epiphany, 2026

Ephemera.

The Epiphany, 2026

Installation with relics, scent and candles at Firstsite, Colchester.