Shopping features heavily in our everyday lives. Everyone shops who is able to do so; some reluctantly, some with relish, others obsessively. Those parts of the world too poor to shop tend to aspire to the condition of those who can.

     The series, itself a form of recycling, derives from plastic carrier bags, on the inside practical containers,  on the outside, mobile advertising. Plastic carrier bags are often taken for granted, a constant presence so universal that they are rarely even noticed

     In my work I like to ‘turn’ imagery from one situation to another, usually painting, to make something unique and permanent from the commonplace and transitory. For this work I collected carrier bags (from near,supermarkets ,and far,Tokyo and New York for example) that provided me with a store of source material with which to work. The paintings utilise the shapes, colours, imagery and patterns printed on to carrier bags.

     The bags are dismembered and freely improvised cut and pasted collages developed from the fragments.  The resultant compositions are enlarged onto canvas to form the basis for the paintings. I try to give each painting an individual character of its own. I enjoy working with aspects of painting’s past and these pieces are made with various aspects of ‘modern art’ in mind, for example cubist papier-collè, Matisse paper cut-outs, geometric abstraction and pop art. 

Related work can be seen in  Retail Therapy Prints