Returning to London.

London, Hockney and the beginning of something new.

Last weekend, I escaped to London for a few days. It's hard to believe that I once lived and worked there. At the time, I rushed through the city like everyone else, always trying to get somewhere. Returning now feels completely different. I find myself walking more slowly, looking up more often and noticing details that I would once have missed entirely.

The reason for the trip was to visit the David Hockney exhibition at the Serpentine. But, as always seems to happen, the inspiration came from much more than just the exhibition itself.

There was the excitement of arriving in London. The familiar streets and buildings that somehow feel both unchanged and entirely new. Long walks with no particular destination. Good coffee. Beautiful food. Desserts that were almost too pretty to eat. Those small moments that somehow stay with you long after you've returned home.

The exhibition itself was wonderful.

What struck me most wasn't necessarily any individual painting, but the sense of an artist who has remained endlessly curious throughout his life. Someone who continued to look, to question and to experiment.

One of David Hockney's most quoted observations is:

"The more you look, the more you see."

I've found myself thinking about those words a lot since returning home.

As artists, so much of what we do begins with looking. Really looking. At light, colour, atmosphere and the small details that might otherwise pass unnoticed. Sometimes inspiration arrives in obvious ways. More often, it appears quietly, in moments we don't recognise until much later.

Many of you have already seen my latest collection, so this trip wasn't an influence on those paintings. Instead, it arrived at exactly the right moment, as I begin to think about what comes next.

Seeing Hockney's work didn't make me want to paint like Hockney. Instead, it reminded me why I paint at all. The importance of staying curious. Of remaining open to new ideas. Of continuing to look closely at the world around us.

Back in the studio, my sketchbooks are beginning to fill again. There are notes, colour combinations, fragments of ideas and memories from the weekend that I suspect will find their way into future paintings in ways I can't yet predict.

The early stages of a new collection are always exciting. Nothing is fixed. Everything is possible.

For now, I'm simply enjoying that feeling of possibility and looking forward to discovering where these new ideas might lead.

And perhaps that's exactly what Hockney meant.

The more you look, the more you see.