Harlequin Fine Art

My interest in painting stems from my dad and grandad who where both avid artists and it was from them I learnt the basics. I soon wanted to learn more and began by looking for ways of improving my technique so I bought books and watched any TV programmes on art.

At a young age, I also became fascinated with horse racing and started to collect many illustrated books and pictures of horses and racing scenes as I could afford to buy. Taking as many opportunities to go the race meetings, I spent lots of time studying the horses, their musculature, the tack and the jockeys with their colourful silks.
I tried to put all that I’d learnt onto canvas.

I began to admire the works of Sir Alfred Munnings, an English artist from Norfolk whose horse paintings came to prominence in the early 1900’s. I also admired the French artist Edgar Degas. Whilst he painted lots of women, he also painted horses and being inspired by photographs his objective was to show realism and motion.

I sold all my early Paintings, a point I now regret. At the time, I was elated that people admired my work and wanted to buy my paintings. I never stopped to think that I might have regrets. All part of life’s learning curve and that of being an Artist.

Today, I do commission paintings for people and sell the occasional painting.
My plan is to rebuild my portfolio and to offer quality prints of my works. I also offer Oil Sketches of famous Racehorses. These are very popular and competitively priced. I can also paint these by request or from a photograph for customers.

My home is on Teeside where I have painted many a picture and etching of surrounding landmarks, places of interest and sentiment for many local people. To them my thanks since this has helped my path and career in painting which is now my passion.

Why Harlequin? Quite a simple explanation really. I was a flamboyant character around Middlesborough in my youth that I became known locally as the Harlequin. Some things stay with you – hence the name of my online store.