Biography
Michael spent his early childhood in London and rural Kent, before coming to Canada at the age of nine. For the next twenty-two years he lived in Winnipeg, Upon completing his B.A. at the University of Manitoba, he moved to Vancouver, B.C. where he met his future wife, Sarah. Together they raised two daughters, Ani and Una, while living close to nature in North Vancouver. Concurrent with his art practice, Michael worked at the Vancouver Art Gallery, specializing in the lighting and framing of exhibitions. For the past ten years Michael and Sarah have been calling beautiful Bowen Island home.
Artist Statement
Painting and philosophy have been two constant threads running through my adult life. I started painting in oils at the age of fifteen and was fortunate to be somewhat proficient in the medium almost from the beginning. For the most part I am self taught. My recent works are imaginative landscapes that hopefully convey a certain mood through the quality of light. Because they are drawn from imagination, these paintings could perhaps be more accurately viewed as expressing an inner rather than outer landscape. Their primary focus, however, is still mood. Interestingly, the ideas and concepts that are the currency of my other passion, philosophy, are nowhere directly expressed in my paintings. It is my hope, however, that in wrestling with the mobile and paradoxical ideas of philosophy, a mood of soul has gradually developed that is conveyed through the images. As Goethe wrote: "Beauty is the sensible reflection of the Idea”.