A
Snowy Owl in flight with the Aurora Borealis. ‘Spirit’ and ‘Ghost of the North’
while not precisely a diptych are companion pieces and painted concurrently.
Both began as quite abstract skyscapes, went through several iterations and
ultimately became what they now are: secretive or perhaps fugitive nocturnes.
The Aurora in Spirit is taken from a still from one of my favourite films;
Powell and Pressburger’s A Matter of Life and Death and the line of trees and
snowy slopes was something I saw while walking after dark.

In
‘Ghost’ we see a Great Grey Owl perched with a moonlit landscape and sky I
encountered on that same walk in the Los Filabres range of mountains in Almeria
Province in Spain.