Given to fly (Original, Signed and Framed)

Original Watercolour

75cm x 56cm (unframed)

I have always been drawn to the other-worldly nature of mountains. I have visited the Scottish Highlands many times and I feel both a sense of stillness and excitement whenever I am close to the weight and mass of mountains.

What I really like is that I have a degree of difficulty comprehending them, as the landscape has an unreal quality.  Perhaps this is what breathtaking encompasses, a kind of amazement at what you are seeing - the scope and the vastness. The mountains in the highlands have stood for an estimated 480 million years moving at an imperceptible rate through shifts in plate tectonics and seismic activity.  With this in mind there is incredible drama in that ancient history, I like to think of them as alive.

They are as dangerous as they are majestic, to climb them takes great skill and ability in reading weather conditions. For me, this gives them even more magnetism and intrigue, the countless expeditions and adventures they represent.  I am not a mountaineer, but whenever I've had the opportunity to ascend in reasonable safety I've been mesmerised by the whole experience and the sense of achievement that comes from being at a life affirming height.

I've tried to capture all of this emotion in this painting.  To imagine standing on a ledge looking over such vastness all in view as if you are flying, looking down.  I wanted to create the pull from the brush marks, the sky straining into a dramatic sunset.