One of the things I love best about creating artworks is the little surprises and accidental discoveries. There are always new tricks to find!

Artmaking is an ongoing journey and sometimes the smallest of discoveries can lead you in exciting new directions and open up possibilities, sometimes straight away, sometimes much later on. I always think there are no mistakes really, some things discovered during the less successful (ok, I’ll say it…’Disasterous”) artworks can prove to be useful later on.

I remember playing our beloved Spiro game on the PlayStation. (going back a bit here!) Discovering tricks to get to the next level and unlocking jewels led on to all sorts of exciting adventures. It took huge amount of determination and perseverance to keep trying again and again after failing time after time before finally succeeding, sometimes accidentally!

Much like life in general really, except no-one showers you in jewels every time you reach another level.

One of my accidental discoveries was buying an iridescent white instead of a plain white and ending up with a silvery sheen. I adored this effect and have used it again with some other artworks.

‘Silver Shadow’, using the iridescent white over a blueish grey.

Recently I put an iridescent white with a bronze and ended up with a gorgeous shimmery Palamino colour. Perfect for a couple of deer-like creatures I had just made.

Much of my artwork has moved along in a direction influenced by these little ‘discoveries’, I see my role in the making process as guiding and using these little surprises, I suppose, just being open to allowing the creative process to unfold.

I like the idea of a creative Daemon. The word coming from the Ancient Greek ‘Daimon’, which was a generic term for minor gods or spirits. I read an intriguing idea describing a creative Daemon, though can’t remember the source of this wonderful idea. (Inside the vast filing room inside my head I have stacks of folders with inspirational material gained from a lot of reading, unfortunately most of the labels have peeled off and are now lying in a corner yellowed and dusty.)

It went a little like this: There are creative spirits or ideas searching for an artist to make real. The artist’s job is to remove their doubts and insecurities and be open to receiving them. Best to humble up also because the ideas are not yours, you are merely helping them to be made real.

Love this idea! The thought that there are creative ideas floating around on the breeze looking for someone to make them real has a huge appeal.

Loved this colour so used it again on this wee guy.

Also works the other way, if your idea was not genius but actually a bit crappy, you just had a dodgy Daemon.