Michael has always painted. He studied art at college and then went on to do a Fine Art Degree. After leaving university, with a B. A. Hons., he moved to Norfolk and began a job share with his twin brother Jonathan also and artist. Michael spent one week as a picture framer and the next painting. Michael and Jonathan then began to hold joint exhibitions in North Norfolk.

At this time Michael painted landscapes mainly in watercolour and became a well known local artist. Often his shows sold out on opening nights and the BBC made a television programme about Michael and his twin, their job share and their painting.

After four years Michael became a full-time artist although he continued to frame his own work often designing his own mouldings. He then moved to Suffolk where he based himself for a few years whilst also beginning to travel more in Europe. Michael’s painting style began to evolve and he worked a lot more in oils, sometimes on much larger canvases. He now painted Venice, Sienna, Florence and Paris as well as continuing to paint East Anglia. He became more interested in texture and strongly contrasting light and shadow. Now he exhibited at the prestigious Mandell’s Gallery in Norwich where for the next ten years he held successful one-man shows. London galleries also wanted his work so Michael began to exhibit in Knightsbridge and the West End namely Campbell’s Gallery in Walton Street and Thompson’s Gallery and the Medici Galleries in Grafton Street and Arbermarle Street.

During this period Michael spent a year living in Bangkok. He worked in watercolour and charcoal as well as oils. He held a successful exhibition at the Neilson Hayes Library next to The British Club in downtown Bangkok. Michael painted people, busy market scenes, beaches, street vendors and night time bars. The work was vibrant with busy strokes of charcoal usually on paper.

Michael was now exhibiting at The Eaton Gallery in Duke Street, Belgravia, Richmond, and Henley-on-Thames as well as in Norfolk. He won a prize in the Laing competition and his work was chosen for the Royal Institute of Oil Painters annual exhibition in the Mall Galleries.

Then in 1999 he decided to move with his young family to the South of France as he was being drawn more and more to the light and atmosphere of this part of Europe. He set up his studio in the village of Valbonne near Cannes and spent the next six years painting the Cote d’Azure. He continued to exhibit in England but now also showed his work in Monaco, St Paul de Vence, and Antibes. Café scenes, crumbling plaster walls and his portrail of the architectural forms of plane trees became his hallmark and he became well known. By now many publishers had reproduced his paintings as fine art cards and limited edition prints.

After six years of living abroad Michael had a strong desire to return to England and put down roots. He had a long standing love of Cornwall and over the years had spent a great deal of time walking and fishing when based at the family holiday home in Fowey. He and his family chose Falmouth as the place to put down roots and he was immediately inspired by his environment. For the first eights months he has been living near the Helford where he spent much of his leisure time walking, fishing, and rockpooling with his children on the nearby beaches.

Moonlight paintings and the changing seasons around him moving from late summer into autumn and then winter. This recent body of work shows his love of his environment the ever changing colours of the sea, sky and light. He uses oil, acrylic, gouache and watercolour as well as collage techniques. No two of his paintings are similar, the light and colours always different, reflecting the ever changing moods of nature. All his paintings are stunning and it is clear that there is now a spiritual element coming into his work and his connection with Cornwall’s beauty.

He is currently working on a series of paintings based on the Isles of Scilly.