"This is my work. It is about a moment in time, a visual record of places I have visited. When the light is right, when the colour of the water is sparkling with unimaginable blues, when the local street has been drenched with rain, or the sun is casting its long shadows across a path - these are all moments that make me grateful that I am a painter. I feel driven to record them as if to remind myself why I live here."

I first arrived in Wellington in January 2000 and liked the place immediately, especially for it's painting potential. The houses lining the hillsides, the winding roads, the colours of the agapanthus behind the council railings, weatherboard clad houses...I could go on. There was no shortage of subject matter for me.

Since arriving, I have remained a full time painter, going from being a backpacking artist, moving nomadically, painting and exhibiting in various countries, to settling full time in Wellington. I completed my honours degree in Fine Arts at the Crawford College of Art in Cork City, Ireland. I ended five years in Cork, the first city I loved, with a show sponsored by Murphy's Irish Stout, travelling to New York to live for six months, where I produced a small body of work in and around Canal Street in Lower Manhattan. I then moved to Hawaii where I spent two brilliant years painting and exhibiting around the islands, learning about myself and my place in the world. Here I met my future wife, another backpacker on her OE. This bought me to Cornwall, where I painted the streets and harbours in St. Ives and Penzance, culminating with a successful show which funded my travels to India for a while and then to Edinburgh, where I had several solo exhibitions over the next couple of years. Between 2000 and 2002 I travelled between Wellington and Edinburgh, producing a large body of paintings of both cities. I finally got fed up with travelling and decided that I missed Wellington far too much to leave again!

For the past seven years I have painted happily from my studio in Island Bay.

Come on out sometime!

McCormack Studio Gallery, 355 The Parade, Island Bay, Wellington (04) 939 9620

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Hours of opening: Wednesday - Friday 10 - 5, Saturday 10 - 4,Sunday 11 -3