SATANIC MILLS​

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“If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear to man as it is, infinite.” - William Blake

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These paintings were developed during my two years on the Turps Studio Programme. Built up in thick, gnarly textures of oil, they stage large-scale figurative tableaus that explore the grotesque, the uncanny, and the extremes of human presence.

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The series draws inspiration from William Blake’s visionary perspective. Reading William Blake vs the World by John Higgs while making these works, I was struck by Blake’s belief that truth is not reached through reason, but ecstatic, felt experience - through the visionary force of image.

 

These paintings attempt a similar pursuit: material excess and psychic intensity as a way to touch something beyond representation. Here, bodies strain, contort, and dissolve into elemental landscapes. They are not portraits but presences, embodiments of love and ruthlessness, grief and transcendence, power and fragility. Their materiality -layered, visceral, unruly - mirrors these states, oscillating between figuration and abstraction.