Rachel Jeffery Cornwall and Isles of Scilly, United Kingdom

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I'm a full time artist having graduated at Falmouth School of Art in 1998 . I live in Cornwall . My work is Contemporary Modern , accessibley abstract in style . I use mixed media and innovative techniques. Mostly Inspired by landscape or the figure often moving towards abstraction .

I work from my art studio at home . I draw a lot to hone my skills and attend life drawing classes weekly at Newlyn art school . I also love to respond to the classic discipline of life drawing . I prefer ambiguity and I am fascinated by the diversity of viewers responses . I made a group of paintings and prints inspired by the idea that it is natural for us to look something recognisable , especially in an image which at first denies them clarity , for example , people often say , "OOH , look there's an eye or there's a face ". This has a name, Paradolia - I look for Inspiration nature , especially in woodlands and Rock forms on my local beaches , to explore this idea .

My work starts with an idea which often comes from a response to the visual and then I either draw or photograph it and often use photo shop to manipulate and play around with the composition and colour . These are then all pinned up around me so I can explore my emotional responses on canvas . I find that my best ideas come to me at the point just before sleep so I keep a notebook beside my bed to keep a record of the ideas that arrive .

New awareness arrives each day. Sometimes there’s a “lightbulb “ moment, clear enough for me to run with immediately. Sometimes, though, these moments are drips - and when the bowl is full it spills out of my head forming the concept. This was the case with LIT - ART .

Whilst on a family holiday in Iceland we went deep into the earth via a tunnel that had been formed by a huge flowing lava stream . The forms and textures along the walls were fascinated me. Our guide switched off the blue lights, plunging us into an indescribable dense darkness, so dark that you felt you could reach out and take a piece of it. When the lights came back on they had changed to red, this changed everything and I observed how the all of the forms, textures and tones now appeared very different from before .

And so another drip landed in that bowl.

Later, back in my studio, when holding a painting up to the light I noticed how the light, seen through the canvas, changed the colours in places and therefore changed the whole composition. DRIP. Playing around with these observations on a variety of surfaces and experimenting with materials and techniques the idea spilled out and I called it LIT - ART .

I want my work to draw you in, not give you all of the details but to encourage you to search for your own narrative . Often those whom have purchased my work tell me that they are still responding to them in new ways . Im more interested in the ooohs and Aarghs !