Whatever happened to the Space Age?, a photo by This Window on Flickr.

If you could turn back time would you? Would painting make more sense?

The definition of what is art and what isn’t has become wooly. Painting is often defined as the application of a medium applied to a surface with a brush but in reality painting can involve other practices like printing.  There are generally unspoken guidelines for what makes a good painting. These intuitive components determine the painting’s aesthetic value. These values and sensibilities constantly go through a shift, depending on cultural, political and social tolerances. There is no longer one definition for what makes a successful painting.

I have always been a hoarder, newspaper clippings, postcards etc. It is only now that I have decided to recycle them.

As an 11 year old I watched the first moon landing in 1969. I was mad about everything to do with space travel, I would read anything that was about rockets, cosmonauts and astronauts. Later in my life I shook the hand of a man who shook the hand of my all time hero Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin, that was for me like touching history, if only secondhand (excuse the pun).

I have just been rummaging through old boxes of stuff and found the picture above – yellowed and faded – it still makes my heart flutter. I wish I’d been to the moon.

Canvas 16″ x 16″