At school, art was one of the things I could do best without having to put in a lot of effort, which suited me fine as I wasn’t big on school. As a child, I could always be found with pencils, crayons or felt pens, drawing this or that. At high school I managed to get my standard grade and higher grade qualifications in art without having to try too hard. I had planned to go to art school but my lack of application and general lack of artistic output backfired on me. It was now too late and I couldn’t turn back the clock. At this point I ‘chucked art’ and started looking for a job. It was the summer of 1981.
From time to time over the past 30 years I’ve planned to start drawing and painting but I’ve always been ‘too busy’. Then in 2011 I decided that I was actually going to start doing something about it. A colleague of Karen’s had asked if I’d sketch her new puppy, which I agreed to do. She was absolutely delighted with the result and this gave me the confidence to start again.
I knew that it was going to be tough to start with, but it was only going to get easier and the results were only going to get better if I was prepared to put in the required effort. At the same time I decided to go back to Nepal in 2012. Returning to Nepal was something I had talked about for a number of years, but for one reason or another it hadn’t happened.
I decided that a blog was a good place to pull this all together, to tell my story. The main reason for embarking on this journey is to get involved with rural communities again in Nepal and help support local projects and communities through volunteering and fundraising. I want to help the people help themselves to a better life. I thought that if my art improved significantly it may be one way to boost my overall fundraising efforts.