Andrew Saunders NAPA

I’ve been drawing and painting for most of my life but I really started to concentrate on art in 2022 after my career in insurance came to an end. 

When I picked up my paints again, after deciding to take early retirement, I didn’t really have an end goal in mind. I just wanted to start painting again and perhaps sell the odd picture occasionally. I had an old Instagram account that I was not really using and so I started posting every now and again.  I was encouraged by the feedback I received and have just started a website to display my paintings away from the vagaries of the Instagram algorithm.   

Many of my pictures feature the sea and the landscape of the Isle of Wight, where I’ve lived since 2001. I tend to use a brighter palette and rarely blend my colours together. This often results in my pictures having a mosaic-like appearance, which borders on the abstract at times. 

I usually start a painting with an initial sketch and then apply the first layer of paint quickly, with a large brush or palette knife. I use a fairly instinctive approach to the colours and shapes at this stage and try not to overthink things. The aim is to create a sense of energy and movement and I then build the painting up with further layers and refine the colours and shapes as I go. Whilst doing this I try and preserve the first marks as much as I can so that I don’t lose that initial energy. I’ve found that taking this approach means that I quite often end up with patterns appearing that I would not otherwise have obtained.     

Over the years I have experimented with different approaches and paint applications, including masking off areas and applying paint in thick, textured layers; starting a painting with a palette knife and working down through smaller and smaller brushes to build up texture and movement; painting within my previous brush marks to achieve something like contour-lines effect.  

Most of my pictures are painted in the studio, though I started doing some work outside during 2023 and have come to appreciate the immediacy that plein air painting brings, though I obviously have a lot to learn.     

I’m a member of the Isle of Wight Art Club and have exhibited at Quarr Abbey and Montage Place on the Isle of Wight.