My Life Story ;- from black & white beginings to a colourful explosion.

I started out in the creative world with eager passion. I just had to have a pencil in my hand to draw anything!. I began by doing black & white renditions that dominated the Bolton I never knew, at a time when I realised the fast changing world around me. It was 1977 and all the terraced housing, corner shops and mills where being demolished. Whole communities brushed aside by the might of modernisation. It happened very quickly; so fast, it caught me napping. I walked around from street to empty street, dilapidated terraces and closed down mills, venturing inside some, alone, forgotten lost. It was a lot to take in.

Slowly, over time, I added a little colour but I felt uneasy about expressing myself. My dad, step-dad and wayward mother, always encouraged me to 'go for it', so to speak but this just held me back more!. I wanted to develope, though at my own pace. I was almost too late.

Now years on, chained by my past, I have painted with emotion, feeling, and a passion for the subject. I kept my subject matter limited all the same. Sticking with buildings, especially old mills that were being knocked down back then, it allowed me to make a few mistakes that no one could really rectify or criticise. Criticism was a daunting prospect for me you know..! My mills enjoyed this anonymity because they had gone but not for me. My drawings would be their saviour.With a few commissions, fellow encouragement, I forgot about the modern world as it grew because I was always anchored in the past, forever lost in an old mill, breathing it's musty air, listening to the silence of those hard working times, drawing in the atmosphere, sharing that once beating heart...

So here I am trapped in this new computer age, full of consumerism, advertisements and must have gadgets!. I hope my work reflects the journey I have tread. Although it was a dirt track to begin with, though lots of hidden beauty spots to discover, I now find myself on the slip road of the newly built A666, or St Peters Way, taking the first steps on the road to success.
Thanks
Richard

Holdsworth Bros, now demolished. Bolton.

Pen & Ink on 120grm paper.
  12X14ins.
£125.

25 years apart!

Winchester Way bridge and weir. Breightmet, Bolton.

Acrylic on canvas.
12x16ins.
£175.

 SOLD