I wrote that four years ago after returning from west Cornwall still feeling the physical effects of its tumultuous constituent elements. A lot of paintings got made after that 2021 trip. They oozed out around the rest of my work like tea coloured water around a welly in a bog.

I’m excited to be heading back that way next week. Early in the spring and delightfully out of the blue, designer Alexander Mackison messaged to ask if I’d be interested in taking up the first artist residency at his family home in a tiny riverside village in southeast Cornwall. Alexander acquired one of my paintings a couple years ago, and thought I’d be a good fit for the fledgling residency programme. It was an easy yes from me.

So this time next week I will be welcoming Autumn west of the Tamar, in the village of Golant, lodged in a bend three miles up the curving River Fowey, in residence at Orchard Cottage. Golant is a handful of houses, the ancient St Sampson’s church, The Fisherman’s Arms, and of course the river.

The Orchard Cottage Artist Retreat invites artists to immerse themselves in the rural landscape of the South Coast, continuing Cornwall’s enduring cultural legacy. Orchard Cottage is a historic and thoughtfully composed home offering a place to rest, reset, and reconnect. Artists are encouraged to engage with the setting, drawing from the cottage, its surrounds, and the broader creative heritage of Cornwall.

Alexander is passionate about developing the Orchard Cottage Artist Retreat and I am delighted and incredibly grateful to be the inaugural artist.