New Solo Show @ The Torrance

I have a new solo show at The Torrance Gallery, with over 40 paintings of Hong Kong and Edinburgh, opening this month. If you're in Edinburgh please pop in and have a look. The opening is Saturday 6th June 2026. There are more details about the exhibition and information about how I made some of the paintings below.

Advert for the show in The Skinny

Painting in Tsuen Wan, Hong Kong

Chuen Lung Street, Hong Kong, 36" x 24" oil on linen - the biggest painting in the exhibition. This is a studio piece I produced for this show. I have painted the same scene en plein air previously and thought this nocturne view deserved to be blown up to a larger scale.

This is one of my favourite paintings I've done of Hong Kong, mainly because of the story behind it. I had walked around for about an hour that day in the rain and was becoming increasingly fed up that I couldn't find a view I wanted to paint. I finally stumbled upon this view down Tak Wah Street and I liked the signage of the bookshop jutting out into the road. I set up, happy that I'd found a spot and hadn't wasted my morning, only to realise that I didn't have any thinner with me at all, without which I can't paint anything. I was fuming at myself! Amazingly, I turned round only to find that I'd set up right outside a painting and decorating shop. I went in and luckily managed to buy a bottle of turps. It wasn't exactly 'artist quality' stuff; it had been decanted into an empty 600ml Blue Girl beer bottle (shown below), it absolutely stunk and probably took a few years off my life breathing it in for two hours, but it did the trick!

Turps - Hong Kong style!

Tak Wah Street, 30 x 20cm oil on linen

This was painted on one of the hottest days in August that year. It was 35 degrees and I was there from around 10am-1pm. A bit silly really but my umbrella stopped me from getting too burnt.

Dai Pai Dong, 30 x 20cm oil on linen

Late Afternoon Haze, Hong Kong 30 x 20cm oil on linen

While I was painting this scene of Wan Chai at night, a big street cleaning lorry parked right in front of me. A man from a nearby shop ran out and told the driver to move out of the way so I could finish my painting, which they did, which was very nice of the shopkeeper and the driver!

The finished painting once the lorry had gone. A girl who said she was an art student stood next to me and watched me paint practically this entire painting (around 2 hours).

Bamboo Scaffolding, 30 x 20cm oil on linen

On this occasion I had left the house without the mast part of my easel so I improvised and bought a metal rod and some duct tape from a DIY shop to craft this beauty you can see here. It wobbled like mad and was a nightmare but it made me paint faster at least.

Late-night Wan Chai, 30 x 20cm oil on linen

Wing Lok Street, 30 x 20cm oil on linen - painted en plein air, I captured a man from one of the local 海味 (dried seafood) shops laying out his product on the pavement. While I painted this, an English businessman approached me and asked me if I could paint his house (not like that) as a commission, which I ended up doing on my last day in Hong Kong before rushing to the airport later on.