The fishmonger kindly agreed to take some photos with me. I believe he is smiling, he was certainly laughing! Click the photo to enlarge!

Fish heads

Oil on Canvas

21“ x 21”

This painting is based on a snapshot of fish heads from the fishmonger in Nag’s Head Market (Seven Sisters Road, London). The way the heads merged together as a collective but also have strong individual characteristics reminded me of some of M C Escher’s geometric animals. I love painting flesh, particularly working with a palette of warm pinks and colder greens and blues. It’s exciting to work with different brush stroke techniques to create a visual language when the subject is organic, but unfamiliar (how often do you spend staring inside fish heads?).

I worked on it over a few weeks, taking quite a long time over it as wanted to give each fish it’s fair attention.