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Accepted into the Open Bite Printmakers group. Formed in 1992, the group exhibits a diverse range of works of exceptional quality and promotes a greater understanding of printmaking in the wider community. I'm looking forward to getting to know its very talented members.

A busy year. I started submitting works to local art prizes and was pleased to make it into four finals. My monotype Deep in the Bush was commended in the printmaking catergory of Ewart Prize.

The four-day Other Art Fair was my biggest artistic undertaking yet. A lot of work but also a lot of fun and a great learning experience. I really appreciated being visited by lots of family, friends and church family.

The results of my experimentation with monotypes at the weekly Willoughby Arts Centre life drawing group weren't great but the camaraderie was! We brought together a sample of our year's labours at our In the Buff exhibition.

I set up my website and found a wonderful, second-hand etching press advertised on an international Facebook group but selling just around the corner! 

Returning to printmaking, I re-discovered the simplicity of monotypes and converted our laundry into a printmaking workshop.

After 13 years practising the art of parenting I decided to give acrylic painting and life drawing a go with mixed results.  

Busy art year with involvement in numerous exhibitions. My work Ambiguity was acquired in an acquisitive exhibition, commended in the TAFE NSW Art Prize and exhibited in several regional NSW galleries.

I held my first solo exhibition of sorts. No fancy gallery - just the walls around our house in Hornsby Heights. Great fun catching up with family and friends and trying to explain the etching and aquatint process.

I started a printmaking course at Hornsby TAFE. For two years I did weekly classes with tutors Bruce Latimer and Gary Shinfield. I then did a further two years at Meadowbank under the tutelage of Rew Hanks.

Signed up for an introductory printmaking course at the Willoughby Arts Centre with Meike Cohen shortly after emigrating from Northern Ireland. My first etching was Somewhere in Italy. I was hooked!

Got into watercolour painting but, being colour blind, struggled with the colour side of things - duh! The highlight of this venture was a week's course on the beautiful Achill Island on the west coast of Ireland.

Got back to drawing again, 13 years after last having done it at school. I sketched a lot during the 8 years I lived in Sevilla, Spain, really enjoying the lovely old architecture that abounds there.

Art was always my best subject through school. I got my picture in the school yearbook and the paper for winning 25 pounds and a silver trophy in a Northern Ireland schools poster competition. I didn't get to keep the trophy or, as it turns out, my hair!

Draughtsmanship is in my genes, it seems. My great grandfather, Thomas Gray, was a keen mountain man, caver, traveller and sketcher (all things I did in my youth). He drew the new climbs and caves he helped discover (including Gaping Ghyll, the deepest cave in the UK) and helped illustrate a traveller's guide to Norway.