I paint in oils from my studio on the Herefordshire/Worcestershire borders. I am mainly interested in people and their relationships with each other and the world. The paintings are sometimes of domestic interiors, sometimes of mythical spaces. Often there is a suggestion of something which might have happened or be about to happen. My backgound is as a writer of plays and now of poems. I used to teach creative writing and inevitably a literary influence comes into my work. However, the business of paint – colour, shape, space, brush and knife marks are the way storytelling enters a painting. My ambition is to make the visual elements work with the dramatic ones. I often begin with a drawing based on several different images which I combine. For example, a drawing I’ve made, a photograph I’ve taken or found, a newspaper cutting, a part of an old painting by myself or sometimes by a past painter I admire. Later, I use this as the basis for the composition which will change as the painting progresses. IG @deborahcatesby