Hi, my name is Roger Brown, a Nottingham UK boy, now since 2018 a retired stone Mason.

I have swapped my hammer and chisels for brushes and paint so just as exciting and challenging.

I am passionate about nature, landscapes, birds and animals and love to paint them.

I joined the local art group and made some more fantastic friends. I also soon realised that watercolour is all consuming and my incredibly over detailed style had to change. Luckily someone said you need some big brushes lots of water and why don't you get a Hake brush.

Great advice and things began to improve.

My next breakthrough was attending a couple of Chinese calligraphy style painting classes where movement came from the shoulder and not my overactive hand and wrist.

I now stand up to paint which gives me more freedom of movement and eases the process when stepping back to see the big picture. It also taught me to think about each stroke, paint without a drawing and appreciate spending more time in the pallet mixing colours, loading and using the whole of the brush and getting the correct paint consistency. If you haven't tried Chinese it's well worth a go.

Happy painting.

Roger.