Drawing is a constant in my work, but it really raised it’s inky head out of the many sketchbooks that I run. Then somewhere along the line, ink gave way to pencil, as a favourite gold-nibbed pen was nabbed, and too many bags got large ink stains from the various spillages and breakages. But in my soul I love the deep blacks of a good india ink, or the velvet of black etching ink pressed into cotton rag paper. Recently I was helping a friend clear the house of a deceased relative who had been married to a stained glass artist. There were bits and pieces of glass everywhere, some of which I saved from heading for the dumpster. I was very intrigued – here was that rich black of a good ink, but fired onto the glass, and the textures were amazing.

I bugged my glass artist friend Francis Muscat to show me how to paint on the glass and then bugged him again to let me use his kilns. Wow! Brush marks and sgraffito; blacks and greys; layerings and edges – it’s all there and more – working on coloured glass! This is the year when my drawings come out of the sketchbook…