My love, bordering on obsession, with plein-air oil painting really took hold of me during a residency at Cill Rialaig in County Kerry in 2018 where I had the luxury of views across the Atlantic right outside my door and nothing to distract me from painting it over and over again in all weathers. Back home in my studio, painting from memory or photographs no longer interested me and that was when my e-bike really came into its own. I live in a very hilly area of the Cotswolds and many of the landscapes I love are a seriously long climb uphill! With only occasional access to a car, I had to get inventive about how to get out into nature with a full oil painting kit by e-bike – and, most importantly, fathom out a way of transporting wet boards and canvases back home.
In the years since that life-changing residency in
