This exhibition has been selected from a body of work produced over a period of twenty years. My formative years were spent in the industrial Black Country of my birth, and by my late teens I found myself in a spiritually desolate place. Drawing offered a way out of the factories and pubs and I drew with fever pitch intensity workers, drinkers, fighters and dancers. Strong form dominated my tight compositions but colour evaded me. On the horizon behind the factories a light gently began to shine. At first I was surprised at this light, but as I looked closer and embraced its brightness, I found myself reunited with nature. Colour returned to my life and for a while my pictures turned into painterly songs of joy.

In 1997 I came to Shetland and realised I was in a strangely familiar landscape that was akin to paradise. Birds and fish became more common in my life than people, and my art from that period celebrates their presence in my life. My dark remote studio on the west side of the island was not respectful to colour, so for five years I devoted my energy to woodcut prints. The restrictions of cutting a woodblock forced my often-unclear visions into stark compositions. The long dark nights of Shetland winters propagate introspection, and before long images of urban strife began to pour into my rural idyll. Two worlds collided, and I realised there is no utopia without reality.

A move to the south end of Shetland and a west-facing studio overlooking the magical St Ninians Isle led to an internal crisis as the sheer beauty of the landscape became too much for me to bear. My urban vernacular prevented painterly access to the ever-changing rhythms of the sea, sky and land and I abandoned everything I knew about painting. For two years day and night, night and day, I painted outside, letting nature be my teacher, then one day as I faced the sea I suddenly realised that I was also facing myself. My landscapes became a confrontation with nature that is at times healing and euphoric and at times frightening and oppressive. Lost for words, I step outside and once again find myself in heaven; the crescent moon and myriads of stars shine over the frosty beach and calm black sea. Tonight the tide is exceptionally low and I am far away from the worlds of commerce and men.

Paul Bloomer Shetland Jan 07