Absent Mind Painting

Tony’s work is influenced by German Expressionism, the Scottish figurative tradition and the Northern Art movement. He has always been a storyteller—in words and pictures—but an early ambition to paint was shelved after unexpected success as a novelist. A six-book deal with the world’s largest publisher, Penguin Random House, led to Irvine Welsh calling Tony his “favourite British crime writer”. Frustration with the mainstream book world, and forays into historical and literary fiction, only revealed the limitations of the form and didn’t quell Tony’s urge to pursue his visual art more fully. He now paints every day, following an instinctive style that, although at odds with the rigid pre-planning of his novel writing, seems to draw on many deep-rooted aspects of it. Tony’s painting routine relies heavily on tapping into the unconscious by allowing the brush to lead the way, which kicks off a stream of images he then shepherds into a coherent whole. Many of the images recur from picture to picture, like characters in a novel, building a narrative of their own. Tony exhibits with a wide range of galleries in the UK and abroad and his work is held in collections throughout the world.