As a painter, illustrator, and printmaker, every new beginning is a leap into the unknown and a returning to the trust of child-like imagination. I am always searching for re-usable materials that can be made into jewellery, tying together pieces of newspaper to make into papier-mâché creatures and layering on thick layers of paint onto canvases in every colour I can find.

I am frequently inspired by exhibitions in the Millenium Gallery which is local to me in Sheffield. I was awe-struck by the pop-up exhibition – Sheffield Hospitals Charity: Impact on Sheffield’s NHS. Combining themes of togetherness in times of struggle, with the mundanity of hospital food, baby-wipes and pot-noodles, it confronts the realities that we encounter when faced with catastrophic injuries, cancer diagnoses and in navigating love and pain.

Another local exhibition that I have found inspiring was at Clifton Park Museum in Rotherham, called ‘Our Habitats, Our Home’: a multi-disciplinary exhibition with interactive video art, large scale multi-media puppetry and a huge collection of taxidermy animals. Encapsulating themes of re-wilding and our changing relationships with nature and then connecting them with both the ancient and post industrial history of Rotherham. The one-person puppet Reign, representing a spirit of the River Don, was made for ‘Roots – Rotherham’s Street Carnival’ to celebrate Rotherham’s heritage, waterways, nature and future. Reign was co-designed by the Children’s Capital of Culture Youth Panel and created by artists Nicola Reid, Amy West, Maria Sofragiu, Lauren Malia, Charlotte Howe, Grace Bower and Karen Hall.

These exhibitions hold clear examples to me as an artist as to how practical artistic discourse can be used to engage people of all ages in celebratory art, history, ecology, the natural world and working toward a better health care system. To be a part of creative movements such as these, while navigating through the traditional and contemporary values of ceramics, painting and illustrating, is not only the focal point of my practice, but a ‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ dream come true.