The Swimming Pool paintings were inspired by watching my young children learning to swim, I quickly became captivated by the interaction between the figures and the water surrounding them. Made over five years, these paintings have an ambition and confidence that comes from an instinctive approach; creating my own painterly language that meaningfully captures the essential qualities of this subject. The resulting work has a gravitas and weight to it, so that whilst colours may zing and leap on the canvas, and subjects may be full of joy – the paintings themselves are anything but lightweight.

This short film was made to give an insight into a series of drawings and paintings made by Emily Ball in response to her journey by car to the studio in Partridge Green. The dazzling light, road signs, changing glimpses of the landscape seen through the car windscreen were all inspiration. Emily reads a poem that she wrote, inspired by the paintings and the journey, that celebrates the experience of looking with fresh eyes at an everyday occurrence. Language, movement and poetic invention are at the heart of what matters to Emily in her work and this subject provided an exciting challenge to explore it in a new way.