The Outer Hebrides is one of the most stunningly beautiful areas in the world. Since moving to the Isle of Harris in 2013, Darren and Chris opened Hebscape Gallery to showcase Darren's award-winning landscape photography. Darren's other passion however was for digital painting and as a result the couple created Hebridean Ceramics Ltd in 2017 as a vehicle for a new body of work. As Darren explains....
"There is nowhere quite like the Isle of Harris. For anyone with a creative background, inspiration is all around you. From the Caribbean-esque beaches with white sands and blue-green waters to the majestic mountains and abundant wildlife.
Visitors to our gallery at first often mistake my photographic work for paintings. Whilst I don't consciously create photographs with this intention, on reflection I'm more influenced by other painters than I am other photographers. As such I've been exploring different digital painting techniques for several years now and really wanted to be able to display some of my new work in the gallery. Ceramics seemed to be the perfect medium to use for these images as the high gloss surface provided great depth and colour saturation.
Each image starts as a hand drawn sketch before being taken into several different painting packages to achieve the desired end result, a process that can take several days to complete. Creating work from scratch using nothing but your imagination is a very freeing experience. As a photographer, you are so used to physically seeking out your subject and reacting to environmental conditions to create your work. Starting with a blank sheet of paper and a pencil rather than a camera and a lens is a totally different creative experience but one I believe that also influences the way I create my photographic work."