From the studio

I send out email newsletters most weeks, sharing some of the creative things I come across day to day in my world of art and art education. You will find some past newsletters below, but if you’d like to receive them each week by email, you can sign up here. Recent newsletters (2025): 16th May9th…

I asked Chat GPT to describe my latest painting. Then I gave it a little nudge to look harder. This is what it came up with. It knows me well! Title: [Untitled – Sunrise Through Glass] Artist: Paul ReganMedium: Acrylic or oil on canvas (assumed)Dimensions: [Insert dimensions if known]Year: [Insert year if known] Description &…

I’ve just finished a tricky oil painting of the sun rising over Paris, viewed through a dirty, scratched hotel window, with reflections on, in La Defence.

The challenge I set students this week was to paint a black and white portrait from the photograph they bought in. The process involved using carbon paper to transfer their image on to their painting surface. This resulted in a lively debate, as it always does, about whether or not using a transfer process to…

I wanted to find some new art podcasts! I think I’ve listened to all the interviews with visual artists on the BBC’s Desert Island Discs and This Cultural Life, and I’ve caught up with the new episodes of The Banksy Story. I do still have a few Moving Pictures left to listen to, preferably whilst…

Dad with Martin Parr at Dorchester HospitalWatercolour on Paper14x19cm2025 I find hospitals disorientating and time bending. Whether we are a patient or a visitor, it doesn’t take long before our connection with the outside world fades and we start to feel a bit institutionalised. Coming across art in a hospital can be a pleasant distraction;…