Hi, I’m Gill, the creator behind A Singing Cricket.

From a young age I have enjoyed a fascination with the natural world.  Natural history and nature were my passions and I spent many hours pawing over books and documentaries.  The desire to be part of the natural world often meant I kept a worm farm, an ant farm or even the occasional butterfly crysilisc in my bedroom.  Although, it wasn’t until I was an adult I found enjoyment in art and nature illustrations.

I started painting botanicals and insects after purchasing a book featuring Harriet and Helena Scott - colonial natural history painters.  The golden age of natural history observation, is a time I find breathtaking from the skill and dedication the early naturalists had.  My love of nature at its most close and detailed form came to light from this book.

Plants and insects on a small scale live in an unseen world of their own.  From a distance nature can be a common, everyday thing, such as a cricket chirping.  But close up is where you really discover that in its infinite complexity, nature is so beautiful and intricate.

I enjoy looking at my subjects on a small scale and taking the time to notice the mundane.  The minute hairs on a flower stem, the wash of red on the underside of a leaf, the puff of pollen when a bee lands on a blossom.  The world that passes by, unnoticed everyday.

If I’m unable to go outdoors I hunt for inspiration in books and photos. I like to understand the personality of subjects before I paint.  How it moves, lives and survives but also, with botanical subjects, how they feel in my hands, how they sound when they are touched, and, most importantly, how I see them.