This was a painting I did in acrylic when I was 18, in the summer just before going to University (to think it was almost half my life ago makes me feel physically sick).

It was an idea of jellybabies escaping from their jar, using a neighboring candy-cane jar. The paradox is that the jellybabies wouldn’t have been able to escape the jar to be able to lower the canes in. I called it “Escape Yourself” because it was supposed to be a metaphor for enlightenment, that we can’t escape ourselves long enough to really appreciate various truths about ourselves and our lives.

I had my two best friends at the time paint two of the small bears sat on the ledge at the bottom.

Those bears represented each of us, facing the warm exciting glow of the future, about to take the plunge.