Why I Keep Coming Back to the Jungle

My as-yet-unfinished lemur painting. Still a work in progress.

In April 2025, I was lucky enough to visit Madagascar - a trip that was, unsurprisingly, very much driven by my love of wildlife and wanting to see animals in their natural environment.

I knew Madagascar was the place to see lemurs, but what I hadn’t appreciated before going was just how many different kinds there are. When you think of a lemur, the black-and-white ring-tailed variety is probably the one that immediately springs to mind, but there are many different species, all with their own colours, markings and personalities.

I think we saw this particular lemur in Isalo National Park, travelling through the forest with a group of others. They seemed to move along the forest floor in a long, slightly chaotic procession, one following another through the jungle. They were not at all worried by our presence, and I think that’s both how I caught this lemur in a relaxed moment of stillness and why I wanted to paint it.

Why this particular lemur?

The lemur sits almost centrally in the image, while behind it the dense foliage opens up into bright, almost overexposed gaps of light. In the foreground there’s a large area of rock, which I’m hoping will really emphasise the depth once it becomes part of the painting.

And there’s something slightly unusual about the image too. This is the classic black-and-white ring-tailed lemur, but you can’t see its famous tail at all. Instead, it’s sitting quite happily, lazily gazing back over it’s shoulder and looking right at us.

I like that. Without the instantly recognisable tail, you have to look a little harder. And your attention is drawn straight to those eyes.

One tiny mark at a time

Instead of working in washes and layers of paint, I work through the painting one colour at a time. The fur is probably the best example of this. At the moment, I’m spending a ridiculous amount of time adding tiny individual marks in a variety of colours, to suggest the direction and texture of the fur. Slowly the shape of the lemur should emerge.

This was the painting I chose to take in to Swindon Open Studios as my “work in progress” piece, and it is still being worked on now. I have a way to go with it, but I’m enjoying the details of the branches, overlapping leaves and light sneaking through gaps. It is a painting which is a sign of where my work has been heading. I seem to be drawn to painting jungle scenes, tropical plants and wildlife. There’s something about the intense colour, dense foliage and unexpected glimpse of an animal amongst it all that I can’t seem to get enough of. How the surrounding plants and light can be just as important to the composition as the animal itself.

It will not be the only jungle resident making an appearance in my studio though. At Swindon Open Studios, I asked visitors what jungle animal I should paint next - and there were some very definite suggestions. I’m not finished with the jungle just yet…!