This year, I’ve been quietly working in the background on the pieces I shot and began developing toward the end of last year. From that body of work, a number of new pieces have emerged across different forms including visual art, immersive work and mixed media.

So far this year, I’ve submitted work to two international open calls and I’m currently waiting to hear back from both. Within the next week, I’ll also be submitting to a third international open and I’ve recently been invited to submit work for a particularly interesting art magazine which I’m considering at the moment.

This month I was due to exhibit at the Cannes Film Festival with a prestigious gallery from Berlin. Every year, there’s a specific opportunity for artists to exhibit during the festival and it brings together a wide range of curators, collectors and people exploring contemporary work internationally. I had also been invited to participate in a couple of other exhibitions across Europe.

For me choosing to do so represented quite a significant personal shift.

Although I create work and regularly put it forward for international opportunities, I’ve never naturally been someone who is highly socially present within the art world beyond what has been necessary for exhibitions in London and Glasgow. Since the end of last year however, I made a conscious decision that if these opportunities arose I would step into them.

I had decided that I would attend Cannes.

However, privately, this year has involved navigating some difficult personal circumstances. After a great deal of thought, I made the difficult decision to withdraw from the French exhibition and the wider travel commitments connected.

That said, the gallery has kindly kept my place open and invited me to return next year instead which is most likely what will happen. I’ll keep you updated as things progress.

Alongside this, I submitted work again this year for Artist of the Year. Last year, I was selected and while I didn’t become a finalist, that was never really the point for me. I’ve entered again this year and may or may not be successful and that’s okay. For me, none of this has ever been about winning. What matters is having spaces beyond my own platform where the work can exist and where the conversations surrounding it can continue.

The work I create has always been rooted in opening questions people may not ordinarily sit with in day-to-day life. If the artwork can create even a brief pause where someone feels invited to reflect, question or connect with something internally, then it has already done something meaningful.

Alongside my own practice, I continue to support community projects and other artists wherever I can. That remains deeply important to me. There are many people doing extraordinary work that should be recognised. Where I can support that, I will continue to do so.

There are also larger plans beginning to take shape in the background although they are still in their early stages and I’m not ready to say too much about them yet. More of that will become clear toward the end of this year.

For now, I’ll continue building on what I know is the path forward.

Thank you to everyone who continues to follow the journey, read the blog, support the projects I share and engage with the conversations that my personal work creates. There is much more to come.