SEEING THE OPTIMISM WITHIN OUR LIVES

MISSION TO INSPIRE

My mission is to inspire you to feel uplifted and truly engaged with the natural world around you. With the artworks I create I encourage you to shift your perspective so that you can appreciate how much joy and wonder surrounds you in your daily life. The artworks are stylised celebrations of the world and they help you tune in to your peak mental state and experience your world with ultimate passion and excitement.

Life can be as vibrant & uplifting as we envision it to be, step into a landscape that radiates joy and wonder to elevate your mood and transform your mind-set.

Throughout my life I’ve experienced bouts of depression as many of us do, and it was during my early 20’s that I realised painting provided a solution. Through creating beautiful paintings and envisioning an optimistic future ahead I came to realise that I could escape my depression (or at least work through it) and in turn transform my dark moods. I learnt that the paintings I created also helped other people focus on a future of optimism ahead, and that gave me the reason for being. A reason for living.

My paintings are aspirational projections of the self into a better future. The reminder to keep persevering in our everyday towards a brighter future - even when that may feel far away in the distant future.

FINDING PLEASURE IN ESCAPE

A unifying theme that runs throughout my paintings is that of escapism. My paintings capture idyllic places and sunnier visions of the world to escape the darkest days we may find ourselves. I believe that if you surround yourself with the state of mind you long for or the places you want to end up, then eventually they will manifest themselves into your reality. It’s all part of the process of visualisation in the pursuit of our desired futures. From time to time we all long to escape and by focusing on where we want to be rather than dwelling on what we are trying to escape from - I believe is the best pathway forward. My paintings are an extension of this idea. I don’t want to paint what is actually there, I want to create a heightened sense of what could be.

‘’For me painting has always been about finding pleasure in escape. Something that I read stayed with me, it said - art is the highest form of hope.’

Video produced by Julian Langham:  https://julianlangham.co.uk  

ACHIEVEMENTS

• Art shown on the London Underground.

• Successful exhibitions in London, Cambridge, Cornwall, Norfolk, Suffolk & Dorset.

• Raised £29,300 for (Wild in Art) Charity Art Auctions by 2015

• Art commissions from numerous clients including Marks & Spencer and Starbucks

• Greeting Card Range sold across the UK

• Shortlisted for the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition

• Featured in a BBC article. Read it HERE

BIOGRAPHY

Born in Norfolk, Samuel Thomas actively resisted pursuing the credentials of becoming a formally trained artist after a brief stint at university. He instead decided to throw himself into painting at the age of 20 and he prides himself on being a self-taught artist.

‘Painting is my life and an extension of how I see the world, formal training didn’t offer me the freedom to paint or pursue the vision I had. I just wanted to do my own thing. I guess I never really did fit in anyway!!!’

Full of passion and conviction Samuel taught himself to paint and eventually started holding his own art exhibitions. As a self-taught artist Samuel had the freedom to experiment and he found himself using some innovative techniques from using tea, coffee and sand to paint with, and instead of painting canvases, he used found objects from life-rings, surfboards and old floorboards!

He eventually carved out his own unique and distinctive painting style, using acrylic paint on large canvas panels and his visions are all about ‘finding pleasure in escape’ - notably in his seaside depictions. However the artist endeavours to keep evolving and developing in his life of painting as he believes life is an ever-searching experience for all of us. And ultimately art reflects life.

THREE KEY STYLES - ONE PHILOSOPHY

The artist works in three key styles across his painting collection that together form THE ART OF OPTIMISM, with the all encompassing philosophy that: ‘A vision of an inspiring future keeps us persevering throughout life’s challenges’. However each style explores the theme of optimism from a slightly different perspective.

For example his geometric Pop art style very much celebrates living in the moment and experiencing the good times in a hedonistic manner. His textured, atmospheric and more realistic landscape paintings explore the concept; that as much as we may crave the brighter days ahead, sometimes we have to persist to journey through the darker times to get there. In contrast his Dreamscape sketches are more contemplative, reflective and surreal. They explore the abstract ideas of life and the fact that as much as we want it to, sometimes life just doesn’t make much sense - it’s very much upto us to try and make sense of it. Samuel believes that remaining optimistic is a real driving force even when we’re desperately trying to resolve issues or whilst we’re striving towards the things we believe will make us happy. Ironically human beings are very rarely happy and content for a long period of time - we’re hard wired to keep striving. Nevertheless optimism should prevail.

In summary our lives are not set out to be linear, formulaic or without challenges - consequently the artists painting style reflects and explores this. You can understand the deeper story behind the artist’s evolution HERE.

‘Our memories of the past sustain us,

Our dreams of the near future keep us persevering,

Celebrating today’s pleasures keeps us living for today.’