How do you develop your skills?
I think the first thing is that I come up with crazy ideas all the time. So that is the starting point, crazy ideas. In terms of my skills, Alison Wilson brought me on, because she was a very talented artist in her own right and she really taught me.
Now I completed my GCSE in Art in prison and I got an A, and it was the first time in my life that I achieved something; first time I got an award for something good. I had received awards for other things when I was in the UDA, and the UFF, but this was for my art.
How did you feel about getting an A in your GCSE Art?
I felt very proud. It also mattered to my family because then everyone can see you are doing something good with your life.
I entered 5 pieces for the Koestler competition and Grayson Perry was the judge and I won 5 awards. The comments I got back from that competition from such a well-established artist gave me so much inspiration. It really makes a huge difference to your life when you are a prisoner.
The Koestler Foundation flew me over to London; that was the first time I had even been to London, and I saw my work displayed in the Southbank Centre. Seeing your work on display in somewhere like that is mind-blowing.
Are there any themes you look at through your art?
At the moment I doing work which goes back, sort of, to my ideas in school and my GCSE’s all those years ago. It’s called “Made in Ulster” and it will be work looking at “The Troubles”. It really is pretty much the same idea that I had developed at school but it has moved on a lot since then.
I was at an RUA exhibition at the Ulster Museum just recently and I was talking to some girls who work there and I was telling them about my idea and they wanted me to keep in touch because I might be able to hold my exhibition there.
