Though it was still early summer the last few days had been hot and clear. The gallery faced a park but I had not been able to take much advantage of the heat while setting up the show in Stockholm. Now I rolled down the car windows and when I could I stopped and sat by the shore. There seemed to be a lake every few kilometres. That was usually where one found the small villages or groups of what looked like holiday homes strung along the edge of the lake. between the lakes were relentless pine forests. the land was gently rolling but not dramatic

The landscape paintings that I have made have all been trying to make a space behind the surface. A space that was clearly false but that you could see into, like a reflection or even a photograph. In a sense it doesn't matter what view you draw as long as it encourages the viewer to look into it, but I had come to Scandinavia to draw the dramatic landscapes that I'd imagined I would find. I have made a lot of paintings of roads, taking photos from the drivers seat. I wanted to avoid that here but to play safe I continued to photograph the road occasionally

I had bought three CD's with me, Dido's "Life for rent", Led Zeppelin "Live" and a relaxation CD called "Bali Dreams". I played them on loop throughout the day. Each one provided a different soundtrack to the passing landscape. I played Dido while getting out of Stockholm in an attempt to lighten my mood. I was now onto the relaxation CD. I have bought a lot of these using them as inspiration for soundtracks that I have commissioned. I play the music or sometimes natural sound effects through speakers hidden behind the paintings. The CD's often mix repetitive computer instrumentals with natural sounds, which is what happens if I exhibit more than one "sound painting"

I have travelled a fair amount both as a tourist and for work but it's only since late 1998 that I have drawn specific landscapes from real places. I made the first ones from photos I took on the way to do a print project in Darwin. I drew an image of Alice Springs airport and one of the Sydney Opera House, drawn from across the bay where I had been installing a sculpture. I later used photos from previous trips, searching through old cardboard boxes in the basement. I've always tended to photograph anything that interested me, what have you got to loose? But i became more focused and had an idea of the kind of view I could draw. I realized that this was potentially limiting and determined to photograph anything that caught my interest. I stopped to photograph piles of logs and rock cliff faces as well as the usual distant views. I also took a lot of shots of the water, but this was not something new for me

I had imagined that it would take me two full days to drive to Oslo but although I was taking small roads I was already well ahead of schedule. I began to revise the trip. I would arrive in Oslo earlier leaving more time to see Norway, and if I drove North now instead of West it would be a longer journey but I would reach higher ground that might be wilder and more interesting. I could find a place to stay in a small town near the border and then spend the following day driving back down to Oslo

I grew up in Oxford but in 1979 I went to study art in London. I loved making art every day but missed Oxford and the countryside. I had met a girl at college and during the first summer holiday we borrowed my fathers' rowing boat and tiny outboard engine and motored along the Thames from Oxford down to London. It rained most of the way and we covered ourselves in tarpaulins and camped on the riverbank at night. I drew all the way and when I was back at college I made a series of small paintings from the drawings that resembled frames from a cartoon strip. The trip gave me an endless supply of views each different but made up of the same elements. I don't know where they are except for one that I gave my grandmother which I took back after she died

I had been driving for a couple of hours and started to pass large lakes surrounded by pine forests. At the head or foot of each lake was usually a small town. many had made the lake front into a small park with benches. Often the church and graveyard would be slightly up the hill from the park. It was easy to stop the car as there was very little traffic and wander down to the lake shore. There was no one around and I circled the churches on foot. They were all closed. The towns and the landscape reminded me of upstate New York; wooden buildings painted reds and yellows, pine trees, white fences and good roads

Throughout my childhood my family had owned a boat. My Father took navigation night school classes and avidly planned trips along the English South coast .We often sailed across the channel to France and Holland. It was a small rather slow boat and we usually hugged the coast where possible, taking most of a day to get from one port to another. It could be very boring and we would read or catch fish. I would draw the passing views. This far out from the coast, the sea and the sky were split by a thin but complicated strip of land. The cliffs are dark and the fields a vivid green divided by long lines of hedgerow. In 1974 my parents bought a house in a Cornish village on the South Coast. My sister helped me paint such a scene on a wall in one of the bedrooms. The wall was just painted blue but was split by the greens and browns of the coast at about chest height. We had to draw the scene over lumpy wallpaper but the effect was quite realistic, and made a nice view from the bed

It had been the usual rush to get the work ready for the Stockholm show and the openings had been intense with a lot of strangers to deal with. I had mixed feelings about how the show had gone down and felt a bit pessimistic despite the great weather. I don't really like the idea of going out looking for views to draw, it seldom works, leaving me feeling confused and stupid as I wander around trying to find some kind of perfection, something I already have in my mind that I am trying to match. I was probably wasting my time with this quixotic trip especially as the landscape so far seemed nice but fairly bland and built up. I was determined to take things as they came but hurried inland

I only had a vague idea of the lay out of Scandinavia. My Swedish gallerist told me that I could easily drive from Stockholm to Oslo where I had a gallery to visit and then on to Stavanger on the West coast of Norway from where I could fly home to London. He booked the air tickets and arranged the hire car. These days when I make an exhibition abroad I tend to do it as quickly as possible so as not to loose a whole week's work and to be back in time for the weekends when I see my eldest daughter. I get flash images of towns like Vienna or Chicago, spending more time in airports and galleries than looking around. Once decided it hadn't been too hard to keep a week clear of meetings and commitments