In 1965 Suleman Sulajee fell to his death from the 7th floor of the Police headquarters in Pretoria. His body was covered with small round blisters. They were made, not by the sun melting wax from wing feathers, but by cigarettes. The image of his despairing plummet to earth merged into y anger at the jealous Sun God’s destruction of Icarus, so foolish and so human. The falling figures in my work are symbols of despair and courage.

Then we were all forced to witness those terrible helpless freefall flights from the burning World Trade Centre.

These paintings are about human flight, about human endeavour. They are not about buildings, or trades, or nation-states.

I have notes in sketch-books – ‘a bird does not exist to be bone, blood and feather, but to brush the air with its wings’

‘the preciseness of a bird in flight balanced between nothing and nothing’