What Landscape Artist of the Year Taught Me About Thinking

(A reflection)

In 2020, I took part in Sky Arts’ Landscape Artist of the Year.

On paper, it’s simple:

turn up, paint a landscape, do your best.

In reality, it’s something else entirely.

It’s time-limited. Public. Compressed.

Cameras move around you. The weather shifts. The light changes.

You’re surrounded by other people making beautiful work.

And your own expectations arrive louder than you’d like them to.

It’s also a very direct way of stepping outside your comfort zone.

Because it isn’t just your work on display — it’s your process.

Your decisions. Your judgement. Your confidence.

All happening in real time.

When you put yourself out there like that, something shifts.

It becomes less about painting a view,

and more about watching what happens to your thinking under pressure.

And it made me wonder:

What if creativity doesn’t disappear under pressure…

it just narrows?

What if the issue isn’t a lack of talent or ideas…

but the conditions we’re trying to think inside?

Because when conditions tighten, thinking tightens.

Time shrinks.

Expectation grows.

The outcome starts shouting louder than the work.

And suddenly you stop seeing what’s in front of you

and start managing what might go wrong.

The turning point wasn’t a big breakthrough.

It was a small return to something simple:

What do I actually see?

Not what should it look like.

Not what will impress someone.

Not what outcome do I need.

Just… what do I see?

That shift did more than improve the painting.

It loosened the thinking.

And it reminded me of something useful:

Sometimes going outside your comfort zone doesn’t unlock bravery straight away.

Sometimes it just reveals where your thinking tightens — and what helps it open again.

Sometimes the way forward isn’t pushing harder.

It’s changing one small condition so thinking can move again.

Sometimes that’s all it takes.