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About Joe
Although I've been drawing and making art since childhood, I've never found one style or visual voice that I come back to again and again.
Now I see that variation as one of my greatest strengths. Working across different styles, techniques and kinds of artwork allows me to adapt to the project, rather than making every project adapt to me.
My Background
My formal training took a slightly unusual route. After leaving school in 2003, I trained at the Merseyside Forum for Painting, Sculpture and Allied Crafts, at the former Tyson-Smith Studio in Liverpool's historic Bluecoat Chambers.
Rather than following a conventional fine-art course, the training was extremely hands-on, covering a diverse range of skills and techniques including draughtsmanship and painting alongside restoration, stone carving, clay modelling, mould making, fresco work, resin, fibreglass and other traditional and contemporary techniques.
It gave me a much broader understanding of making things than I probably appreciated at the time. From there, I went into partnership with my brother as Forrest Fine Arts in 2007, producing commercial work for bars and restaurants, including Vodka Revolution. I also completed a separate solo commission with Jamie Carragher's 23 Foundation.
I later spent several years working in graphic, web and logo design before returning fully to artwork and commissions as a solo artist in 2016. One of my first major projects after returning fully to artwork was a collection of murals and canvases for Simon Rimmer's pub The Viking in West Kirby, Wirral.
Since then, the work has taken me around the UK and into long-running relationships with businesses, designers and contractors, alongside private commissions, portraits, murals, commercial interiors and public artwork. Looking back, the route makes more sense than it probably did while I was taking it. Drawing, traditional craft, design, making and problem-solving all feed into the way I work now.
How I Work
In practice, I start with what the project needs rather than a fixed house style. Sometimes that means detailed traditional painting. Another project might need bold graphics, loose expressive marks, accurate reproduction of supplied artwork or a mixture of completely different techniques.
I enjoy both sides of the job: working out what the artwork should be and then figuring out how to actually make it work. Clients don't need to arrive with everything resolved. Some bring detailed briefs and finished designs; others have a photograph, a few references or simply know there is something they want to do with a particular subject or space.
A large part of my job is interpreting those starting points, asking the right questions and finding an approach that actually works.
That unpredictability is probably why I'm still interested in doing it over 20 years later.
Recent projects have taken me around the UK, from Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Anglesey to London, and I'm always interested to see what the next brief will bring.
A Longer Version of the Story
In 2025 I wrote a more personal piece about how I became an artist, the different turns the business has taken and some of what I learned along the way.
Have an idea in mind?
You don't need to have everything worked out before getting in touch.
If you have a space, a photograph, a design, a strange problem or simply something you've been wondering whether an artist could do, send it over.
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