Interview.

TOSH: When did you start painting?

TM: I started painting in oils when I was fourteen. I was the only pupil at school who was painting in oils. However, it wasn't until I attended the Byam Shaw School of Art (1981 to 1984) that I learned how long to spend on a painting. That is what art school taught me. Corrections, corrections and more corrections. Self-assessment. If a painting is not quite right, it is not quite finished.

TOSH: When did you start writing poetry?

TM: I started writing poetry when I was fifteen. I had two poems published in the Hull University staff magazine, where I was a post-boy. Philip Larkin was the librarian, he read them and gave me some words of encouragement. The poems were terrible. I cringe when I think of them now. My education was poor. I went to a dead end school. No G.C.E.'s, not even C.S.E.'s. At school leaving age the career's officer came around and asked, "What would you like to do?" Whatever suggestions you gave the career's officer replied with the question, "Would you like to work in a factory or a shop?" Those were the options. And so my working life began. In the North-East there was very little cultural life, at that time, and if it was there it was difficult to find If you didn't come from a particular type of background. Options seemed very limited, and a lack of confidence made them appear even more so. Britain was, and still is a very class conscious society. There are too many people doing one another favours. I think that is why many people and artists find it difficult to get their breaks. Rejections can also be very demoralising. I left Yorkshire when I was seventeen. I wrote a few bad poems in London. In 1967 I travelled to India. I wrote a number of things I called 'word dramas', most were unpublishable. A handful were interesting because of the subject matter and source material. Technology, Science, politics from cut-up press cuttings. When I returned to the U.K. I wrote very little, nothing to write home about! I went to a few poetry meetings which were more like confrontation groups for psychotics. Slanging matches to fights. Having something to say is one thing, being able to say it in a prose style is something else. For the most part, I can express myself but words still don't come easily.

TOSH: Why did you start painting , writing, etc.?

TM: I react to the world, sometimes I turn my response into an expression with a recognizable form- then I guess, that's what it is- some kind of art.

Tiger Eye: What is your eye condition?

The condition I have is: Stargardt's Flavimaculatus. 
I am registered blind with the local authority.
I can no longer read normal print, even with a visual aid.
Obviously, I have some sight, but it is not easy to see details, moving objects, or things in the distance.

Tiger Eye: How do you focus with a camera?

I use a loope, and line up the F-stops with the measure. I know what my depth of field is. If I am out with my camera I set the shutter speed, and then set the right F-stop to infinity. I know what is the nearest distance I have in focus. Everything after that will be in focus, too. I also carry a metal tape measure in my bag for when I am shooting something close up.