1992 Diaspora 96 by 142 cm. £3,500. Framed

Diaspora. 1991. This work was painted in response to the first Gulf War. Norman Adams had a way of making the dreadful beautiful. The painting depicts the displaced Kurds stranded in the hills (beautiful people in a beautiful place). The sky is filled with what are part angels and part war planes. At the time we had used the same planes to drop food and medicines that a few weeks earlier had been used to drop bombs on them.

2000 Dark Madonna. 128 by 124 cm. £4,000 framed

This is one of a series of paintings Norman painted shortly after his mother died. The central figure is his mother, wearing a flowery dress as she often did. She looks very like a nun, making her almost a saint.

Norman had visited his mother and driven home to be told that in the five minutes it had taken him to drive home she had climbed the stairs, got into bed and died. Norman got back into his car and drove back to her, to be shocked by the suddenness of the transition between life and death. One moment his mother had been his mother: ten minutes later she was a body and her soul had gone. One side of this painting is all about life, the sun, bright colours and growing things. The other side is the colour of dead meat, and has the symbols of death.

2002 What The Birds Said to St. Francis 135 by 103 cm. £4,500 framed

This work 'What The Birds Said to St Francis’ is one of my favorite. After Norman died some of his works were in his studio in London and others in Yorkshire. One day I was up in Yorkshire looking through his work when I came across the top half of this work. Clearly very interesting, but I wondered what had happened to the bottom half (which would also contain the title).
A few weeks later I was looking at his works in the South, and I realized that I was looking at the bottom half. I got the two halves together in Yorkshire. 'What the Birds Said to St Francis': Clearly one of the best kept secrets in religion.

2003 Ghosts. 70 by 106 cm. £2.500 framed

Painted just 2 years before Norman died. Norman had Parkinsons Disease, and at this time it was getting very bad. I remember watching him paint at this time. The paper would be flat on a table in front of him and his whole body would be shaking and swaying, but the hand holding his paintbrush would be rock steady.

It is a picture of purgatory. This work shows a great plane inhabited by lost souls. There are winged angels, dressed in white, presumably to help, but also soldiers with helmets and fixed bayonets to keep order. In the centre a man carries a cross. In the distance there are hills, and on the horizon, the Sun is rising or setting. The souls are progressing towards  the horizon. 

Ben Adams