The Painter and The Poet

Sometimes the right connection comes out of nowhere. That’s what happened with me and Atom St George.

We’ve never met in person. We live on opposite sides of the world. Different time zones, different daily lives, different struggles but one thing tied us together MS. We both live with it. Different symptoms, different battles but the same shadow following us around every day.

Atom paints. I write. Simple as that. But what made this so powerful is how those two things collided. Atom would send me a painting and I’d just sit with it. Stare at it, the movement, the feeling it gave off. Then I’d build words around it. My job wasn’t to explain the art, it was to give it a voice. 

To let his paint speak through my pen.

It wasn’t always easy. MS doesn’t care if you’ve got a deadline or a spark of inspiration. Fatigue, brain fog, pain, they don’t wait for the right moment but that’s exactly what made it matter. Every poem that came out of those paintings wasn’t just creative, it was connection. It was two people, both fighting their own invisible battles, pushing through to create something real.

That’s what I love about this connection. It showed me that creativity doesn’t need to be face to face. It doesn’t need a shared studio or a long list of plans. Sometimes it’s as simple as one person creating, another person responding, and both recognising the struggle underneath it all.

For me, Atom’s art pulled out words I might not have found on my own. For him, maybe my words gave a second layer to his work. Together, we built something that proves connection has no borders. MS might slow us down, but it doesn’t stop us.

This wasn’t just collaboration. It was proof that creativity crosses oceans, that resilience echoes louder when it’s shared, and that art, whether paint or poetry, always finds a way to speak.

You can find our joint videos on either of our socials or YouTube, the book is complete so hold tight for the release of that. 

The Painter and The Poet 

Atom St George x Robert Gillett - Beneath The Tracksuit 

One Scar. Atom St George