Naive John is a self-taught artist. Early work like "The Blue Man" (1988) with its use of flattened space and cartoon imagery predates Lowbrow art and Pop Surrealism and is indicative of the artist's approach to art production. His current paintings combine mythological, surreal and popular images juxtaposed with Liverpool's urban setting. They often refer to concerns for the environment with a humorous element. The painting "Sefton Park – Genetically Modified" is a good example of the issues the artist has explored. In other paintings figures are shown in isolation and appear pensive and alienated from the rest of society. The relationship between the difficulty facing ordinary human beings making moral choices when they have to face hostile environmental factors is portrayed in "Toxteth Cherub".