Born in Cumbria in 1964, Halliday was brought up on a farm overlooked by the Pennines in rural Cumbria. The surrounding landscape was to have a lasting impression on him. Graduating from Exeter in 1992 with a BA Honours in Fine Art, he pursued his interest in contemporary art in London. There, he produced a range of work, much of which reflected his concern for the destruction of our environment and was full of messages. However, when a painting he did one day appeared to be a simple seascape and yet he was drawn to it, Halliday realised that he wanted to explore more. Gradually he turned his back on what seemed to him the purely cerebral nature of Contemporary Art and started to paint what was around him in the City of London.

In 2005 a move to Derbyshire put him in a new but essentially rural landscape again. As his relationship with that landscape became more established, Halliday realised the growing importance for him of the “application of paint”, and that painting landscapes without reference to people or buildings allows that to predominate adding a timeless quality to the work.

“I paint Landscapes because that is what I most relate to, my working method is very bold and expressive as I want a painting to look like a painting and not get bogged down with detail.”​