Dales Diary - Saturday 24 April

Roots, Rigg's Beck (Pentel Brushpen, watercolour, A4 sketchbook)

Our two cars met up in Bedale on Friday for a sandwich and to collect the keys. With only a short diversion to the Black Sheep Brewery at Masham for essential supplies (Golden Sheep and Riggwelter), we were soon being astonished by the house that is The Rookery. It's massive. It was once the stable block of the old house, which says something about how big the house must have been.

The rest of the day was spent settling in and wandering round the house and grounds, but the following day, Saturday, I started out with a determination to get at least one drawing done each day. Not particularly ambitious, perhaps, but for me, who likes to walk around a lot taking photographs, it's adequate.

I started with a gentle walk (new boots!) up Rigg's Beck that runs through the farmland round The Rookery. New-born lambs everywhere and an unfortunate number of dead and decaying rabbits. I wondered about the rabbits. Were they being shot and left to rot? Sadly, I suspect myxomatosis is to blame.

The day's one drawing quota was achieved with this drawing of roots falling down into the beck.

Compo & Clegg Again

Branches (Pilot disposable pen, A4 sketchbook)

It's that time of year again. I'm off for my week's drawing and painting today. Drawing mostly, I expect, and mostly things like this sketchbook drawing of ivy branches. And just possibly, a rock or two.

I'll be back in a week to let you know how it all went. Meanwhile, don't get too worked up over the election. He's not worth it.

Restaurant Progress

Kastela Seaside Restaurant (work in progress)

Everything at the Club was still wet today, except for the Harry Ramsden painting, which I've brought home to finish. I knew that would be the case, so I took along this Kastela Restaurant painting and made some headway with it.

There's a lot of balancing of colours to be done but that will probably have to wait for three weeks. Next Friday will be the start of this year's Compo & Clegg Painting Week. This time we're off to the Yorkshire Dales, somewhere I've never been before. What an adventure!

Split Rock

Split Rock (Oil on canvas, 12 x 16 ins)

Back at the Club, I found the owners of the building were making up for the freezing we suffered in the Winter, by pumping out all the heat they must have saved up from that time. Still, it didn't stop me from pressing on with and finishing Split Rock.

With a little time in hand, I gave the poison dwarf in the clothes shop painting her cards and made a start on the upper part of the picture. I'll advertise for someone else to run the store, someone with greater stature. Or maybe it doesn't need anyone in it. What do you think?


Clothes Stall (work in progress)

Old Drawings #56

Cypriot Depths (Charcoal on A1 cartridge paper) Private Collection

My eyes have been bothering me lately. My left eye, in particular, has been aching now and then and blurring occasionally, so I finally gave in and went to have them tested, the first time in 13 years. As I suspected, there's been some deterioration in my vision, especially in the left eye, so I'm on the point of biting the bullet and getting some glasses.

This puts me in the slightly worrying position of not knowing how it might affect my work, how I might cope with painting while wearing glasses and - as a friend asked - whether it might lead me into more detailed painting. I think the latter is unlikely, given that my earlier painting was less detailed years ago, when my eyesight was actually better. The more detailed approach in recent years is due to other factors and is something I keep under review.

All of this, together with some Spring cleaning and some minor work on the house has led to a pause in painting. So for now, here's a drawing done after my first visit to Cyprus in 1999. It's a view into and through an old building whose roof had collapsed, possibly as a result of shelling (it was near the demilitarised zone).

This is the painting that followed on from it. Both drawing and painting were completely ignored by the tutors at Uni, of course, but that was par for the course.


Into the Depths (Oil and collage on canvas, 36 x 36 ins)

Kastela Restaurant Again

Kastela Restaurant (work in progress)

I really was very taken with this restaurant we found in Kastela, a series of little seaside harbours between Split and Trogir. So here's the beginning of another version of it. Built out on stilts into the sea, it's rather like a modest version of our Victorian piers.

Clothes Dwarf

Clothes Stall (work in progress)

Back at the Club after a couple of weeks, I made some adjustments to my clothing. Hah. I mean I put in the folds which has improved things a lot, I think.

However, I'm not at all pleased with this woman who has wandered out of her cubbyhole at the back in an attempt to sell something. She seemed to be OK when I left the studio, but looking at the photograph now, she's definitely gone down in my estimation and appears to have become something of a dwarf. I'll make her grow a bit next time I see her.

Scrubbed In

Kastela Seaside Restaurant (work in progress)

It was a fine Spring day today and I really felt like getting things done, but I'd arranged for the Rat Man to come. He was supposed to call last week, but Something Went Wrong. I guess Something must have Gone Wrong again, because he didn't arrive today either.

As a consequence, the rats are probably still plotting a Second Front and I spent the day pottering. But I did get time to quickly scrub in this small painting which should help fill out the Small Works Collection quite well, I hope.

Keeping Them Coming

Boat in New Harbour, Chania (work in progress)

I've made a little promise to myself to keep these small paintings coming. This is another, started today, on a 30 x 30 cm canvas. As Pat pointed out, it's another boat which could indicate a series, but I suspect that's accidental. There will be more boats, but mostly what I'm aiming for is a set of small paintings of Mediterranean, Aegean and Adriatic subjects.

Another Hour

Chania Harbour (work in progress)

Another useful hour presented itself today and I took advantage of it. I decided to straighten out the curve of the harbour in the interests of composition within the picture plane and have developed the colours and shapes of the buildings. More to be done yet, though.

A Useful Hour

Chania Harbour (work in progress)

On April Jarocka's blog, there's a thoughtful post about time, the uses of it, and its effect or otherwise on achievement. Finding myself with other things to do today, I could still identify an hour or so in which I might get some painting done and I knew I had a small (30 x 30 cm) canvas ready primed with a burnt sienna ground.

I still have a plan to get a good number of small works under my belt this year, so here we are with one of them - a view of Chania harbour with the old tourist ship in the foreground. A decent start, but some way to go yet.

Sawrey Farm

Sawrey Farm (Oil on canvas, 24 x 18 ins)

After some thought, I've decided to do no further work on this painting. I like it the way it is.

This means that there is one more painting outstanding in this series - the Split Rock painting still being worked at the Club. However, I've enjoyed making these images so much that I think it very likely I'll continue with them. I already have my eye on a remarkably deformed tree I found on one of the Compo & Clegg Painting Weeks at Duntrune in Scotland.

Unrecorded Work

Hot damn! No camera! I went to the Club again today and worked on the Split Rock painting, adding trees to the brow of the hill behind the rock. I also did more to the rock, but I had no camera to record what I'd done.

As a consequence - short post.

Critical Mass

Clothes Shop (work in progress)

Like Bob Dylan in Maggie's Farm, I got a head full of ideas/ That are drivin' me insane, which is why I keep beginning new paintings: I need to keep getting them out of my head and onto canvas. So, rather than finishing one of the pictures at the Club today, I took in the new Clothes Shop (which I began just before going off to Corflu) and worked on that. I think it's coming along quite well.

This means, however, that I now have four paintings on the go and that's approaching critical mass, by which I mean that unless I want one of them to start slipping into the background and not be thought about again for maybe some months, I have to start finishing off.

Home Again

Corflu Attendees (minus a couple who couldn't get out of bed) (Photo:Mike Scott)

What a wonderful weekend! I met people I haven't seen in thirty years and it was just like yesterday. In all sorts of ways I can't begin to describe, I came back from Winchester thoroughly invigorated. One cartoon for a fanzine cover already under my belt (a rare enough event in itself) and ideas for new paintings in a notebook.

Old Drawings #55

Snake Root (Charcoal, compressed charcoal on A1 cartridge paper)

This seemed an opportune moment to post the third and last of the Picton Root drawings, because I won't be able to post anything new for a short while. I'm off to Winchester for a few days, to have fun at Corflu, "the convention for SF fanzine fans". If you don't know what a science fiction fanzine fan is, don't worry about it.

As a parting shot, here's something I started last night. Can you tell what it is yet?

Right Turn

Right Turn (Oil on board, 18 x 17 ins) £420

It seems I'm faced with a dearth of exhibiting opportunities this year. Many of the galleries I've shown in during the last couple of years are now booked up for the next couple of years. So, whenever an opportunity arises to get paintings out of the studio and onto a wall, I take it.

The Federation of Northern Art Societies is about to hold its annual exhibition at Preston Hall Museum in Stockton-on-Tees and as a member of the North of England Art Club, I was entitled to submit two paintings for consideration. Which I did. When I got home today after a weekend in Tynemouth, there was a phone message to say that, not only have my paintings been accepted, this one, Right Turn, showing a street in Crete, has been Highly Commended. There's a cheque attached to the Commendation, too.

No major exhibitions maybe, but this year seems to be turning into one of Success by Drip Feed.

Another Rock

Split Rock (work in progress)

There was a private view in town this evening, so I decided I'd go to the Club this afternoon and go on to the preview from there. This turned out to be a not terribly good idea, given that by the time I got to the preview, I'd been on my feet continuously for five hours, so shuffling round the gallery became a test of endurance.

However, on the positive side, at the Club I got yet another rock painting going. There are trees to put in on the brow of the hill. I know I eventually took the background trees out of the Sawrey Farm painting, but - at least for the moment - I think the skyline trees are necessary to make this picture balance. But you never know, I've been wrong before (just don't tell Pat that).

Seeing the Wood for the Trees

Sawrey Farm (work in progress)

Back to the Club today where I was hailed as some kind of hero for my page in Artists & Illustrators. This was, of course, deeply embarrassing and I busied myself with painting out the background trees from the Sawrey Farm picture.

I think this is a big improvement and leaves the painting almost complete. A bit more work on the upper parts of the trees and I may make the sky a little more complex in colour (without destroying the overall flattish quality, I hope).

I'm in the A&I

A while ago I submitted this image to the Artists & Illustrators Magazine for consideration for their Portfolio section. I heard nothing more from them and forgot all about it. Imagine my surprise, then when I was told I was in the April edition!

Special thanks are due to April Jarocka who first drew my attention to the possibility of submitting work to the magazine and then for telling me I was in it! Without her timely heads-up, I might have missed it altogether.

T-Shirt Diversion

Sometimes a bit of my earlier life catches up with me and I'm asked to produce a cartoon. In this case friends wanted a cartoon knight to be incorporated into a design for a T-shirt logo. After several days of toing and froing, colour corrections and adjustments, this is the character I provided.

Everyone involved seems happy with him, and he certainly looks pleased with himself.

Easels and Trees

Sawrey Farm (work in progress)

I took the Sawrey Farm painting to the Club today. It was fairly quiet by the time I got there, but I couldn't help noticing a dismaying number of easels left for someone else to put away. Lot of new members, not enough explanation of studio etiquette perhaps, but who do they think is going to tidy the place up?

I've moved the painting along well, I think, but the trees in the background, which I included for what I thought were perfectly well-justified reasons are troubling me. I'll try losing them next week and see how I feel about it then.

Old Drawings #54

Machine Root (Charcoal, compressed charcoal on A1 cartridge paper)

Yesterday was one of those disastrous occasions in the studio. I attempted something which turned out to be ill-considered and seeing it in the bright light of day today, I recognise that it'll all have to be scraped off.

No time to start afresh today, unfortunately. I have other jobs to do, so here's the second of the Picton Root drawings. This one turned itself into something oddly mechanical.

Abroad Posting

Sawrey Farm (work in progress)

I've recently sold two paintings to a friend and client in San Francisco and had to make arrangements to get them there. My mate and fellow painter Mike Bell (no relation!) suggested I use an online Agent called Interparcel whom he'd used in the past and from their differently priced services, I opted for delivery by UPS. So on Thursday I had to wait for the UPS van to come and collect the parcel. At the time of writing it's in San Francisco now and on the point of being delivered which I think is pretty good service.

What this meant, of course was that I didn't go to the Club to continue with my painting, Above Harry Ramsden's . Nor did I go on Friday, so the painting awaits completion. What i did do on Friday was go to the preview of ØRNULF OPDAHL Mood Paintings of the North at the Northumbria Gallery. I love Opdahl's moody paintings of Norwegian fjords. In fact, although the oils are out of my price range, I have two of his lithographs which I treasure dearly.

Because of the usual chatting with folk I haven't seen for years, I didn't get to see the video interview with Opdahl. People would come up to me and say, "Have you seen the really interesting video?" then talk to me long enough to ensure I couldn't. I'll go back to see the show again and the video, but if you'd like to see the video now, you can do so on the King's Place website. Make sure you enlarge the view to full screen.

Aware that the Harry Ramsden painting presents little in the way of concentrated work to get it finished, I decided I need to get one or two more started, so today I got this Sawrey Farm painting under way. It's another in the Rock & Tree series which is holding my attention at the moment.

Old Drawings #53

Crustacean Root (Charcoal, compressed charcoal on A1 cartridge paper)

In 1999 I was doing research for my BA Dissertation on the Pembrokeshire landscapes of Graham Sutherland and in an effort to get first hand knowledge of the area that so inspired him, I took the opportunity of a stay in Swansea to go for the day to Picton Castle.

Everything I'd read told me that Sutherland had donated his considerable archive to Picton Castle in the form of the Graham and Kathleen Sutherland Foundation, so it came as a big disappointment when we got there to find that everything had been shipped off to Cardiff and the gallery space at the Castle was devoted to contemporary Welsh artists. Apparently funding for the Foundation had proved insufficient and all of Sutherland's papers, drawings, paintings had been lodged with the National Museum Wales.

But the trip wasn't wasted by any means. Before going back we had time to wander along the shores of the Eastern Cleddau where the shaly soil of the banks has fallen into the curious shapes that fascinated Sutherland and where the twisted roots of old oaks poke out into the air.

This drawing is one of three inspired by the roots of the Eastern Cleddau shore. Not done in a terribly Sutherland manner, but they are important to me. As each of them developed, accidental effects made them take on individual characteristics that the original roots didn't obviously possess. This one, for instance began to take on the look (at least to me) of some kind of lobster or other crustacean. These drawings represent an approach not yet explored but waiting for the time to be right.

Just to round this story off, I did get to see the Sutherland Archive in Cardiff. It was unbelievably thrilling to be able to sift through his sketchbooks, squared-up photographs, watercolours, prints and paintings. Definitely a trip to remember.

Buildings with Tyne Bridge

Buildings with Tyne Bridge (Oil on canvas, 9 x 12 ins) £190

I think I'm heading for an entry in the Guinness Book of Records: for the longest-running cold. The cold I developed around Xmas becomes, by turns, a cough, a runny nose, a sneezing fit then a cough .... None of which saw me in much of a mood to get things done at the Club this week. Especially as the revived central heating has brought back members keen to catch up on the gossip.

"Do you know", said Joe, "I've done nothing today but stand around and chat." Then stood around and chatted some more.

Despite all this, I did finish off Buildings with Tyne Bridge which a search of this blog suggests I last worked on in October 2008. This can't be right, because the picture I worked on today was almost complete. Maybe I did more to it at home. Anyway, there was little needed: a few windows here and there, a touch up of railings on the Bridge and there we are, another addition to my increasing collection of Small Works.

The Harry Ramsden's has moved along slowly, with work on the lettering proving a fiddly detail, but next week could see it almost - if not actually - complete.



Above Harry Ramsden's (work in progress)

King's College from The Backs

King's College from The Backs (Oil on canvas, 9 x 12 ins) £190

I should have realised that some of the paint on the King's College painting would still be tacky, which meant that I couldn't make the final adjustments straight away, so I began work on a new painting related to the Seaside Cafe pictures. By the end of the afternoon, the paint was firm enough for me to finish King's College from The Backs. At only 9 x 12 ins., it's a little too fiddly for me to consider anything else like this soon, but I'm quite pleased with the way it's turned out.


Above Harry Ramsden's (work in progress)

I'd already started this painting a month or so ago, but I wasn't happy with the composition, especially as part of the Harry Ramsden signage was off the bottom of the picture. I knew my good friend Kevin had taken a photograph in Brighton at the same time as I took mine, so I asked him for it. His is almost identical but the image was more securely anchored in the rectangle and I much preferred it.

Today's work meant painting over the original start and moving the image slightly to the left and up. I was worried this would take some doing, but it all went well. The only problem now will be in developing the signage so it looks as close to the real one as is desirable.

Picking up the pieces

King's College (work in progress)

Another week of getting nothing substantial done at home, so back to the Club today, only to find that - hurrah! - the boiler has been fixed and people are trickling back to the studio. Old Tom was there, working on the big woodland painting he's been tinkering with for the best part of a year.

"When will it be finished, Tom?" I asked.

"2030" he said, after some consideration.

"How old will you be then?"

"108"

I like his style.

For myself, I'm going through one of those catching up periods when I finish off all the paintings that tend to get put to one side when I have to concentrate on making work for an exhibition. The two Seaside Cafe pictures belong to that category, and so does this painting of King's College, Cambridge.

It's almost complete; just a bit of work to do on the lawn and perhaps a taking down of the windows of the white building. I'm tempted to go back to the Club tomorrow to finish it off. If I do, I must make sure the photograph I take of it isn't influenced by light reflecting on the sky.

Seaside Cafe Nos 1 & 2

Seaside Cafe No.1 (Fortunes of War) - (Oil on canvas, 9 x 12 ins.)
Private Collection


Seaside Cafe No.2 (Due South) - (Oil on canvas, 9 x 12 ins.) £190

The cold weather, coupled with the failure of the Art Club's boiler meant that when I got there yesterday, the oldsters had decided that they couldn't take any more frozen bones and gone home.


Bolbec Hall Studio

In splendid isolation, I set to and finished off the two paintings of Brighton cafes

Old Drawings #52

Rooftops (Charcoal and compressed charcoal on cartridge paper)

This drawing is clouded in uncertainty. I don't really remember when I did it, but this seems an appropriate point in the Old Drawings scheme of things to post it. I can't locate the dimensions of it either, although I suspect it was done on a sheet of A1 cartridge paper.

It's a drawing of the rooftops to be seen if you look over the Western side of the Tyne Bridge. Eventually, I made a painting from it, but people so rarely look over the side of the Tyne Bridge that no one knew where it was and kept asking if it might be somewhere in the Mediterranean! The painting is in a private collection, so I don't have access to a good photograph of it, I'm afraid.