A Week in Staithes (5)

Chimneys, Staithes (0.8 fine  line marker in 21 x 26 cm sketchbook)

As the freezing wind ate away at my confidence to do work of any duration, I went back up the path I'd used the day before. This time, however, instead of concentrating on what lay across the valley I decided to draw what was closer to where I stood.

You might think that the lines in the background represent a cloudy sky, but they are, in fact, a basic delineation of part of Cowbar Nab, the grass-covered rocky outcrop to the west of Staithes. The Nab is covered in nesting seagulls, but at least one of them has settled on the smaller chimneys to the left.

A Week in Staithes (4)

Yellow Houses at Staithes 
(Disposable fountain pen with watercolour pencils in 21 x 26 cm sketchbook)

No wind abatement, so by now I was looking for places where I might get a bit of shelter. Half way up a path that climbed the south side of the valley, I found I could look across the roofs to the other side.

I really liked the yellow houses over there, so I was disappointed when the lines from the disposable pen ran into the yellow pencil and spoiled its purity

A Week in Staithes (3)

Houses above Staithes Beck (4B pencil in 21 x 26 cm sketchbook)

Some of the best subjects in Staithes are concentrated on and round the Beck which runs through the bottom of the valley. This drawing was done at the upper end of the town where a set of concrete stepping stones allow you to cross the Beck.

What attracted me was the diagonal arrangement and I'm keen to see how it works out as a painting.. At the time I planned to make more of this area but I soon came to realise that standing still in the bottom of the valley with the freezing wind blowing in my face was bearable for only a short while. A visit to the warming atmosphere of the Royal George was soon called for.

A Week in Staithes (2)

From Westgate, Staithes (Watercolour and crayon in A4 sketchbook)

Later in the day, after I'd been on the valley top, the weather turned wet. It wasn't the torrential rain we'd been told was coming, but wet enough to make us stay indoors for the rest of the afternoon. While the others worked on things they'd done earlier, I stared out of the window from my chair by the dining room table. Eventually, I figured I might as well have a go at drawing what I could see.

I have to say I didn't much care for this drawing when I'd finished it, but I'm coming round to it now. It started with a 2B mechanical pencil, then had watercolour washes added. Finally, I tried out some crayons I'd bought years ago and not used and which I discovered this time I don't really like at all.

The box says they're "Special Guitar Artist's Crayons - especially made for tropical use". I guess the reason they're suitable for tropical use is that for wax crayons they're horribly short of wax which makes them go on in an unpleasant dry manner. I think I might get rid of them and accept that the "24p" price still visible on the box is something I can afford to lose.

A Week in Staithes

Staithes Roofs (0.8 fine line marker in 21 x 26 cm sketchbook)

As I do every year, I went off at the beginning of the month for a week's "painting" with some of my mates from the Art Club. I put that in inverted commas, because it's rare for me to get anywhere near some paint. Mostly, it's a couple of sketchbooks and some favourite pencils and pens and maybe a slosh of watercolour and a smudge of coloured Conte.

I honestly thought this year might be different.  For one, in Staithes  I'd be amongst buildings, which should mean I'd not be hunting for the odd twisted tree to provide some structure. Buildings, after all, are my thing. So it did seem as if I might at least get out the tubes of gouache I take along every year.

But I'd reckoned without the wonderful British weather. The north easterlies blew straight in off the North Sea and up the Staithes Beck valley. Although the torrential rain we'd been promised in the forecast didn't materialise, and the sun shone quite a bit, it was bitterly cold - one night saw temperatures drop to -6C!

But I set off with a good heart the day after we arrived, climbing up the side of the valley to look down on the town. From there I could see Westgate, the house we were staying in  That's it in the centre of the drawing, just across from the former chapel now housing the Captian Cook and Staithes Museum.

Surprisingly, the wind wasn't too bad at the top of the valley, so I was able to spend a couple of hours working on this drawing. I thought about adding colour, but I was coming to the view that I might do without colour or tone in the sketchbook on this trip, so I left it as it is.

Hard Drivin' Man

Had I opted for a new hard drive to be fitted in me, as I joked last time, I might now find myself with several fingers (or worse) missing. My backup drive has let me down and I've had to painstakingly restore much of my data from a CD of my paintings up to October 2011, the photographs I still have in my camera (luckily I haven't wiped most of those in the last two years) and from elsewhere on the web.

What I'm unable to replace are the bits and pieces of work I'd done with photograph modification, collaging etc, but I'm taking the optimistic view that sometimes a good clear out  and a fresh start can be invigorating.

Hang on while the invigoration takes hold.

Hard Drive Blues

Please bear with me for a while. I've had to have a new hard drive fitted - in the PC, of course, not in me, although I sometimes wonder if I could do with a new one too. It's going to take a while to get everything loaded up again and back to something resembling normality.

Very First Sketch Book ( #2 )

Monastery above Naxos 26/9/85
(Fineline marker and grey felt-tip in A5 sketch book)

After Athens I moved on to Naxos and made this quick sketch of a monastery above the town. The felt-tip was a  rather clumsy tool, I found.

Cathedral Work

Cathedral (work in progress)

Back to the Club on Friday to spend a short time working on the Cathedral painting. The foreground is coming along, but the more distant view will take some time to get right, I think.

[And as an aside, can I just say how irritating I find the new Blogger posting system  It wasn't broke; it didn't need fixing.]

Preparations for a Show

Madonna of the Toboggan (Oil on canvas, 36 x 48 ins)        
                                

Magic Mushroom (Oil on canvas, 28 31 ins)

Passing a Palazzo (Oil on canvas, 36 x 36 ins)

 Central Hotel with Cars (Oil on canvas, 24 x 24 ins)

Train with Prickly Pear (Soller)  (Oil on canvas, 24 x 24 ins)

I'm beginning to put together some pictures for a new Figure8 show in Bishop Auckland Town Hall. There won't be any new paintings from me in the show, but I'm trying out some combinations of old and new ones to see what resonances they might draw from one another. I rather like the old Hoppings paintings (the two at the top) with the more recent vaporetto, car and train images. 

The Hoppings paintings date from 2004 and show that even then I was intrigued by the idea of  "people in containers".

Hot Cathedral

Cathedral (work in progress)

I had some good news today which made me want to get on with some fresh painting. So it was back to the Art Club where I set about painting what seems to be a view of Newcastle-en-Provence but is in fact St Nicholas's Cathedral in Newcastle upon Tyne. A good start on what was actually a very wet day.

Very First Sketch Book ( #1 )

Opposite Hotel Pythagorion 16.9.85 (Fine marker in A5 sketchbook)

I'm still finding a reluctance to get work done right now, but it's always been my policy to try to keep blogging through these flat patches.

Previously, I posted from my series of Old Drawings but those are all posted here now. So what I've decided to do is work my way through my sketchbooks. I've mentioned before that the sketchbook habit has evaded me over the years, but I do have quite a few sketchbooks and some of them even have drawings in them!

In 1985 I decided to try to get into the habit of sketching and bought an A5 spiral bound sketchbook to take with me on a trip to Greece. This is the first sketch I made, looking out of the window of my room at the Hotel Pythagorion in Athens. It was done quickly as I'm sure you can tell and I used a rather unsympathetic marker, but I was happy with it at the time.

I've often thought that I might use the sketch as the basis of a painting, but that hasn't happened so far.

Back to the Cakes

Glasgow Cakes (WIP)

I figured it was time to move this painting to a conclusion. It's not quite there yet, but it doesn't have far to go. All I have to do now is find the reference material I was using and which I seem to have mislaid during my break. Tsk.

Sold

Shark Rock (Oil on canvas, 12 x 1 2ins)



On the Wansbeck (Oil on board, 9 x 16 ins)



Bigg Market Buildings (Oil on board, 5 x 7 ins)

As an interesting corollary to the previous post, I thought it worth mentioning that during the Month of Short Retirement, I did in fact sell these three paintings to some good friends who can now add them to what, in my mind, qualifies as a Harry Bell Collection.

The Times They Are A-Changin'

Corridor 1990 (Watersoluble marker in A5 sketchbook)

A month is a long time in the Blogosphere. If that isn't a famous quote, it ought to be. It's just over a month since I posted anything here; I feel I should act before the inertia really builds up and starting again becomes a chore. I'd hate to think you'd all given up and gone for good.

Hello? Hell - ooo?!!

There's a reason for the pause in my blogging, one that's relevant to the pause in my painting too (for the pause has manifested itself there as well), but it's one that I'm only now coming to terms with.

I turned 65 at the end of January and became the grateful recipient of a State Retirement Pension. Suddenly, I'd come out of a long dark tunnel and a huge weight was lifted from my shoulders. For the last ten years I've been beavering away trying to earn a crust from my work and now, well, I don't have to. I've never painted anything I didn't really want to paint, but there was always the thought at the back of my mind that I needed to sell it.

And now that thought has evaporated. I can do whatever I like, including doing nothing. which is rather what I've been doing for the last month, at least in terms of making art. I have been visiting friends, I have been entertaining friends who paid a return visit; and I have been seeing exhibitions, most notably the wonderful David Hockney RA: A Bigger Picture at the Royal Academy in London.

But now I feel it's time to get back in the studio and make art again. There's another Figure8 show coming up, and I may want to do something new for it (or I may not - the power of the new freedom!). The great thing about how I am now is that I can do anything and everything, without considering the consequences.

But there are a couple of paintings I think should be finsihed before I launch into anything fresh. So watch this space. Oh go on. Just to please me.

Interviewed Again

I'm not one to talk about myself much, which must seem a strange thing to say here, given that this blog is all about me. But what I really mean is that in person, I don't like talking about me.

However, now and again I like to take the opportunity to answer written questions about my art. In the past, I've answered questionnaires from 'A' Level students tasked with writing a study of a local artist. Some contained quite searching questions, some were more basic. I finally gave up agreeing to them when the promised copies of the eventual studies didn't materialise.

But recently I was asked by Joanna the Mad if I'd be prepared to answer some questions for publishing on her blog, facebooklet.ca . I agreed and found the experience interesting as usual. I hope you'll check out the interview on her blog. You can make up your own mind about the pencil drawing she's done of me. I'm afraid I'm rather averse to being photographed or drawn.

The written form of interview is helpful, because it provides the opportunity to consider and rethink the answers and in time, I think those answers may be helpful to me when it comes to working out where I want to go.

"Where I want to go?" Oh, more on that vexed question in due course, I'm sure.

Biscuit Factory Show

I was able to spend a little time at the Biscuit Factory, photographing my paintings hanging in the Figure8 show. They looked good, I thought - better than these photographs might suggest - and were very well received at the Private View, but sales were absent. Depressing though that is, it's made more bearable by the general absence of red spots throughout the gallery. Obviously the financial climate isn't favourable to fine art sales.

The show is finished now and I'm faced with the usual problem of bringing the pictures home. Taxi again, I suppose.

Edinburgh

Edinburgh Churchyard (work in progress)

Sorry for the pause in blogging. Pat and I went to Edinburgh at the beginning of the month and I came back with a three-week cold. Writing came a poor third on my list of priorities, after coughing and wiping my nose. And painting stalled altogether until yesterday.

The trip to Edinburgh was a birthday present from Pat and timed to coincide with the exhibition of FCB "Bunty" Cadell's work at the National Galleries of Scotland. A wonderful show! Not a poor picture in the whole collection; his work during the 1920s was particularly exciting yet at the time he didn't find much commercial success with it.

We also paid two visits to the Open Eye Gallery to look at Kirsty Wither's new work. Previously known for her figure paintings and flower still lifes (both of which were represented here), she's recently turned her hand to landscapes and I thought these were really successful. Lovely subtle passages of colour laid on with a painting knife, with some of it scraped through. Gorgeous.

The cold started to show up on the last day in Edinburgh and by the time I was home I was ready to vegetate. But by yesterday I felt I should make the effort to get working again, so went off to the Art Club. Inevitably, the last person there was just about to leave as I arrived, so I spent the afternoon in splendid isolation, working on this small painting which you may remember from its last appearance in August.

I think I still have reservations about the lighting in the studio at the new Club premises. It's a combination of natural light diffused through ceiling panels together with some strip lighting. On an overcast day like yesterday the light coming through the diffusion panels seems poor and I was uncertain of my tones while painting. As a consequence, this painting looks different when photographed in the Club's common room, where the light comes through big windows, than it did in the studio.

Private View

Here's the invitation to Figure 8's new show at the Biscuit Factory. I'll be showing eight of the Rock & Tree series paintings, including the two new Auchterarder Hedgerow pictures.

If you can make it to the opening, I'd be delighted to see you there. Come and say hello! If you can't get there, maybe you can get to the Biscuit Factory before it ends on 4 March.

Failing that, you'll find all of the paintings on my website.

Auchterarder Hedgerow No.1

Auchterarder Hedgerow No.1 (Oil on canvas, 61 x 61 cms)

Auchterarder Hedgerow No.2

Auchterarder Hedgerow No.2 (Oil on canvas, 61 x 61 cms)

I'd rather have taken my time finishing this off, but the images were needed by the gallery today, so ....

Still, I think I'm satisfied with this and the companion piece. If not, I can tinker next week before I hand them in.

Hedgerows again

Hedgerow No.1 ((work in progress)


Hedgerow No 2 (work in progress)

I'm still feeling my way with these, but I'm happy with the progress so far. Not a lot more to do, actually, unless I make some major mistakes.

Sutherland Through the Hedge

Hedgerow No.1 (Work in progress)

Last night I set about quickly adding an horizon and a blue sky to the first of the Hedgerow paintings. Reviewing the result this morning, I realised how much my love of Graham Sutherland was becoming evident in this painting. There was no conscious decision to make that happen, but I can see it's there, I have no problem with it and in fact I was quite pleased when the influence was immediately commented upon at today's meeting of the Painters' Group.

The meeting was interesting in that I felt my work wasn't universally liked but that reinforced a renewed determination to plough my own furrow. I generally do that anyway, but in the last few years I think I may have drifted into market-driven thought patterns for understandable but unhelpful reasons.

Through the Hedge

Hedgerow No.1 (work in progress)


Hedgerow No.2 (work in progress)

I'm working under pressure again. I have about ten days to provide the images of all the paintings I intend to hang in the Figure8 show at the Biscuit Factory in February (details for you nearer the time) and so far I have only four completed. I probably need two or three more and recently have found ideas in short supply.

To clarify: I have lots of ideas for paintings, but having chosen a particular theme (Rock & Tree) for this show, I need to make some new paintings that fit that theme and ideas for such have not been readily forthcoming.

What I thought I would try, therefore, is see what I might be able to do with some hedgerows I found by the side of the road at Auchterarder when I was there in 2009 on one of my annual painting trips. I'm in two minds about how these are going; certainly I'm happier with the first than the second, but as I've put in more time on the first, that's to be expected. I'm very much feeling my way with these and intend to keep looking for more ideas in case they don't work out.

Meanwhile, if you have any thoughts on these paintings, I'd be interested to hear them, but do bear in mind they're very far from completion.

Edward Burra

Every morning as true as the clock
Somebody hears the postman's knock.

To be accurate, he didn't knock this morning. He rang the doorbell.

As I struggled into my dressing gown and rushed downstairs, I ignored the cries from Pat of "There is no bug! The doorbell didn't ring! Don't go outside with no clothes on!" I leave you to decide which of us was the more awake.

I admit I 'm prone to hearing phantom doorbells which have more or less replaced the catalogue of nightmares I've listed before, but this time I knew there was a book on it's way from Amazon and I was anxious to avoid having to go to the depot to collect it tomorrow.

The book in question was the volume published by Palant House in connection with their exhibition of Edward Burra's work. Although my interests in painting extend well beyond these shores, I have an abiding fascination for the work of British painters of the 20th century, and there was a distinct gap in my knowledge of Burra.

Never in good health, he chose to work mainly in watercolour on a large scale and the book captures the remarkably vivid colours he was able to achieve with his chosen medium by constantly overlaying with thicker and thicker paint. I was familiar with the paintings of bars and Harlem low-life (see the cover above) and the Surrealist tendencies (he was a friend of Paul Nash and showed with the Englsih Surrealists in the 1930s) but the landscapes were a real revelation in their pared down simplicity.


Valley and River, Northumberland, 1972
(Pencil and watercolour on paper, 40 x 27 ins)

A lovely book. I'd love to have seen the exhibition.

Refreshments Van, Cambridge

Refreshments Van, Cambridge (Oil on board, 5 x 7 ins)

This year, as we did two years ago, Pat and I are spending Xmas with Pat's son Andy and his partner Helen in Cambridge. Last time I made a small Holy Island painting as a thank you Xmas present and I thought (without wishing to set a precedent!) that I might do the same this year. Looking through some photographs I'd taken in the Xmas market in Cambridge, I picked out this refreshments van as something I thought would make a nice little painting.

I've had to keep it quiet, of course, but it's Boxing Day now and Andy and Helen should have seen it, so I can safely post it here.

River Factory

River Factory (Oil on board, 12 x 12 ins)

The show at Whitley Bay ended on Sunday and I went to collect my pictures today. And there were only three to bring away! This one, River Factory, was sold on Saturday, possibly to an old friend of mine whom I haven't seen for twenty years or more. It shows a factory on one of the bends in the River Tyne, now quite possibly demolished.

Although the show seemed to be doing less well than the similarly situated show in July, by the end it had done about the same level of business. People may have been hesitant about spending in the current climate, but it's clear they recognised a good buy when it came down to it. I think we might try the same format next year if the shop space is still available (and who would expect a sudden demand for large shop spaces in the next 12 months?)

Xavier Pick: Commission

Xavier Pick is an artist whose work I really like. Here's a video of his preparatory work for a commissioned painting of London which I hope you find as interesting as I did.

Pick is a particularly good draughtsman who trained at the Royal College. Imagine how much better he'd have been, however, had the timelines shifted and he'd gone to the RA Schools where he could now benefit from instruction from the Grande Dame of English Art, Tracey Emin, who has now been appointed Professor of Drawing there.

Ahahahahahahaha. Sorry.

Fallen Log

Fallen Log (Oil on canvas, 40 x 40 cms)

Have I mentioned the Painters' Group before? No, perhaps not. I began my painting studies in 1989 with the OCA and continued with them for quite a few years before taking a leap of faith and going to Newcastle University to study for a BA in Fine Art. In the last few years of being with the OCA, the tutor was William Varley. At the time Bill was also in charge of First Year Studies at the University and wrote exhibition reviews for national newspapers such as The Guardian and The New Statesman. He still writes some critical pieces, I see.

Anyway, Bill proved very influential in my development and, indeed, was instrumental in encouraging me to think it might actually be possible for me to undertake the degree course. Unfortunately, he retired from the University in 1998, a year after I started there, and frankly the quality and direction of the teaching moved away from what I had gone there to find.

Bill also gave up his role with the OCA but continued an informal critique session every month with former students. For some time it didn't seem to be something that would meet my needs, but recently one or two friends of mine, including Maureen Stephenson and Elizabeth Talbot, joined what had come to be called The Painters' Group. That made the difference for me and I joined Bill's group again in October (in time to be included in the XIV Show, in fact).

The most recent meeting was on Saturday and I made a special effort to get this Fallen Log painting completed on Friday night. Inevitably this posed problems in carrying the wet painting on the bus to the session, but it was worth it. It's always good to get other people's input and on this occasion not only Bill but some of the other painters had interesting comments and questions. The questions, I find, are particularly helpful because they make me think about the painting and articulate my thoughts more clearly than might otherwise be the case.

The painting was well received and as has been my experience of the group in the past, I came home wanting to get straight back in the studio.

"Art in the Park"

Traders' Rooftop (Oil on board, 12 x 12 ins)

Earlier in the year - June, I think it was - the Art Club held a selling exhibition in an empty shop in the Park View Shopping Centre in Whitley Bay. For whatever reason, I took no part in it, but I understand it was popular with the public and sales were good.

Which is why I have four small paintings in the new show in the same premises, which opens tomorrow. I think the standard is pretty high, given that it's a club show and no judging was done on the entries. If you're in the area, why not drop in and take a look?

If you can't get there, or if you'd like a flavour of the show, try the slideshow on the Club's website. The pictures will be changed next week, I think, but for now it shows the painting above.