OPEN STUDIO May 2016

 The studio will be open on Saturdays in May, the dates being 7th, 14th, 21st and 28th
  Paintings and drawing all for sale, most in the region of £20 - £500, some are framed and ready for the wall, as above; and others such as work on paper and some canvases need framing.
 For more details contact me through the website, email, or phone.
 This is not part of any larger event, I am opening my studio to meet friends old and new raise some funds and clear some space. 

Sounds of 2015

A list of the music that has kept me going through 2015, in no particular order these tracks have, pushed, cajoled and nurtured me through a year in the studio and the Sunday afternoon vinyl sessions;
Fake Plastic Trees Radiohead
Dance me to the End of Love Leonard Cohen
a.k.a.i.d.i.o.t The Hives
I think i'll call it morning Gil Scott Heron
The Pan Piper Miles Davis
Budo Miles Davis
Intoxicated Man Serge Gainsbourg
World in a Jug Canned Heat
Where did you sleep last night Nirvana ( Unplugged in NY )
Doesn't make it Alright The Specials
Don't take your love from me  Coleman Hawkins
Scattered Black and Whites Elbow
Music for the Last Couple The Jam
The Party's Over Talk Talk
Nothingman (West Palm Beach ) Pearl Jam
Come with Us Chemical Brothers
When You call my name  The Skatalite
Looking for the heart of Saturday night Madeleine Peyroux
Looking for the heart of Saturday night Tom Waits
I knew the bride when she used to Rock and Roll Nick Lowe
Shipbuilding Elvis Costello
The number one song in Heaven Sparks (for Bella )
Birdman Ralph McTell
Everybody Dance Chic
Fire on The Bayou The Meters...

For Alex and Bella  and in memory of my cousin David Fowles    

Studio wall

It's strange what I choose to hang on the wall of the studio, in theory I don't want anything distracting me from what i'm working on, but on the other hand there are those blank walls crying out for something on them, and I have a large stock of paintings sitting in stacks, so here they are, there are two versions of the one on the left, and the other one hangs in our dining room. the framed image is from the valley of the rocks, in Lynmouth, from the time when I lived in Exmoor, and below is a study of a lump of flint ( which inspired the painting on the left ) 

A couple of studies from earlier this year

Some tree studies from earlier in the year,

Looking West towards Grovely Woods

This is the view of Grovely Woods from below the A36 , with the willows in the foreground, which gave Wilton its name, where the Wylye river flows, and the hill rises like a formidable bulwark. The Roman road runs straight ahead from this point of view at the crest of the hill, the Roman Rd from Old Sarum West climbs up the hill to the East of this view, descends into Wilton, and then climbs this hill again from the left of this depiction. To me this corresponds to the description of Wilton by Asser , with all the identifying aspects apparent. The Nadder river runs in the valley to the left of this picture, south of the hill.   

Wessex and Wilton

The woods above Wilton have many stories attached to them, and part of the reason that I have walked and cycled so much around these hills and tracks, is to gain a sense of this historic landscape, and my paintings and drawings, are part of this exploration 
 Without Wessex there would have been no England, and without Wilton there would have been no Wessex.
 In 871 the Vikings were hammering at the gateways of Wessex, the last Kingdom to succumb to the assault of the Northmen. There was an intense amount of activity in this year with battles named in Basing , Meretun, and Wilton. According to Cassells Battlefields of Britain and Ireland; Asser recorded that Wilton was on a hill south of the River Guilou ( or Wylye) and speculates that this might mean "The high ground between the Nadder and Wylye, along the continuation of the Roman road westwards from Old Sarum through Grovely Wood." all of this area is five minutes from where I live,and as I explore the paths and ancient earthworks, i think "A nation was lost and then forged here ", and I am thinking of the sacking of Wilton and the bargain which Alfred made , paying off the Vikings for long enough to repair his fortifications and eventually resist their advance. So though I am trying to record what I see before me , perhaps I am also hoping some sense of this significance is captured.
     

Into The Woods

A couple of paintings from sketches, I have been going up into the woods at Grovely, particularly atmospheric at this time of the year. I stood lost in sketching in the middle of the woods for about twenty minutes, then heard the cracking of twigs , and a large animal moving nearby, I never saw the creature, I assume it was a deer, but it brought me back into the moment, and sudden awareness of the smells and sounds of the forest .

Paintings from the sketches of cliffs

.. back in the studio and working in the evenings now, some first ideas using the cliff sketches..

Charcoal sketches of St Ives cliffs

We were walking past Porthmeor beach when we saw a man on the beach with two large canvases working in the morning sunlight with the tide far out. I went down to talk to him, and he explained that the canvases he had already painted in his studio, and he brought them out to get "something" from the landscape,he said so many things which I agreed with, about how the first painting gave him something to struggle against, and how he was avoiding "picture making", his bold and expressive work was showing all that week at the Crypt in town. His name was Paul Wadsworth, and he inspired me to try and be  more free with these studies of the cliffs, and I really like their mood, and energy, so thanks Paul...

St ives School of painting studies

These are from the Saturday session and I arrived ten minutes before the class to find the door at the top of the stairs locked, I knocked and the model opened the door in her dressing gown, it felt rather illicit and risque, until I entered a room crowded with ladies and a few men poised at their easels. Awkwardly I searched for a spot to stand, ad finally found a corner, my first pose was the model's back as she sat in a chair, and I wondered how I was going to get anything out of the view, then I realised the window looked out to the beach and the sea at Porthmeor beach, and so now I see the picture and hear the surf, and the seaside light coming into the room. The poses were longer than before, with a final 25 minute one, which is the model lying on her back. 

The intersection of a number of lines of influence at the grave of Alfred Wallis in Barnoon cemetery St Ives. If you ever wondered how we became so preoccupied with a subdued palette of greys, muted greens and blues, and the motif of naively rendered ships, lighthouses and harbours, then this tile covered grave contains the remains of the originator. "discovered" by Ben Nicholson and Christopher Wood in the 1920s, he had taken up painting images of the life he recalled as a mariner and inshore fisherman, when his wife died. He painted in household paints on whatever he could find, making his work like objects or icons as much as paintings. The tiles were made by Bernard Leach, who along with Shoji Hamada set up the St Ives pottery in the 1920s, and kick-started the studio pottery industry, providing the model for the English vernacular style which thrives to this day, though to the dispassionate modern eye, studio pottery recalls a particular late sixties, seventies self sufficiency vibe. 
 I came looking for this grave, and was slightly disappointed when I found it, thinking it was small and rather grim, the tiles, sort of dun coloured, and reminding me of fire surrounds in 1930s terraced houses ( for good reason) , then I looked more closely at the story  depicted on the top, the tall slender lighthouse withstands huge breaking waves, and at the door at its base an old man with a stick ascends a set of stairs to seek shelter. The top of the lighthouse, where there should be a light, instead has a cross; as I read it this is Leach's depiction of Wallis finding respite after the storms of life, and his ascension to Heaven, though Leach himself was not a Christian but a follower of the Arabic Baha i faith.
 The grave overlooks Porthmeor beach and within sight are so many of Wallis's motifs, including the island and its chapel, the bay itself, and Godrevy lighthouse.
Balanced on the top of the grave was a sea shell, the outer surface with a Walis-like image of a ship and a lighthouse in black biro, and on the reverse "For Alfred Wallis " .   By the time I returned to take these photographs, it had gone, blown away by the wind coming off the sea.    

A sheet of figure studies

At the end of the session at the life drawing there is a 5,4,3,2,1 challenge , these being the number of minutes given to draw successive poses, and this is the result ...

Life drawing at the St Ives School of painting

Some life studies from the midweek St Ives session. It's always a pleasure to return here to the drop in classes, up the stairs to the studios, and a challenging set of 10 and 15 minute poses, run by Steve Dove, who always makes for a relaxed and friendly class.

Sky and sea watercolour studies

While the weather remains unsettled, I am looking out of the window and working at the table after breakfast

In St ives for our holidays, and while the weather has closed in with storms whipping up the sea I sit at the breakfast table and make a quick watercolour sketch

A still life

some objects on a table top, the time honoured subject of artists, feels a bit like homework, but becomes interesting when the positive and negative forms are seen and worked, it has also been a while since I worked in pencil, apart from sketching 

View from the studio in watercolour

I keep thinking of a conversation I heard on the radio , discussing creative pursuits ( music, art, writing ) and that the good work is made when there is uncertainty. Making something new takes courage, and the conversation discussed the idea that "writers block", or the inability to work is a failure of this courage; the fear taking over. In order to keep working I have to manage that lack of courage, the fear, and know when to stop and when to keep working regardless of a clear sense of direction. ( Lauren Laverne talking to Ben Folds on 6 Music )

The dead tree and an imagined landscape

At the top is the attempt I made to paint the dead tree outside the house in Guildford,home to a fox which sat in the branches in the morning sun , and below is one of the remembered landscapes, which recall the view from Grovely to Fovant both are in watercolour.  

We are here in Guildford for another few days, and while I am here, I only have watercolours to work in. Using a block of landscape paper I have started to try some generic ideas, I find that I am painting the view from Grovely to Fovant that I know from home, there are some basic components that I am trying to convey, mastering the palette is an important part of this, in order to convey the sense of distance. Also how to make those blobs and dashes into convincing trees and shrubs.
 The block of apartments across the meadows, built in the sixties I am guessing, stand out against the green trees around them. But the rain has set in and I cannot see that I will get a chance to draw the view.   

I have tried to paint the dead tree which lies opposite the front of the house. The weather bleached branches reach out like an open hand against the deep green of the trees. It lies in a patch of ground left to go wild; a wilderness of grasses, nettles, shrubs and bracken which provides a home to a fox which daily suns itself within the contours of the trunk. Land here is at a premium, houses round the corner in the same road are being offered for £2 million. Property developers must be having palpitations at the thought of its potential, and yet it resists the tide of development, and avoids being partitioned, traded, "ameliorated".  
The watercolour fails to convey the atmosphere I was hoping for, I am working from some sketches I have made, but it seems that i do not have enough information, or skill, to capture what I had hoped for.  

Suddenly I have no idea where I am in the year; i think it could be January or February. I am staying at my sister's house near Guildford, and the rain is sheeting down, making the patio indistinguishable from the surface of the pond. There is a feeling of gloom and being stuck inside. 
 The hard floorboards and tiling are taking a toll on our 17 month old child's knees. My wife attempts to work on her laptop with an internet connection which seems recalcitrant to say the least, given that this is Guildford and not a rain forest. We are both tired and stressed trying to judge the correct tog grow bag for our daughter to sleep through the night.
 I have found an art supply shop within five minutes drive , and replaced some important colours;( green and yellow) and before I know it I have spent £100 and carry out my purchases in an A5 plastic bag. 

Oil on board painting trees and Temple Copse, Wilton

An overcast day and I stopped at the edge of the field below the clump at Ugford, the hill behind was catching sunlight as the clouds shifted, a close humid thundery atmosphere,  

Oil sketch for trees above Wishford

A view above Wishford having walked up the hill, found I had forgotten white paint, so had to cut it short, only using what was on the pallette....

A medium sized 25cm diam. bowl with my hand painted decoration

Using the same design as the tableware at Bay Window gift shop in Wilton applied to a serving bowl 

Temple copse in Wilton

Temple copse lies within the grounds of Wilton house, and this is one of the few places from which it is visible as any kind of a hill.

View towards Fovant from Grovely

The hottest day of the year so far and I found the shade of a hedgerow, to look over the Nadder valley toward the ridge of hills at Fovant , where the Regimental badges are carved in the chalk hillside. A pleasant way to spend a couple of hours, but the flies seemed to be attracted to the smell of turps...or maybe it was me...

A couple of landscape sketches

I go out when i can to get some studies from observation, thinking particularly of colours and tones, they are only sketches but making them helps to develop my palette

The view from the studio progresses

Trying to work on this in the afternoon to repeat the light and conditions,

Sketch for a tree

This no longer exists, as it was the first suggestion of a tree which i later worked up, but I am posting it because I really like the energy and character in these few first lines,

Painting table and a colour chart

The table is a 1950s number with a bit of our kitchen worktop sat on it, I am trying to make these colour charts more often now, and be more methodical about my colours. 

Table ware delivered to the Bay Window Gift Shop in Wilton

 Here are the handpainted designs soon to be available at the Bay Window Gift Shop in Wilton

Dinner plates and side plates fresh from the kiln all my handpainted decoration

A new landscape with some colour notes

The painting wall ,

  a conceptual piece, telling the story of various attempts at representation,....not really

Started a new canvas today , the view from my studio

 Have always overlooked the view from the studio window, with Reeves bakery in the foreground and the trees and Grovely hills beyond...

I think that's it, the portrait is finished

Allowing for the problems of colour differences in photograph, this is the final image, both sitter and I are happy with the result.

The portrait develops

    We have spent five hours now with two hour sittings, and a few half hours, we both seem happy so far with the results, probably a couple of sittings left 

The portrait takes shape

    Some tone and colour goes onto the latest portrait,