Posted on
A pictorial alphabet of favourite places around England - Introduction
Introduction to a series of regular blogs about an alphabet of favourite places I've painted and sketched around England
When the coronavirus lockdown began in March, I started to write another book. My first book “A Painter’s Dozen”, passing on hints and tips to develop your own style, was mostly text with the pictures used to illustrate the ideas and techniques discussed. This new book was to be about my pictures, with a small amount of descriptive text. It soon grew to a size which would be unrealistic to publish commercially, however, so I have decided to post most of it as a regular blog, hopefully daily. This is not a book of pretty watercolours of the usual favourite English places. Thatched cottages and other views that grace boxes of clotted cream fudge may delight the eye but they don’t make my heart sing. It’s the overlooked, and often elemental, views found in remote and empty places that typify England for me. I try to capture these in watercolour or ink, inspired by my hero artists of the past, Edward Wesson and James Fletcher-Watson. My purpose in painting and sketching them is to achieve, firstly, total fulfilment in the action of doing so at the time, and, secondly, to build up a body of work which I can look back through to recapture those moments, and places, later. If my paintings please other like-minded people as well that’s a bonus, and if they like one well enough to buy it, then that pays for more materials. Although we have travelled the world over the years, my wife, Suzy, and I find ourselves returning to favourite English places more often, with our Labrador, Hobson, and it is these areas that produce my most satisfying images. The Suffolk coast, West Sussex, North Devon and the Lake District all call us back several times a year, (or they did before Covid-19) so it is subjects in these areas that feature predominantly in this alphabetical journey. Also featuring heavily, of course, are the places on my doorstep, Higher Poynton’s fields and woods, where I paint every Tuesday morning with two pals (the school of “Poyntonism” !) The effect of climate change, however, is that more and more Tuesday mornings are too wet for painting so I take my sketch book for a walk further afield, to the Macclesfield Canal, the Peak District or the Staffordshire Moorlands. I much prefer outdoor painting, but painting at home from a sketch soon afterwards helps me to remember how it felt to be in that place at that time. These comments refer, of course, to pre-Covid days and it is the ultimate irony that every Tuesday since the lockdown commenced has been gloriously sunny! Next time I’ll start the alphabet with my first A.
Comments
Login or register to add a comment