A classic

This is one of my favourite books about an artist, the Horse's mouth ,written by Joyce Carey in 1944. It is about Gulley Jimson, an old, skint ,randy artist in post war London living in house boats and run down studios along the Thames. He's in the stage of an artist's life between early success and the late recognition that an artist too often gets after they die, but he always tries to make the most of a bad situation, including stealing paint from shops and sponging off his friends and a couple of millionaire collectors. Its a gritty, funny, but also quite sad story with some beautiful descriptions about how an obsessive artist's mind works.
It was made into a film too which has some good bits with Alec Guiness great as Gulley, but it has a bit of 50s slapstick which I guess was to bring it to the mass audience. As usual the book is better.

new gallery

Towards the beach , acrylic on board.

Pontoon no.3, acrylic on board.

Fishing boat, acrylic on board.

Harbour with yachts, mixed media on board.


I have just joined a gallery in Bath, a city which I have never been to before - beats me why, I was very impressed with it. The gallery is called Edgar Modern and it has some very good south - west artists, http://www.edgarmodern.com/Artist-Detail.cfm?ArtistsID=289

new exhibition

A couple of shots of me yesterday hard at work putting the finishing touches on for a new show which starts tomorrow , at Beside the wave gallery in Falmouth, opening view 6-8 pm. I always work on the paintings right until the last minute, getting different ideas as I go along. As you can see I've even been too busy to have a shave. I heard a famous artist once say - 'the painting is only finished once its sold' and I'd be inclined to agree with them. http://www.beside-the-wave.co.uk/

recent shows

Getting busy now with producing paintings for summer exhibitions. I have two (below) in this exhibition at Falmouth Art Gallery which is on all summer. Although not exactly what most people would call impressionism, my paintings do have deep rooted influences from a couple of Impressionist painters, namely Monet and Cezanne. I remember Cezanne was my absolute favourite painter when I was in my early teens.

Beach cafe , 30.5 x 30.5 cm.
South Coast Surf , 45 x 45 cm.
Beside the Wave gallery were representing me at the Bristol AAF last month. Apparently the paintings were recieved very well and there were a good number of sales, including the painting on the ad above. Great for the paintings to be shown to a new and appreciative audience.

Allotments, Longrock

Allotments, Longrock, 76x76 cm ,acrylic on canvas.

This is a painting I finished last week, of the allotments at Longrock near Marazion- which I only new existed when I drove past them a few weeks ago.I'm always interested in the orderly grids versus the spawl of growing plants in an allotment, and especially liked the view of the mount peeping over the top. For my initial drawing, below, I had to precariously stand on top of a wall to get more of a plan view and also to see more of the mount. There were a couple of worried looking allotment owners wondering what on earth I was doing, and they came over and saw that my intentions were honourable. They said homeless people had been helping themselves to fruit and veg under cover of darkness, which must be a problem on most allotments. The drawing above is a study I do before painting of sizing the compostion to the canvas and making a few small changes. The painting will be on show at Cornwall Contemporary gallery in Penzance later this summer. www.cornwallcontemporary.com

Cornwall today article August 2010

This was an article about three artists who have links with surfing, which nicely included me, for the ever excellent Cornwall today, edited by Alex Wade, who has strong surfing roots himself. The other artists were Ges Wilson and Jonty Henshall. Ges was married to Colin Wilson who was a champion surfer and good shaper, and I have owned a couple of his boards. Jonty is a solid surfer from down Sennen way, and as surfers tend to stick to home breaks, I've never met him in the water, as I'm always around Godrevy. The stunning cover photo is down at Gwenver near Sennen.

Paintings from January

This was my first painting of the year, a suitably wintery snow capped farm looking across to distant mountains. It has abstract areas of machinery and fenceposts which always seem to be strewn around farmyards, and a red ground to keep the temperature of the painting up above freezing. 'Farm in snow', 30x30 cm, acrylic on board.

Also from early this year is 'smallholding, Roseland' ,50x50 cm, acrylic on board. Painted from the Roseland peninsula in Cornwall looking across to the mainland. Use of a red ground gives the painting the underlying heat of the spring heatwave we enjoyed this year. A quiet sleepy day on the Roseland, with black hens sunning themselves on a smallholding.

Both of these paintings will be exhibited at Beside the Wave gallery in Falmouth in July. www.beside-the-wave.co.uk