Oil Painting 36 - Brindley Place

I was pleased with how Oil Painting 35 'Birmingham watching the Olympics' was going but felt one thing it didn't do was reflect Birmingham's love affair with the canals; "more canals than Venice" being the infamous boast. The redevelopment of the central canal passage has been startling, not that I was familiar with the area previously but it is obvious that the transformations around Brindley Place, leading on to Gas Street and the Mailbox have enabled the city to enjoy its canal association, to the point of now being one of the top tourist attractions in the city centre with boat trips, boat buses, boat hotels, boat restaurants, boat scout excursions, boat cafes and boat stag and hen doos!


My favourite cities worldwide seem to have a central structure to connected to water, e.g. London's Thames, Budapest's Danube, even the coastal separation of Hong Kong and Kowloon, and be celebrating that association. The rivers, canals or coast give recognisable geography and identity to our cities as well as offering a place of relaxation in the hustle and bustle. Birmingham has reinvented its own water structure which has in turn made the city centre easier to navigate and much more enjoyable as a whole.

It is quite obvious why I picked this view, human activity between 3 different levels linked by staircases with a central passage of water can hold the viewers eye with routes in and around the painting. The bright scarlet red of the cafe boat providing a bold diagonal device. This boat was manned by lovely chatty brummie ladies serving up sandwiches from the side hatch.

The experience of painting this piece is marred slightly by my eventual removal by security staff at Brindley Place meaning the painting was left in quite a loose state. Even though I wasn't selling, just painting I found out I needed to show evidence of my setup and work, and personal liability insurance, plus a method statement and risk assessment form that would take 3 days to be reviewed by the operations manager and presented before a team. I didn't do this (or knew i needed to) I just wandered up with easel, and tried my luck, which on this occasion ran out on the second day and there wasn't the time to jump through all the hoops before we left Birmingham.

I want to state that every person I had dealings with at Brindley Place seemed genuine, friendly and interested in what I was doing, I had been happily chatting with the security on the first day and throughout the first part of the second before the guard asked me if I had permission. When I had then found out from the office the protocol the security staff were deeply apologetic and assumed it wouldn't have been a problem, and we're sad to see the painting go.

I know it gets complained about a lot, but this red tape culture and the fear of law suits stops so many productive things from happening. I ask a lot of questions of public space ownerships by setting up with a canvas in all sorts of locations, and am glad that it is a by-product to my work, but it is often hard, and will detract many artists from the process of claiming their streets and in turn their own experiences. It is a shame that one of the most commonly asked questions of me whilst painting is 'did you get permission to do that?'

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Oil Painting 32 - Captain Karen

Of course this is a joke title and in no means reflects the true captain of our mighty vessel. Karen was privileged enough to be given temporary control whilst on a very straight section of The Birmingham Main Line and later the Tame Valley Canal in order for me to produce this sketch.

I want this project to have a real human element and am aware of how there seems to be plenty of imagery of wide angle scenes taking in the new scenery we find ourselves in although not much of the individual character side of boating. I am sure this next winter, when I shall retreat more indoors will release some enjoyable studies of our wood burning stove in action and still life's and interior boat scenes.

I can already see in my head a piece entitled 'Karen the galley slave' with atmospheric steam rising from the pans on the stove!

Oil Painting 27 - The Willows of Gnosall

The plan was to get down to Thomas Telford's Stretton Aqueduct but when you underestimate the distance and then stop at such a peaceful spot as Gnosall surrounded by a passage of flowing Willow trees, the plan, and life, has to wait for 2 days whilst I produce this piece.

I have wanted to paint a willow for a long time, especially seeing so many on this project, growing by the water. If you remember with the French trip to the Vendee coast this year I produced one of my first tree 'portraits' with 'Tree by the Atlantic' study. It has been just a matter of time since then until I paint a willow, I know the flow of draping leaves in the movement of the wind will suit my approach with paint. I am not sure that this piece is 'it' however, it has some of that love of willow trees but is also a comment on the Shropshire Union canal and the long passages without locks where you are cruising through a tunnel of trees. I am enjoying the small front of the boat dwarfed by these leafy giants. Incidentally the owner of the boat in front got it cheap because it was underwater when he bought it!

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Oil Painting 26 - Shrewsbury

The final results after the second , very rainy day of painting

Our stay in Market Drayton coincided with Millard and Lancaster's Summer Show in Shrewsbury and a commute into town was relatively easy from here. I have had great success working with this fabulous gallery earlier in the year and was glad to be able to set up on the streets of Shrewsbury and raise awareness of this group show. You can see the solo show I had at Millard and Lancaster in February 2012 here

I had set up in the town centre in the run up to the solo show and generated a great deal of interest with potential customers and local press working on location. The general public are not used to seeing this manner of work and respond really positively. I painted the Old Market Hall and the iconic Railway Station



I chose this composition for Oil Painting 26 because I was interested in the swing of the street wrapping around the 2 churches. One passer by described the road in my painting as a helter skelter. I felt I hadn't yet conveyed the intriguing geography of Shrewsbury and its formation across quite steep slopes and wanted to illustrate varying heights of interesting architecture within this piece.

A snap of the foundation started one a sunny first day, compare with final result

After a good first day, a went back to add a few touches and the the scene had been transformed by rain. This year's weather has been difficult so far with the wettest June on record. I wasn't going to be deterred and set up hoping the rain would let off, it didn't, and the result was a wet scene with unusual reflections off the cobbles and roads. I have painted a few rainy scenes in the past, the flotilla one of the most memorable, and they often release some unusual colours and different treatment of the landscape.

This piece was purchased by a law firm in Shrewsbury who are based round the corner and saw the painting coming together.

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Oil Painting 25 - Market Drayton

This piece was squeezed into the 48 hours available at a visitor mooring in Market Drayton. It is not a bad challenge actually, to have these marked time periods at stopping points along the circuit, sometimes frustrating but it has kept us working and moving. Before this boat project, The most I have managed was a solid 48 hour painting stint for charity, when I painted 32 canvas portraits depicting 37 different sitters. The sitters were allocated 90 minute time slots throughout the 2 days and nights. I was exhausted and the last few were a little ropey but all in all it was an interesting experiment and raised £3000 for meningitis research. I wonder if I could do a similar format in a British Waterways 48 hour mooring spot.

Anyway, back to this piece, despite enjoying Market Drayton's town centre and having a good cycle round to gauge possible painting locations I ended up sticking with the visitor mooring spot and enjoying the idea of producing a piece from the boats perspective looking along the roof. This is an iconic view for any boater when steering your 60ft piece of metal along the waterways. I am pleased with the result which happily combines the reflection study of an attractive boat with some dramatic spacial representation.



The view or weather conditions are nothing extraordinary but it is a good image to sum up what I am trying to do with this project in giving an alternative take on the actual experience of travelling on a boat around the British canals. I say 'the actual experience', of course I am heavily manipulating this recorded experience, for example, I really didn't need a fire on the evening of finishing the painting yet fancied painting the wispy blue smoke across the composition from the chimney at the front of the boat. I was sweating cobs inside the boat for the rest of the evening!

Oil Painting 24 - The Shroppie Fly, Audlem

We had been looking forward to spending some time in Audlem, and the popular Cheshire village didn't disappoint. The Shroppie Fly is the name of the cream canalside pub in this painting alongside Audlem Mill and canal shop. When you walk into the Shroppie you are faced with the awesome bar, a former working 'fly' boat, with the bar staff pulling the pints from inside the boat. I was also taken with some great framed sketches on the wall of some of the live music acts they have had there. I myself, really enjoy and would recommend the challenge of trying to capture a moving live performer on stage. Some of the other pictures on the walls of the shroppie admittedly made my heart sink, there was at least three paintings or prints from the same viewpoint as I had just started from with this Oil Painting 24. Views become iconic because they have an impact or gut appeal - Should the artist refuse these viewpoints because they have been explored many times before? Or embrace the universal appeal? A noticeable difference with my painting is the wide angle that allows the inclusion of the wonderful lock keepers cottage. The garden to this cottage was something special with the owners selling bits and bobs to passing boaters from amongst the flowers. We bought a second hand windlass from them. I am really enjoying the amount of tiny independent trade on the towpaths and wish to paint more of them. After being self employed for 5 years now, entrepreneurship is a subject that really appeals. I am embracing this culture myself displaying past Year of the Boat works on easels alongside my current painting to entertain the passers by. One of the passers by on this occasion was the boat 'The Cat's Whiskers', a boat that has already passed me working once in Wrenbury on the Llangollen canal. You can read their experience of the Shroppie on their blog http://thecatswhiskersnb.blogspot.co.uk/

Oil Painting 23 - Nantwich Town Centre

After the spectacular aqueducts at the end of the Llangollen canal, and the excitement of painting the Jubilee pageant, it was time to return to the boat, and make our way back along the Llangollen canal back into Shropshire and Cheshire, getting a good soaking from the weather on route. It is amazing the difference a bit of sunshine can have on how you remember a canal! Once Hurlestone Junction was reached we took the turn right onto The Shroppie, with the destination 'Birmingham'!

First stop was the town of Nantwich. After walking from the canal around town it was the central high street seating area, with the flowers and jubilee bunting, that had the most appeal subject matter wise. It was a good spot to chat with shoppers and I was pleased to be getting a painting of a canal community rather than purely water based subject matter. I also wanted to get the town in relation to it's church, which dominates the skyline with the unusual octagonal tower.

Oil Painting 22 - The Diamond Jubilee River Pageant

DETAIL - Oil Painting 22 - Diamond Jubilee Thames Pageant 2012

When I heard 6 months ago that a flotilla of 1000 craft was due to sail down the Thames to mark The Queen's Diamond Jubilee, I knew one way or another I would have to get there and paint this historic occaision as a centre piece for the 'Year of the Boat' project.

This en plein air oil painting of The Queen's Diamond Jubilee River Thames Pageant was probably the most difficult of my career; the logistics of researching a good spot, accommodation in London, physically walking all the set up around the capital, 2 days of preparing the background, securing the spot at 5am on the day, intense painting in the middle of a crowd, downpours of rain and a 7 hour journey home at the end, including squeezing through funneling crowd controls, on tubes and trains trying not to smudge the end result left me exhausted and suffering with ill health, but it was more than worth it!

A drizzly morning shot on the morning of the pageant 

I was fortunate to find a location where I could complete the piece elevated on a brick platform in front of a crowd in a similar position to the vantage point of Canaletto's painting The River Thames with St Paul's Cathedral on Lord Mayors Day.

Canaletto recorded with this staggering piece, the last time 1000 boats were on a pageant on the Thames in 1756. The National Maritime Museum are using this piece as the lead image for their exhibition celebrating the diamond jubilee 'Royal River' 

The crowds grew and grew

I was based at the Founders Arms by Blackfriars bridge near Tate Modern and Bankside gallery

God Save Our Queen!

The Royal Barge passing St Paul's

A great vantage point for a memorable show

The below photograph taken by @rachel_duk was picked up by ITV and used on their newspage on the day of the pageant - http://www.itv.com/news/update/2012-06-03/oil-painter-up-against-the-elements-by-the-river/

Oil Painting 21 - Pontcysyllte aqueduct

The big one! One of the wonders of the waterways, the longest and highest aqueduct in Britain and a UNESCO world heritage site. This Aqueduct is a terrific experience for any boater, as you pass over there is no barrier protecting the boater's side, and the thin cast iron trough the canal flows through, is pressed against the side of the boat giving the illusion of floating in mid air and a completely unhindered view of the 126ft drop. A bizarre phenomenon for a boater used to weaving underneath cities to now be floating above tree tops and the River Dee with birds flying underneath you.

Now, how to represent it? My gut instinct was to try and capture this drama from a boater's perspective, to sum up the drop from high up, but the feasibility of actually doing this was proving difficult. The popularity of this spot means there are usually boats waiting to cross so parking the boat in middle and trying a quick painting was impossible; then there was the towpath side, possibly a view peering over the barrier similar to Oil Painting 20 - Chirk Aqueduct, except to get the drama of the drop you have to wander to the middle of the Aqueduct and the towpath is so narrow that it is diificult for two pedestrians to pass anyway, let alone with an artist, a large oil paint soaked canvas and all the trimmings that come with producing the works entirely en plein air. 

I might have to swallow the exclusivity to 'on-location' with a painting from the top of the aqueduct and produce a further memory studio painting utilising the pencil sketches and dare I say it - 'photographs'. In the meantime, you get the 100% on location, 100% enjoyable to produce Oil Painting 21, looking up at the Aqueduct from the viewpoint of stood in the River Dee. The water study this year was coming in to play again, this time with more dynamism having a rushing river flowing around my sandaled feet! A big square painting produced during this Mays heatwave. Very lucky to be based in such a spectacular location with such weather.

Oil Painting 21 in situ

View from the Aqueduct of the painting being produced

Oil Painting 20 - Chirk Aqueduct

You can see the Welsh mountains starting to have an affect on the landscape as you are getting closer to Chirk, then you round a corner and are suddenly faced with this impressive aqueduct accompanied by a railway viaduct. The canal immediately goes into a tunnel at the other end of the aqueduct. This is the view as you round the corner, I wanted to get the drama of the multiple levels, looking down to the river and up to the passing trains as well as seeing the water of the canal. It was a tight angle to achieve the water and the arches of the Aqueduct. There are sheep in the flat flood plain fields below. This span marks the border with a sign at the end - 'Welcome to Wales'.

Oil Painting 19 - Llangollen Canal skirting Blake Mere

 On the way into Elesmere the Llangollen Canal has a beautiful stretch winding between the tree covered meres of Cole Mere and Blake Mere. This painting was rapidly produced in glorious sunshine, there wasn't much time to waste with a rendevous arranged with Karen and the car much further down the canal. As a result it is the bare minimum of an oil painting trying to sum up the scene in broad strokes of a wide brush. On the Mere surface I was enjoying the difference between the light blue of the wind rippled water and the dark greens of the undisturbed water reflecting the foliage on the banks. This reminded me of one of my favourites in the National Gallery, London  ...

Lake Keitele

1905, Akseli Gallen-Kallela

http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/akseli-gallen-kallela,-lake-keitele/*/moduleId/ZoomTool/x/90.5/y/0/z/1

Oil Painting 17 - Sunset on the approach to Middlewich

Our first time round the Cheshire ring I saw this sunset subject on the stretch between Sandbach and Middlewich. Before buying the narrowboat, whenever I have driven this stretch I always enjoyed seeing the boaters operating the locks higher than the road and so it was doubly enjoyable to actual be one of the boaters looking down on the traffic. This stretch also marks the start of the enormous salt and chemical works which line the canal up to Northwich.

This is the start of the Cheshire plain, and (for a canal) we are still at quite a high vantage point dropping down onto the flat landscape which makes you especially aware of the last sunlight and dramatic weather.  The down side to this being you are quite exposed and I had a battering by the wind getting this piece together. I also witnessed fork lightning from here as a storm swept in calling a end to the second session. 3 sessions in total.

Oil Paintings 15 and 16 - Water study at Etruria Industrial Museum

These paintings were produced at the same time, flitting between the two small studies whilst both on the same easel. I was at Etruria Industrial Museum leading a workshop with the Orme Group of Artists, a group of artists who meet from Staffordshire and Cheshire. This is the second workshop I have ran with them, last year I met with about 12 of the artists and we painted on the platform at Crewe Railway Station, after I had given a small talk on the themes of movement and transport in my work.

Crewe Station 2011

This year Etruria Industrial Museum was chosen as it offered various subjects which I have explored and could encourage with confidence, the obvious being the canals and this current Year of the Boat project. The museum sits on the junction between The Cauldon Canal and the Trent and Mersey, it is a British Waterways office, hosts a fantastic canal festival and is surrounded by deep dramatic locks and some beautiful victorian Industrial architecture. I painted this subject when I had first started self employment as an artist -

Etruria Industrial Museum 2007

The other exciting subject at this location was the opportunity to paint a female blacksmith, a good friend Charis Jones, at work in her atmospheric Victorian forge. Charis is more an artist working with the medium of steel rather than a commercial blacksmith producing horeshoes and swords etc. You can see her website 'Sculpted Steel' here.

Last October I exhibited a body of work of small local North Staffordshire creative industries, painted at work, entitled 'Vis Unita Fortior' the motto of the city of Stoke on Trent. This included a painting of Charis. You can see all the work from the show here

The Female Blacksmith 2011

After a brief introduction talk about these bodies of work I left half the group with Charis pelting metal and ventured outside for some more water study in the sunshine. I knew I would be limited on time to produce refined oil paintings but fancied attempting bashing out some expressive studies. I am pleased with the results and the comparison with the work painted from exactly the same location nearly 5 years previously (see Etruria Industrial Museum 2007 above). When we all met at the end of the day,the Orme Group had produced some startling results, the entire group seems to flit between different mediums easily, rapidly exploring all forms of representing the canals and the moving subject of Charis.

Painting trip to Vendee Coast, France 2012

This trip came about from the offer of accommodation owned by friends, in the region of Vendee, France. After the hustle and bustle of Manchester, and the logistics of working afloat, on the move, two weeks based in spacious holiday accommodation was sounding ideal. I have been hopping over the channel to work, twice a year for the last three years. The process of removing yourself from Britain but retaining the independence of your own vehicle and equipment facilitates a really productive painting experience. I had never been to the Vendee region before; it is on the Atlantic coast mid-way down the country. We were staying just north of La Rochelle, in a small village called Les Conches near Longville-Sur-Mer. The region is extremely flat and popular with French tourists with good beaches and resorts scattered all up the coast. The landscape allows good family holidays with miles of dedicated cycling but no obvious drama for my enjoyment of multi-level spaces.


Vendee Oil Painting 1 – Yachts at Jard-Sur-Mer 
 

I am developing more and more interest in leaving behind special representation with the use of wide-angle perspectives, and instead enjoying painting compositions purely or largely dominated by organic masses. The previous painting trip to Provence, last October, facilitated great water study, which has naturally filtered into the Year of the Boat work so far. The water being an ever-changing mass of transparency and moving reflection makes it near impossible to represent. This gives the artist a freedom to explore a purely painterly process of exploring many colour sat side by side.

This painting of the yachts reflection is a dazzling turquoise water (especially coming from the British canals!) is a continuation of that work and an enjoyable artistic experience to get the ball rolling on this trip.

Vendee Oil Painting 2 – Looking into the Forest

There was something about the light combination scattered through these trees that made it stand out as a subject I wished to paint. It was also an exciting unknown, the intensity of all the detail in the forest view with the constantly changing light and shadow moving across dense textures meant that I couldn’t visualise an obvious finished piece. The chaos of the scene was so much so that towards the end of the first session, I doubted myself, and the progress of the piece. Clarity came with later sessions, when I consciously chose a more stylised format for the trees and definite structure for the composition as a whole.


Vendee Oil Painting 3 – Fire Study 1

Vendee Oil Painting 4 – Fire Study 2

These studies are not my first attempts at fire painting. I painted a fire piece whilst staying up in the Cairngorm Mountains in Scotland in the winter of 2010. Similar to the water studies a fire poses an organic moving and ever-changing subject although the transformations in this subject are much more dramatic. With these two studies I have attempted to relate the different stages of the fire. As with outdoor night paintings, colour difficulties arise when trying to capture a subject with your palette in low light, it often takes a review of the results in morning daylight to better judge your night’s work.

I never seem to capture the drama of the contrast at first attempt, this reminds me of another French painting I did, Kitchen Window at Night, I which I revisited over several nights adding more and more contrast to achieve the glow from the window.

Vendee Oil Painting 5 – Harbour

  The weather wasn’t really cooperating on this trip, it is still mid-April and we had frequent rain everyday, interspersed with periods of dazzling sunshine, it was often a case of just get out there and see what happens. This piece was started in bleak conditions stood tucked into a wind break above the Port de Plaisaunce, the harbour at Jard-sur-Mer. Sheltering myself from the strong winds I became especially aware of the purpose of a harbour in protecting the craft from the elements and quickly tried to get down a representation of the shielding arms of the harbour hugging it’s floating tennants. This is the reason behind the drama of the composition even though the subject changed somewhat when I revisited in beautiful morning sunlight a few days later.

Vendee Oil Painting 6 – La Forge

This is a representation of the accommodation we were staying at, I was interested in capturing the spot lit honeysuckle flowing in the wind against the shaded front of the house. This used to be the blacksmith’s for the village. It is useful to have a painting in progress where you are staying, particularly on this trip with the unpredictable weather, which you can dip in and out of. One of my favourite French paintings is called ‘The Breakfast Painting’ from a trip to Provence in 2009 that I would dip in and out of in a morning whilst the others were having breakfast outside the accommodation.

Vendee Oil Painting 7 – Rapeseed field with water tower.

I didn’t know if I could make this one work, just a mass of one primary colour taking over the painting. We first spotted this subject biking the Vendee coastal cycle paths, the vibrant yellow of the rapeseed demanding attention in the landscape. The water towers also stood out as colossal sculptures in this flat region. I wasn’t the only one attracted to the yellow, many people stopped their cars to photograph the field, and insects and butterflies were in abundance, hovering on a layer above the flowers, not knowing where to start, like kids in Toys R Us.

Vendee Oil Painting 8 – The Tree by the Atlantic

Clearly this tree has not had an easy existence. It stands as a visualisation of the intense Atlantic winds flowing over the sand dunes, a character in itself. I wish to do more portraits of trees in the future.

All these oil paintings plus other work from France and Scotland will go on display at my Newcastle -under-Lyme exhibition opening next month. More details to follow ...