Column Week 12

Click to enlarge


These are the images and text that made up my illustrated column entry in the Cambs Times and Wisbech Standard, in print today.

Heavy Duty Trespassing

Arrived early for my yoga class again yesterday and decided I'd sketched enough from the car park there for a while so I drove past the British Legion in Manea and turned right into a yard with access to a public footpath. I wasn't entirely sure if I should be parked where I was, it looked suspiciously like someones farm yard to me but the yellow monster in front of the old tin barns was just too tempting and worth the risk.

I was sketching for about five minutes when a tractor pulled up and a farmer jumped out and headed towards me...Gulp!
I informed him I was sketching and asked if I was okay to continue, surprisingly his response was very positive. He then drove the JCB, carrying it's large fertilizer bags, up to his tractor and slit the bags open to load. For a moment I thought I'd lost my subject but I was mistaken. The farmer re-loaded the JCB with two new bags and parked it back EXACTLY where I had found it.
What a considerate and charming man.
I gave a grateful wave and continued to sketch for 20 minutes or so, adding a little colour from my Schmincke box, before heading off for my yoga class.

Thank you to the kind gentleman that made me feel so comfortable while trespassing on his farm Wednesday morning.

Waiting For Yoga

Another sketch from the Royal British Legion car park in Manea while waiting for yoga class to commence.
This time I parked facing the rear of the building and sketched the little shed that caught my eye.

A Busy Week

I have been exceptionally productive this week, so much so that I have a number of journal pages to share in this post in order to close the week.

The first is a 2 minute sketch I made on Wednesday, while waiting for yoga class to commence.

Above, you can see that the bunch of Daffodils, I have sketched a few times already this week, are now all in bloom.

After my meeting with John Elworthy on Friday I popped to Tesco Cafe to kill time before collecting my youngest from school.

I still managed to arrive outside the school early, so I parked up and sketched the Acorn Video shop, made a few notes and added colour on my return home.

Full English Yoga

Manea Royal British Legion Club

I attended Yoga class this morning and arrived early...again!
I seem to do that a lot since keeping a journal, grabbing chances between appointments to lurk suspiciously in my truck with a pen and sketchbook in my hands.

After Yoga I decided to turn left instead of right for a change and headed towards Chatteris. Once reaching Chatteris I couldn't get Bluebell Cafe out of my mind, they cook THE best full English breakfast of any cafe I have visited...and I've visited quite a few. After being told all morning, in yoga class, to 'listen to my body' I decided I had no alternative but to indulge.
I'm sure my teacher will be very proud of me.


Blubell Cafe, DJ's Garden Centre, Chatteris.

Locations and Postcards

Today's journal entry was sketched on location at the Tesco Cafe in March, Cambridgeshire.

I have been busy creating postcards for my Postcard Pen Pal project where 3 successful exchanges have already taken place to date:

Postcard Pen Pals

I've also managed to get a couple of location sketches in my large moleskin sketchbook while parked:

Location Sketchbook 2007

For now, sketching from the drivers seat is as brave as I get but as the weather improves I'll be heading out, once again, on location.

I now have to decide whether to continue with two separate blogs or add all my 2008 location sketches here on the one blog.

Any thoughts on this?

Sketch Crawling

For an artist to interpret the world around them with a heartfelt passion , they must first see it, feel it and breath it in.

My sincere apologies for the huge intermission in my updates, I have been making use of what good weather we have left here in the UK and taking my sketch books on little art trips or sketch crawls. Each of my sketches take no longer than around 15-20 mins, some less, and I use these pages to master my skills and play with various mediums.
One of my most recent trips took place this week and started at my home here in the Fens. From the comfort of my sofa I sketched the view before me while consuming my first coffee of the day.

I then drove through Wimblington and into Manea, a small village I haven't visited very often in my 14 years living here. I soon came across the jewel in it's crown, St. Nicolas Church, and decided to produce a cropped sketch of an area my eyes kept resting upon. Moving up slightly, I realised the beautiful house next door to the church was in fact a residential care home for the elderly.

I remember wondering to myself if that had a negative effect on the residents, being so close to their local graveyard at such a vulnerable time in their lives or if they in fact found it comforting? Cathyrn House stands strong, has a warm glow about it, welcoming, inviting, pretty and the shadows cast from the gravestones in the churchyard next door do not hamper it at all.

Back in the truck, I drove through Manea, stopping occasionally to photograph isolated barns sat like scarecrows in the vast landscape. My journey brought me round into Chatteris, an area I am more familiar with and where my dear friend Rob Morris lives, whose studio I shared for our recent Fenland Visual Arts Collective Open Studios project.

I left the truck outside Robs studio and my sketch bag and I soaked up the sunshine while strolling together. It wasn't long before we came across the Old Bakery Cafe, a quaint little place on the corner of the street offering old fashioned food and hospitality. The sight of the tables outside mingled with the smell of fresh coffee were too much to resist so I grabbed myself a seat and tucked into a slice of homemade almond cake with my latte.

I sketched the corner of the street opposite me and sat for a while watching the traffic go by. Mature figures manoeuvring their empty trolleys through the streets, a prop providing them the excuse to be among people and escape the lonlieness. A regular ritual, offering friendship and conversation.

A visit to Tesco took me into March, a small Town, where I took a moment to sketch the ever growing industrial additions to the Fenland landscape.
Daily routine took over until later that evening when I managed to finish my sketch crawl with a quick watercolour sketch of the fading sun falling behind the distant barns from the comfort of my dining room window seat.