Gloucestershire Black Kidney Potatoes

Dymock fruit trees

 Back in 1997 I painted a Dymock pear, plum and apple for Charles Martell, who makes artisan cheese

 in Gloucestershire.  He has sourced old varieties of fruit trees and is doing his best to preserve as many as he can on his farm near Ledbury.  He now makes a perry liqueur out of the pears.  This morning I went to his home to deliver another painting he commissioned from me, of Gloucestershire Black Kidney potatoes.  They are almost purple in colour but sadly on opening them, they were creamy inside, not purple as I had expected.  He let me photo the old paintings.  The photos have not come out too badly considering they were in their frames and I had forgotten how to stop the flash from working on my camera.

I went to +Vin Sullivan's near Blaenavon last Thursday, hoping to paint a large fish.  The only large one Johnny had left was a brute of a cod, who looked rather ugly.  Anyway, I set to and did a rough sketch of it along with a whole lot of bass, trout, mackerel, sardines and whiting.  Incidently, whiting was thought to be fit  only as cat food, but now seems to have reached a more respectable status.

After an hour or so I had had enough and returned home to thaw out, but bought a mackerel to paint. They have fascinating colouring, and I had a bit of fun painting it.  I ended up putting it on a bed of ice and seaweed as it looked a bit strange floating in mid air.  I am not sure whether to continue with the cod......  

Graham took me to Bentley's Oyster Bar and Grill for my birthday in early November.  He adores oysters and wanted me to paint a plate of them for my exhibition in May next year. We got there quite early having dropped in at the Royal Academy on the way to see the 'Bronze' exhibition.  They produced a plate with three different kinds of oyster, Mersea, Loch Ryan and Dorset, all on a bed of ice and seaweed.  Sustained by a delicious cup of coffee and later a glass of Sauvignon, I painted as much as I could and Grahamthen devoured them with relish.  I sent the photo of the finished product to Bentley's and they are keen to use the image for their Christmas Card.  I took it to my printers, I-Pixel this morning.  Apparently, I cause them real problems as I use off white paper.  Hopefully he will manage.....

'Name' paintings

It is mid May and it is still quite cold outside.  I have managed to do some painting, but not a lot.  I have done a number of 'Name ' paintings which seem popular as Christening presents for a few friends and relatives.  I try to make them as personal as possible,  with references to the child's home, or the place of their birth. Here are a few examples of ones already done:

I painted these two piglets not long ago.  They belong to Penny Johnson of PJ's catering, and I am afraid are destined for ham at some stage.  They seemed to be friends and it is so strange that something so cute as a piglet can change into a huge sow with a really ugly profile.  I used a bit of chalk to show the hairs on the back.
 The big sow belongs to Richard and Annie Hall at Hailes, near Market Drayton.

2012 getting back in the groove

I have not used this for so long and on another computer. I hope I can put images onto this blog again. The days are getting longer and soon we will be in the garden until 6.00pm. This is Cwmyoy Church right up in the hills not far from Llanthony Abbey. A friend of my daughter was married there in February and it was snowing. The hill is so steep and narrow that there was only room for the bride's car, so everyone else had to walk about half a mile up hill to get to it. It is a beautiful, wild place. No wonder she wanted to get married there. This is a painting for her wedding present. I hope it shows how cold and snowy it was as I had to imagine the snow.