Potential Book Cover

 

Joint Biography of Vincenzo Lunardi and James Tytler

 Just been commissioned to write the joint biography of Lunardi & Tytler, the first ever to fly in Britain. If you want to know more look on this blog for November 2017.

                           Vincenzo Lunardi (Scotland, 28 July 1786)         John Simlett

Pen & Ink on Cartridge Paper

12 inches x 8 inches

Two Wheels On My Wagon... But I'm Still Rolling Along

I thought I would leave a ripple in the pond, otherwise you might think me gone to meet my maker..................! plop !

No art anymore, my eyesight won't permit it. I'm fine though, it's just the bits that carry me around are a bit dodgy. As I approach my 88th year, I'm still working  playing 7 days a week: writing and studying.

Since my 84th birthday things have gone ballistic: I was elected to the Society for Architectural Illustrators, elected a postgraduate member of the Royal Historical Society, passed an MA in Naval History, and an MSc in Forensic Psychology. 

I was going to do a PhD in Naval History and had offers from Portsmouth and Suffolk universities. But I have decided I don't need the travel time spent between, uni, museums, archive etc. Instead, I'm just starting an MA in Creative Writing (CW) - I did a couple of CW courses as an undergrad, so I understand what is involved.

I have so many projects on file that never got written up, therefore the CW will allow me to get it all written up with modern influences. It will get me out of academic writing, and back into stuff suitable for mainstream audiences. Should be fun.

Bye for now

 

Ave Des Gobelins

This replaces the post of 29 June 2023 which became corrupted - The Comments (David & John) were lost ...sorry!

 Just as you thought you'd seen the back of me ........

I always get pulled back to my roots, and a building often needs to be drawn. This one caught me .... the ink is still wet.

Number 2 the Avenue of Goblins Paris - as it looked in 1904

As 2023 Stumbles OUT, I Stumble ON!

 I don't suppose there are many who remember me as the prolific blogger, I doubt those that do will ever look in here...... BUT ... my life is very different now to how it used to be, and so here's an update for the few that might might peep in. xxx.

My wife died just over 2 years ago, we were married 62 years, and it changed me considerably. Now, aged 86,  I go where the wind blows me ... at first I painted and drew day & night like a maniac. 

...the wind changed direction and I fell into Forensic Psychology and took a Masters of Science degree (MSc).

...the wind changed and connected me to my childhood: At 15 years of age I became apprenticed for 5 years to be a Shipwright (Ship & boat builder) ... I have begun, and have almost finished, a Master of Arts degree (MA) with the University of Portsmouth, in Naval History.

If the wind stays in this direction I shall start a Doctorate (PhD) late 2024. I intend to write a thesis on a marshland that became Samuel Pepys's Dockyard, which in turn built a hamlet to accommodate the dockyard workers. Until then, the workers and their families lived in the Hulks of the old Ships of the Line of the Royal Navy.

The Hulks were loved by the workers, with street names, and 'house numbers'. Against their will they were moved to the wooden houses: the 'Blue Houses'...the houses grew to become a wooden town named Blue Town ... no electricity, water from a well, almost primitive, and here is where I grew up.

There is so little written about this particular history, that the two years for research will be fully utilised, and then a year to write. The only problem is!!!! I feel a slight change in the wind and am feeling the need to draw what I will be writing about! 

The Dockyard was closed in 1960. Blue Town expanded to become Sheerness and is more of a London suburb than a coastal town. So here we have the lifecycle of a dockyard and a way of life.  Amen.

If I 'pop my clogs' before I finish, at least I will go out of this life loving what I am doing.

NOT MY ARTWORK

 

Busy, busy......BUSY

 I'm just not getting enough time to 'do' this blog, because I am really on a roll. I will just bring you up to speed as to where I am.

I saw a photo taken, I'm fairly sure, by Chuck Black, the American painter I so admire, and just had to paint it:

Patsy's Alpine Adventure

Then I fell under the influence of Tobias Brenner, the German painter I also admire, and I painted:

An Afterlife on an Ocean Wave

Then I fell under the influence of my eldest Australian Great-grandson, 'Topgun' (Logan) who wanted a painting of 'Among us red'????? After research, he got this:

Among Us Red 

Next I saw a photograph of the 'Porthcawl Wave' by Nigel Waters, which I didn't copy but it gave me a steer.

So that's five paintings in four weeks ... plus ... I was invited to exhibit in London next February!! I was flattered at the invite but turned it down as, at 84, I don't feel like shipping paintings and going to London at this stage in my career.

CHAOS Continues and its effect on my portrait paining

 I have found that the relaxed process of chaos-drawing, has influenced my portrait painting. With portraits I attempt to put a likeness on to a surface, with 'chaos' I seek to extract a likeness from the chaotic surface.

With a portrait I don't exactly use a grid but I position certain features, by measurement, specifically from centre lines I have drawn. This procedure does restrict and discipline the portrait painting. It's as if I don't trust myself to put the key-features in the correct place. 

With 'chaos', it is totally freehand and I don't even think about trusting my ability, in fact I don't even consider I may get it wrong because it doesn't matter. Here it becomes common to continue with the mistakes and accommodate and correct them as you go along.

I hadn't realised all this until my niece asked me to paint a portrait of her husband's mum. She was quite a fantastic woman and a good friend, who died a few months ago aged 97.

The last portrait I painted was four-years ago, before I broke away from art to nurse my late wife. It therefore made sense to draw a portrait, before attempting to paint it: to try to get back into the swing of things. Consequently, I did a freehand charcoal sketch; the direct result of doing 'chaos'. 

I was quite pleased with the sketch, and this encouraged me to paint the portrait entirely freehand, which I did. (The flash of the camera has hidden the eyelashes on her right eye).

Madame Maachi was Algerian by the way, which reflects my cosmopolitan family ... we also have a Japanese, American and Australians ... not to mention English.

'Madam Maachi'  Oil on Stretched Canvas 

 16 x 11 inches (400 x 280mm)