The First Five Pictures I Ever Drew... and Fairy Dust!

I won't be able to post any new artwork on here for 7 - 10 days as I have to get this final 'English assignment' completed. However, I've  now got the photograph of me 'at the beginning' of my plunge into art and I thought I would post that. (I look a right stupid Berk!!)

Not much point in posting the photograph without telling the crazy story behind it though. I feel as if it is someone else's story, as it is so long ago, which is good because otherwise it might feel  like boasting. At the risk of sounding boring, here it is.

After I was about 8 or 9 years of age I stopped drawing in an artistic manner. All my stuff became purely technical, although pen and ink had become the tools-of-my-trade. 

I was conscripted into the Royal Air Force for 2 years, at the age of 21 (3 weeks after our wedding!). We decided that, with the shipbuilding industry being in a slump we would stay in the Air Force, and that I should try to get a job as aircrew, because the pay was really good! The RAF must have been desperate as somehow I got through the selection process. I then flew on long range jet transport aircraft for 20 years. Home for a week - away for two, home for four days - away for three! So there was no time for hobbies - no art!

I was posted to Germany in 1979 as a 'Seagull' with the Phantom Jet Fighters for three years. This meant I would be home most nights with lots of time off. Hobbies beckoned.

 Pat had a paper-bag with a pen and ink drawing on it of an old house in Cornwall, England. I felt the need to draw it, and I did - I was surprised and pleased with the result. She sent it off to a magazine competition and ... they used it for their front cover (only ever happens to other people normally). Encouraged I drew pen & ink pictures of three castles on the banks of the river Rhine, and one of a Dutch Windmill. Followed by a fifth picture, the castle at Dalfsen (see last posting).

Pat had joined a Theatre Club, but it was about to be closed down because it was falling to pieces.  Amongst other things, the stage lighting and most of the technical stuff needed replacing they needed to raise about £7, 000 ($11,000). 

They had a fund-raising meeting at our house during which a young teacher, Rachel, said, "We could always sell prints of John's drawings." I laughed, thinking she was joking, I never even though of framing them - they were for fun. 

However ... the unstoppable force ... Pat, got behind the idea and the next thing we were getting prints done in Holland and buying complete frames from a warehouse in Germany.  We sat for hours putting the prints into the frames. The small shop on base said they would sell them for us (the woman in the photograph).

Then the impossible happened. They sold out in two weeks! 

We got lots printed, and spent days framing - they sold out. The USAF down in Ramstein wanted them, Berlin wanted them and so on ... and so on ... They kept selling out. We lost count of how many hundreds sold. They were the perfect product in the perfect market place at the perfect time. There was lots of demand and NO competition, They raised enough money to help equip the theatre (there were lots of other activities raising money at the same time).

The press were all over us, and commissions began to pour in ... at the end of the three years I was forced to leave the Royal Air Force and turn professional... where the adventures continued!!!