Colossal shadows

This image is a photo I took, then changed in Adobe Photoshop using the 'fresco' tool.

I love the undulating across the columns. When drawing on site I often loose track of the shadows and get lost in the detail. Photos like these mean I can go home and take a step back from the wind and grass.

Penshaw

Penshaw Hill itself is nestled amongst other hills stretching across Weardale. This is the view east across Herrington Park. If I was stood a little higher up Penshaw hill I could have added the North Sea in the far distance.

The sky

The monument has no roof, and the sky can be seen in peculiar shapes between the apertures of the columns and the entablature (that means the top bit - more about that later).
I remember that when I was a child my dad would always exclaim, "It'll be nice when they get the windows in and the roof on!"

Immense

Penshaw Monument stands on a hill 136 metres above sea level, and is itself 20 metres high. I am just over 1.5 metres tall. So, whenever I visit, pulling up in the car at the bottom of the hill, walking up the hill and standing at the monuments feet, I am awed by it's size.

Penshaw Pillars

The pillars of Penshaw Monument are made of sandstone, which, it is rumoured, were taken from a nearby Roman dam. The whole monument is coated in coal dust which has accumulated over the years since it was erected in 1844.
I have taken on a challenge of working on it for 6 months, so we'll see where I end up around February 2009. As I post images I'll include some of it's history along the way.
I spent yesterday morning there making sketches and paintings and taking photos.

Spring Rain

Looking down from the top (4th) floor of Sunderland Library I watched shoppers dash by with umbrellas and bags.

Quink Ink

I know, more pyracantha studies. But what else am I meant to draw at 7am when I manage to grab 20 minutes while the kids are eating breakfast? And yes, that is a bit of green you can see there. All the way on the drive into work I was thinking about using inks on an impervious surface to depict the back lit leaves. I want to make the branches more opaque, with more texture and modelling. This project has legs.




Then, again grabbing about 20 minutes after work before getting the kids, I did these two colour studies at Doxford Park. I especially like the one on the left, and they work upside down too!

Hard Pruned

As I drive around Sunderland I see lots of trees in front gardens which have been cut back within an inch of their lives.

More Trees

Every spare minute when I'm out and about I've been looking at trees. And drawing trees. Here are some.

Wordless Wednesday

Doxford Beech Trees

After work I got the chance to do some sketching near my work. I am very happy with these.

Keep your mind on the driving......

But it's so hard. If I'm in the car with the kids it's actually easier, because I'm making an effort to ignore their antics and drive carefully. But when I'm on my own, especially on the drive to and from work, it's easy for my mind to wander. This is one of the sights I pass on the way into my work each day (in fact this would be the view in my rear-view window on the drive home, as I took this photo on a late December afternoon, but you get the idea, yes?).

This time of year, when driving on a morning I'm heading west with the sun low in the sky behind me. This can cast a gleaming pale yellow light onto the buildings I pass. And if there's a stormy sky in the west, blowing down from the Scottish Boarders, then the gilded houses are set against a dark grey-blue sky. That's when I say a prayer of thanks to God, and start singing 'Then Sings My Soul, or suchlike.

But it's also when I am known to start swearing too. You see, hubby got me a compact digital camera for Christmas, and I have cursed often for not bringing it with me when I see such a glorious sight. When we went to Vienna last year I only took out my other camera once on the whole trip, as it's a digital SLR, and it's very bulky. That's why he thoughtfully bought me a teeny tiny one, for my arty stuff.
So, at last, I've found how to re-charge the battery for it, and how to download from it, and now it's residing in my bag.

So if you're driving behind me on the way into work, and you are familiar with seeing me swerving as I catch sight of a bird, or a nice view, please now keep your distance even more, as I might just slam on the breaks and leap out with my camera in hand. You have been warned.

Storm tide

Last week there were banks of black seaweed that had been driven high up the beach by the usual seasonal winter tide, but also a great swell caused by high winds on the North Sea. The shops along the front had laid down sand bags in preparation, and we saw dozens of lobster pots that had been ripped loose and washed up in the rage. I observed this scene in the calm light of day, but knew the great force that had caused it.

These are great!

Actually, they're awful. They're oil pastel studies of the sky over Roker. I could see that the sky is like a landscape, and the further towards the horizon you look, the more compact the formations seem to get, in a way. The cloud banks were grey, with yellow highlights.

What makes me happy with these, even though they fail in so, so many ways, is that they show I've made a start in trying to get to grips with the sky. Hey! Things can only get better, right?

Roker skyline

Here are some more rooftops I drew yesterday. They're all from the alleyways behind my house. I love the way the buildings have been added onto, with extensions, skylights and conservatories. The back walls are different heights as people have fitted garage doors, or blocked in coal chutes.

The telephone wires cut across, and it's easy to miss them. I've drawn them too thick here. But I know they're going to be an important part in the final composition. I'm thinking about how to paint these full size. I may opt for acrylic rather than oil. I can worry about that later though.

The idea

.... was to create large canvases depicting multi-layered Northern England skies, with a sliver of rooftops across the bottom, possibly in silhouette,possibly in greys and pale yellows, as I'd seen back lit walls turn in cold, early morning sunlight.

I've been struck by LS Lowry's skies. They look blank in reproductions in books, but in real life (and we're lucky to have some originals in Sunderland Winter Gardens) there's a lot more to them.

I've also been stunned by Schiele's flat white skies, with depths of colour behind. They make me want to grab a palette knife and start smearing.

So, for the last week or so I've been peering intently at the sky any time of day I can, and amazed at how we seem to never get simple weather. There's always so many layers - high thin clouds in horizontal wisps, banks of thick dense cloud, lit wonderfully around 16.30 as I leave work, and often, when there's a strong, wet wind, these fantastic streaks of rain-laden cloud screaming across in front of all that. And yet, they clear sky peering through is the translucent blue of a newborn babies eyes.

So, the drawing on the earlier post was an early attempt, with only a pencil to hand, to capture these skies.

The second part is the rooftops I love. So, this afternoon I ventured out to draw some, literally round the back of my house. As I said, my first idea was to have these as almost back silhouettes at the bottom of the picture, but when I've looked back through the drawings i made, I love the lines they describe. So I'm thinking of leaving them as outlines, laid over the skies, still at the bottom as an anchor almost, but looser, more linear and drawn livelier than flat shapes.

Now I'm off out to draw more rooftops in charcoal. This feels very exciting.

Penshaw Monument

Sketching in fresh air is great. I should do it more.

I didn't get to spend long on each study, only about 10mins each, if that, as I had the kids & my cousin with me. But I found it very productive.

The first sketch is a basic study of the monument from the bottom right of the field & path. Nothing exciting here.

Then I walked to the far left of the field, changing the angle slightly, and started to look at the construction of the monument. While drawing this, I was thinking about creating a piece using collage of rubbings taken from the monument itself in different tones maybe.

This last piece I love. The monument is made of sandstone, and Penshaw and the surrounding area was full of coal mines until late in 20th century (don't get me started on Maggie Thatcher!) Anyway, the stone has been blackened by generations of coal mining & burning, and is starting now to weather away, leaving the bare sandstone beneath. I am glad that the council has so far decided not to clean the structure, as it's facade tells a story.



Anyway, the third view was drawn crouching below the corner of the monument looking up. I have always enjoyed the way that the monument seems to grow in proportions as you approach it, and the whole thing is over sized. You can't just step onto the base, you need a leg up, and the columns are massive. There's no roof to it, and I don't think there ever was. But a family tradition on seeing it any time is that my Dad always said "It'll be nice when they get the windows in!".

I deliberately drew it going off the edges of the paper, giving the impression that it's too big for me to fit it all in. I intend to make more studies, take some photos and rubbings, look at the colour of the soot and of the stone beneath, and paint a canvas similar in format to this last sketch.