Own work: Life Drawing LVII

     Back, finally, to the life drawing studio. A number of short poses and then one hour long one. All made using pencil-crayon and displayed in order of production.

Own work: Stones and Moon

     Another pen and ink drawing for you: Stones and Moon, approx 12 x 18 cms on 300 gsm watercolour paper.  'Really eerie, that,' says a friend.

Own work: Standing Stones

      My first pen and ink drawing in a long time, 'Standing Stones' approx 14.5 x 16.5 cms.

Own work: collage

     My latest collage,version 1. 15 x 23 cms mixed media of 300gsm watercolour paper.

The Pump Room, Tenbury Wells

     The object of our foray into England was a family birthday. On our return journey I insisted we stop at Tenbury Wells, a small and attractive, work-a-day market town in the extreme north-west corner of Worcestershire. I wanted to see the spa. And as you can see from the photographs what an extraordinary little structure it is. Pevsner said, perhaps a little harshly: 'much like Gothicky or Chinesey fair stuff without seriousness or taste'. I prefer to see it as an example of British eccentricity.

     As you can well imagine it is Victorian in date, by an architect who even I've never heard of James Cranston. A local, I think, though the local tourist information says he was a Brummie. Apparently the whole thing, apart from the porch, is prefabricated. The roof is clad in 'bespoke' iron sheets. The tower looks like it has strayed from a Hollywood production set in medieval Russia. Pevsner was right, it is rebarbative; but I think that misses the point.

     The Pump Room isn't the only building by Cranston in the town which is mainly red-brick Georgian with a handful of the Medieval thrown into the mix. It's well worth a stroll about.

     Below is the only slightly less extraordinary Market House dating to 1858. Not that many buildings I know are oval in plan. Pevsner rather liked it but I feel somewhat less sympathetic. It isn't bad in itself, quite whimsical really, even charming, though from some angles it looks like a grossly inflated cabbies' shelter.  The problem lies for me, however, in the execution which is rather harsh, better suited to a Victorian city than a Georgian and Medieval market town. That is partly down to the use of machine made bricks and tiles. Perhaps it will have to stand around for another 150 years for it to have bedded in properly, quietly maturing like a cheese or fine wine. Perhaps it never will, but be doomed to be forever an architectural outsider. In the meantime a change of colour scheme re paint may help. Both buildings are High Victorian in style, and one suspects Cranston was under the influence of 'Rogue' architects such as Lamb and Teulon. Drunk and disorderly on Muscular Gothic and the possibilities of mass production in the new Industrial Age.

Own work: Collage

     I have a new collage to share with you. Finished just a few minutes ago. 22.7 x 25.2 cms on 300 gsm watercolour paper.

Own work: from my sketch book

     Thought I'd briefly share this drawing I did the other week of one of the trees at the back of our house - inspired by the tree studies of John Constable and Samuel Palmer. I find the form and shape of trees deeply fascinating particularly in winter where they are empty of leaves; I also like the sound they make in the wind. Like the sea. However I've always held back from drawing one feeling my skills weren't up to snuff and I have to admit it was a tricky thing, loosing my way a few times, but over all I would count it as a success.

Grange Court, Leominster

     It really was a flying visit. We didn't pay enough attention to the town in our determination to get to the Priory.  But we did see we really liked and we will return.

     One building, however, really did attract our gaze: the rather jaunty Grange Court standing neat and trim behind an equally neat and trim garden near the church. This was originally the Butter Cross and stood in the town centre at the junction of High St and Broad St until sometime in the 19th century when it was dismantled and moved to its current, somewhat genteel location becoming a private residence. Originally the ground floor was open to the elements. It is the work of John Abel of Hereford, the King's Carpenter, and dates from 1633.  We've come across his work before in my post about Dore Abbey.

Leominster Priory

     Without a doubt this is a monster of a church.  Perhaps not that big in the scheme of things - it is roughly 100 x125 ft - but there is something sublime about what is in fact merely the fragment of a larger medieval priory. It has to be said that is quite the experience to step into this building with all its complexity and seeming vastness. The scale is big, and very often powerful, almost primitive. At times verging on the sublime. At first it is difficult to comprehend, this is not a building that is at all lucid or coherent, and it is only as you walk around and it continues to open up to you is understanding achieved. A building to be apprehended first emotionally rather than intellectually, I think. Well, I suppose that could be applied to all buildings and in particular medieval churches where there is an attempt to embody mystery in the material. Only more so at Leominster where one is unprepared for the unexpectedness of it all, for what one encounters is really two interconnecting churches: a massive, and austere, early Norman priory nave and N Aisle, and in startling contrast to the S a vast parochial space divided into nave and s aisle (or is it two aisles?) by an elegant and daring arcade which is the work of George Gilbert Scott Sn in the 1870s. It replaces an arcade of Tuscan columns (the stoutest of the Classical orders) that in turn replaced the arcade destroyed in a fire in 1699. I would think Scott based his design on some surviving evidence, but even if he didn't it's a coup de theatre that easily justifies its presence. Bar the spectacular and vast Perp w window all the rest in this part of the church is early Decorated, in the style we have met before in the N transept of Ledbury church. There is plenty of ballflower here too both inside and out.
     The best sculpture is, however outside, where the late Norman w door survives in all its massive and barbaric splendour. The six capitals are fine examples of the Herefordshire school of Romanesque sculptors, blending late Antique and 'Barbarian' northern European elements. The two outer capitals are the most classical: on the right hand-side there is a form of 'running palmette', and the left 'Inhabited Vinescroll'. This latter is a symbol both of paradise and the church (which in worship is a foretaste of heaven, or should be). The other four capitals are definitely more northern in inspiration and the symbolism a little obscure in places. The easiest to understand is the centre left which two husbandmen pruning vines. The vine is both a symbol of Christ and the church (which is both his body and his bride) see John 14: 1-15. As Christians we are all grafted into the vine, i.e. the Body of Christ, and sometimes pruned away - this is what the capital depicts. Both this capital and the one to its left, the 'Inhabited Vinescroll' are Eucharistic symbols. It is also possible to see both column shafts as Christ himself. I think, while I'm about it, I'll also suggest that the two inner columns represent the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (left) and the Tree of Life (right). The left inner column may also represent the Brazen Serpent erected by Moses see Numbers 21: 4-9, a type of the Crucifixion of Christ see John 3: 14-16.
     In all great architecture, but there are no fittings of note, sadly. And those present are lost in the vastness. A lot of money would need to be spent in creating something that could hold its own here with any confidence. The only thing to stay in my mind is the picture hanging above the south porch - one part of a reredos perhaps? Alas there is far too much clutter, and I hate the re-ordering. Not a church I think I would happily worship in.