Own work: San Pietro della Immagini

     Have sort of finished this, the façade of the Sardinian Romanesque church of San Pietro della Immagini - St Peter of the Images.  The images being a Deposition group of polychromatic sculptures that was once housed in the church.  St Peter's is situated in the small town of Bulzi. Not really that happy with it, but I can't honestly see a way forward.  

Own work: The Banqueting House, Studley Royal

      So, The Banqueting House at Studley Royal, in N Yorkshire, that remarkable water garden that also includes the ruined Fountains Abbey within its purlieus. I have been to the Abbey, as a teenager, but not the garden.  The Banqueting House is thought to be a design by Colen Campbell, built by the mason Thomas Buck between 1728 and 1732.  Rather Baroque, all things considered.  Mixed media, 56 x 36 cms on 300gsm watercolour paper.

Own work: The Temple of Bacchus, Stowe

     Of late I've been rather interested in garden structures, such as follies and banqueting houses, and, slightly tangential, to that the influence English garden structures, such as those by Vanbrugh and Kent had on French Neo-classicists such as Claude-Nicholas Ledoux.  I'm particularly drawn to the over-scaled and dramatic architecture of Sir John Vanbrugh.

     Here is my interpretation of a now lost building by Vanbrugh - The Temple of Bacchus that once stood in the gardens at Stowe, in Buckinghamshire.  It was built in 1719 for Viscount Cobham and survived until the 1920s when it was demolished for the school chapel designed by Sir Robert Lorimer.  
     I accidentally discovered a photographic illustration of the temple in a book in the horticultural library at Aberglasney.  It was my first I encounter with the building and I was very intrigued - it had drama and heft.  A quality of presence and mystery.  It was, I thought, a suitable subject for a painting, but could find very few other illustrations of the temple? and those were of poor quality or too small.  However I wasn't to be deterred, and so here then, based on those meagre resources, is my evocation of a lost part of our architectural history, our patrimony.  Mixed media, 23 x 46 cms.

Own work: Covehithe Church

      My latest collage; 'Covehithe Church' on the coast of Suffolk. A vast church that was partially demolished in the end of the 17th century as surplus to requirements, and a smaller, much smaller church erected within the ruins. A rather M R James sort of place. 22cms x 10.4 cms on watercolour paper.

Own work: West Walton

     

     The latest finished painting ahead of my exhibition in October: The Bell Tower, West Walton. 28 x 52.5 cms, mixed media on watercolour board.

     West Walton is one of architectural sights of Britain - a mighty detached bell tower, sophisticated Early English Gothic, except for the parapet and pinnacles. West Walton is in the extreme west of Norfolk on the silt fen, and is one of a number of excellent parish churches to be found between the rivers Nene and Great Ouse.

Own work: 'Archway, Bath'

     Welcome to the Salon des Refuses. I painted this specifically for an exhibition in London. Not something I usually do as living in south west Wales it is such a schlep. Anyway I was relieved of the hassle of getting it up to town and back by being rejected. Alas.

     The judging criteria meant that this isn't in my usual mixed media. I have had to work in water soluble media only. This has meant a change in my technique, and a little learning in the process. The composition is also slightly different in that I have included the urban context of the arch, which I usually play down or omit altogether.

     Perhaps this is not sort of architecture that one immediately thinks of in connection with Bath - it being Georgian and all that. This structure is however late Victorian, the work of the Scottish born architect J M Brydon, and illustrates how by the turn of twentieth century British architecture was swinging back to full blown Classicism. It forms part of his complex of civic buildings - Guildhall, Market and Art Gallery - in the centre of the city. The arch is merely the rear entrance to the site. I love its sculptural, mannerist qualities.

Own work: Aberglasney:

     Ahead of my forthcoming exhibition at Aberglasney I've created this mixedmedia image of the house. All rather John Piper, which - I have to be honest - was not quite what I was out to achieve, however I do seem to have regained a more confident approach than the hesitant approach I took in that painting of St Cathan's church recently uploaded here.

Own work: St Cathan, Llangathen

     Finally, finally, started painting again! It has been months of emptiness. The consequences of Lockdown here in the UK - not the epidemic, but Lockdown. And here is what I've managed to produce - a bit laboured I'm sad to say. The 'usual' mixed media. All this activity as I'm exhibiting in next month at Aberglasney: 10-06.22 - 16.06.22

Own work: Grant's Iron Foundry

     As avid readers of this blog will know I am very much a fan of Bryan Browning - south Lincolnshire's finest, and provincial architect extraordinaire. It is an architecture of power and emotion with roots in the English Baroque school and French Neo-classicism. Anyway here is my latest painting a mixed media effort. It depicts the monumental entrance to the former Grant's Iron Foundry on Wharf Rd in Stamford. Quite the thing.

Own work: The House of Correction, Folkingham

     The first big piece of art I have done in a long while. The House of Correction, Folkingham, Lincolnshire, by that excellent provincial Georgian architect Bryan Browning. A favourite of this blog. Here is the real thing.  Perhaps a little more restrained than I would have liked, but maybe that is a reflection of how I'm feeling at present. Usual mixed-media.

Own work: Nevile's Gate, Trinity College, Cambridge

     Finally got round to posting this!  Nevile's gate, Trinity College, Cambridge and a rather nifty piece of  Jacobean architecture it is, dating from c1610. I worked from a photograph which I took several years ago, the lockdown meaning I haven't been out much of late. I think the shadow under the arch needs darkening before it's framed.

Own work: The Sardis Chapel, Ystradgynlais

     

     Revisiting the Sardis Chapel at Ystradgynlais, this being straightened times when travelling in search of new subject matter is out of the question. This time mixed media with some collage. To be honest I didn't really enjoy the process, perhaps with time and distance my attitude towards this painting will change for the better. At the moment all I can see are the faults.

Own work: West Door, Leominster Priory

     Two new artworks in a week, what's going on? Here's The West Door of Leominster Priory - the usual mixed media 26 x 27.5 cms on 300gsm watercolour paper. Enjoy.

Own work: The Sardis Independent Chapel

     Another new work for you.  The Sardis Independent Chapel, Ystradgynlais, Breconshire. Ystradgynlais, which is visually nearly all Victorian and later, is oddly enough situated south of the Brecon Beacons towards the head of the Tawe valley. So sort of industrial South Wales, really. Not the sort of place one would automatically associate with deeply rural Breconshire. The chapel, perhaps the grandest in the town, dates from the 1860s and is a far more dominant presence in the streetscape than the retiring parish church. As you can see from the collage it is a rather odd building with a number of mannerisms to the classical façade: the bases and capitals of the eight Doric pilasters, (which are missing both their pads, or orli, and abaci), are continuous between adjoining pilasters, and the entablature is missing most of its cornice.

     It is now closed. Anyway, this is a mixed-media collage roughly 30 x 37cms on watercolour board.

Own work: 'Rocks and Cave, Pennard'

     Latest painting, after a short-ish hiatus: 'Rocks and Cave, Pennard'. Mixed media on 300gsm watercolour 30x26cms. What more can I say?

Own work: 'Rocks and Scree; Pennard'

     I had started this last month before me exhibition completing it during the first full day there.  It is based on a drawing I made of the cliffs at Pennard, Gower.  Mixed media on 300gsm watercolour paper, again making use of butter for the stopping out. I hope you like it.

Own work: Cliffs at Pobbles Bay

      A new work to share with you: Cliffs at Pobbles Bay.  Mixed media on 300gsm watercolour paper.  Pobbles bay, which at low tide is connected by smooth pale sand to Three Cliffs Bay, is one of those hauntingly beautiful places that peninsular Gower is so rich in. The sky and the rocks were created by applying a wash over butter!  It, the butter, was then removed with a hot iron.

Own work: Bethania Chapel, Morriston

     Finally!  Finally able to share this with you all out there - The Bethania Chapel, Woodfield Street, Morriston.  Mixed media, as yet undetermined dimensions.  I have to admit this took for longer to do than I had hoped, having infinite pains with the windows.  This chapel, like so many now in Wales has closed for worship.  That whole proud nonconformist culture is in what seems to be terminal decline.

Own work: Llangathen church

     For a few months now I've been really struggling in the attempt to paint topographical subjects. Finally I've actually achieved something I'm vaguely satisfied with - a little bit too Edwardian - but ok.

Own work: Aberglasney

     I have to admit I'm rather pleased with this sketch.  Not that I had thought it would turn out stylistically quite as it has. I simply didn't sit down and consciously conceive of making a drawing in the Edwardian manner. It just happened and I'm glad it did.