Jura 1

 Late Summer evening (Jura), watercolour 14" x 20" 2010

Back to painting today: I worked up a couple of things from my recent trip to The Isle of Jura. Here's one of them, a biggish watercolour of the evening light over Small Isles Bay. I'm off to the Borders for the weekend to see if my daughter can carry on my tradition of failing to triumph in art competitions - she's entering the Yarrow Show's children's art contests: a painted stone, a decorated wooden spoon and a painting of 'My Home'. Her stone in particular is very abstract in its design and I'm not sure this is the way to appeal to the judges... My mother however, has form at the Yarrow Show, so perhaps her luck will rub off on the young 'un.

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Geo Prints

 Untitled, monotype/screenprint, 2010

 Untitled, monotype/screenprint, 2010

 Untitled, monotype/screenprint, 2010

 Untitled, monotype/screenprint, 2010

 Untitled, mixed media, 2010

 Here are the prints I made recently. They have gone on display at The Forest in Selkirk where they will remain till the end of september.  In these prints I am looking at the landscape in a more oblique fashion than in my usual painting, using geological maps and diagrams. To the untrained eye these diagrams can seem mysterious and impenetrable, a series of abstract marks and forms with little discernible relation to the landscape, whereas to the geologist of course they are as clear as a photograph and will illuminate their understanding of the landscape. I am not a geologist, obviously, but I have access to a friendly one who can interpret it all for me.

Approaching these diagrams and maps from an artistic point of view, I can appreciate the beauty of the lines and marks and appropriate these by incorporating them into an artwork. By removing them from their natural scientific context they become almost abstract compositional elements, yet they retain their underlying significance in terms of explaining the landscape. Broadly, this series looks at elements of British geology, with the diagrams themselves relating specifically to the Southern Uplands area. The fossils included are of Silurian origin, in keeping with specimens I discovered on excursions to the fossil beds of Kilbucho, near Broughton.



The Forest Bookstore can be found at 26 Market Place, Selkirk. Tel: 01750 22763
The prints were all created at the Amber Arts print studio in Edinburgh

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Fife fossils

 I forgot to take any photos of my printmaking. I did take some snaps when I went fossil hunting in Fife the other day though! The East Wemyss foreshore and cliffs offer an abundance of carboniferous shales and fine sandstone, full of exciting plant deposits. This big rock shown above is the fossilised remains of part of a giant tree fern, about 300 million years old.
Next up, I'm going to the Isle of Jura on the west coast for a week of painting and whisky sipping so there'll be no action here for a while. If you're in need of a landscape fix in the interim, don't forget it's not to late to visit Frames Gallery in Perth to see my most recent work.




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Showtime

 This week I've been down in Edinburgh at Amber Arts doing some printmaking. The prints are nearly finished, so I'll try and get them posted up here next week when they're done. Meanwhile, here are a couple of photos from Perth Show. The Highland bull with the weird nose ring may, for all I know, actually belong to the Queen as she had some beasts from Balmoral on show. One was reserve champion of Native Breed Bulls in fact, but beaten to the top title by an Aberdeen Angus. The goats were great. They like to eat willow herb and kept trying to climb out of their pens to nab some from their neighbours.

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New work and butterflies

 Summer Light (Buchanty), oil on board, 24" x 48" 2010

This is a new painting which examines the view down towards the plantations at Murray's Hill, with Buchanty basking in summer sun to the left. One of the interesting elements of this composition, for me anyway, is the matrix of marks and tones made by the different land uses in the foreground. The heather burning patterns of the moorland and the savage tearing up of the felled plantations create some good lines and swathes of tonal variety. In the middle ground the tone is dependent on the broad chunks of forestry and the different colours of agriculture. The sky was agreeably heavy, yet with an intense light still penetrating, which gives this painting the only sort of tone I like to deal with in summer.

I am now back in Perthshire after a few days in the Borderland doing some more photography for the Cooncil's Shop Local campaign. This time round it was garden centres and ironmongers and at two of the former I saw small tortoiseshell butterflies (seen feasting on marjoram below). These are becoming scarcer across the country and the Butterfly Conservation people are hoping to record sightings to verify their status. I duly filled out the form here and you can too if you see the wee critters anywhere. I came across them at Lowood Nursery near Melrose and Woodside, near Ancrum. These are brilliant plant places, beautiful and both full of wildlife.

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Cnemidopyge

Beginning to get the hang of linocutting, just about, I think. Here's the latest, a trilobite of course but not from the Borders this time. I found him courtesy of Richard Fortey's awesome book Trilobite! Eyewitness to Evolution which I will never tire of promoting. Everyone should read it, whether they think they're interested in fossils or not. They will be by the end I guarantee. You can buy a second hand copy on Amazon for 40p!

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More

A couple more linocuts. The one on the right which resembles an upside down tree is a brachiopod.

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Printmaking: Fossils

Linocut fossils: a trilobite and some coral, all from the Kilbucho fauna in the Borders. I'm trying out some different linocut techniques here, still some way to go before I perfect the art.

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General Wade's Road

Today I took the watercolours out for a bit more exercise, though I supplemented my armoury with some good strong inks. I found myself up at Glen Cochill, a wide low glen along the middle of which snakes General Wade's Military Road. These roads were built in the first half of the 18th Century as part of the government efforts to subdue or suppress the Highlands. Along with the old drove ways, these tracks provide an interesting element of the moorland landscape, something I hope to investigate further. Above are three sketches I did out there, the first two looking north west to the triangular pinnacle of Schiehallion, the third looking back down the road towards Amulree. 

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Photography: Textiles

Photography again today as I continue the ongoing assignment with Scottish Borders Council to document elements of local trade and industry. This time it was textiles, so I had a fascinating day touring mills and design studios across the region. Here is a photo of a worker at the Lochcarron mill in Selkirk.

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Jupiter Artland at TFAD

The excellent culture blog Touching From a Distance  has now been adopted by The Spectator Magazine to be its official online arts voice. In its new incarnation, the blog's editor Simon Mason has very generously invited me to contribute occasional pieces about culture in Scotland. My first one has been published today and is all about Jupiter Artland, the marvelous sculpture garden near Edinburgh. You can read it here , if you so wish. The photo shows one of Laura Ford's Weeping Girls.

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Watching the woods again

Those Dark Trees (Plantation Study) Oil on gesso on board 8" x 10" (approx) 2010

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