Landscape

Landscapes have always been my thing and so living at the end of the road is perfect for me. 

I like the wild best of all, I think that's why I have a strong affinity to the sea. I've lived within 10 miles of the coast all my life, I've spent the last 30 years with the sea almost on my door step. I can't imagine what it would be like to live inland.

I spent most of my early life surrounded by fields, woods and marshes, I still live very close to nature except I've swapped the fields & marshes for moorland and hills, so these are the things I draw.

I like to have a personal connection to the places I draw, that's why I draw my little corner of Exmoor. 

I don't feel I could draw somewhere else unless I have been there, but even then I feel slightly guilty for stealing someone else's landscape.

The view from the allotment is spectacular, across Lynmouth Bay to South Wales, on a clear day you can see the mountains and wind farms on the coast, this year we haven't had many clear days, but it was very clear on Sunday when we were at the allotment. I've never drawn this view, but the clouds are so amazing in this photo that I'm considering it. 

This is the view sideways to the east, the white building in the middle is The Blue ball pub, the white blur further up is camper vans in the car park we use when walking on Countisbury.

As I'd photographed The Blue Ball from the allotment I thought it was only right to photograph the allotment from the Blue Ball. You can just make them out in the second photo, to the left of the houses, behind the row of bungalows.

I'm not sure whether I will draw these views, but I like the fact they are connected.

Below are some of my other favourite local landscapes all within 5 mins from my front door.

Ilkerton Ridge which I have drawn several times and will probably draw again.

Holdstone Down, which I plan to draw next, maybe .....

Lynton & Lynmouth from Countisbury Hill, I love how this view illustrates just how remote we are. If I ever draw it I would need to draw on at least A2 size paper as I have a compulsion to draw all the buildings in the right places. Maybe it will need several sheets of paper and more photographs using a very good camera!

Park Gardens from Hollerday Hill, the angle is wrong, Park Gardens goes up hill to the right, but I photographed from it from the snowball path walking up hill to the left. I will have to alter the angle before I draw it.

There are so many more amazing views, almost every direction I look. When I decided I needed to appeal to a wider audience I decided I needed to leave Lynton and draw landscapes further afield, but as I've chosen to draw for me I can continue drawing my landscape without any guilt.

Photo's on my Phone 9th of May - 25th May 2024

The sun shone a lot, the dogs were hot, so we dumped them in the river under the bridge in Lynmouth and accidentally had a cheeky pint.

The next evening we walked the dogs on Countisbury Hill, the photo of Tinks is to remind myself that old dogs are just as disobedient as young dogs. The sun was still shining so we had another cheeky pint at The Blue Ball on the way home.

As the sun was still shining Mummy and I took the boys to the beach, they all swam, but the sea is still cold for me. I'll wait a few more weeks till the water warms up.

Then the sun stopped shining.

Monday's walk was at Crow Point in the wind and rain!

I started a new drawing of Woolacombe its a stunning massive sandy beach. It's a famous surfing beach and you can see Lundy, so I decided to draw some of the houses instead!

 

I sold a drawing of Ilkerton Ridge at the Paracombe Art Exhibition, so we walked the dogs on Holdstone Down to celebrate, the view is stunning in every direction.

I did a sketch and am going to do a drawing of it at some point in time.

My lovely friend Jacquie (who runs our local dog shop - https://www.thelynvalleydoghouse.com/ )

organised a big pup meet. 

I don't have many photo's, luckily Jacquie managed to capture this one of Siri in the paddling pool, he got thrown in the river on the way home!

Then the car started smoking, its at the garage, no idea how much its going to cost or whether it can be mended. I did suggest we leave it at the garage, sell everything we own, buy a van and travel, but Phil said he didn't want to sell his special tagine, so guess we won't be taking to the road after all.

All our adventures for the foreseeable future will be at home, we have feet and the cliff railway.

Ilfracombe update - 25th May 2024. Still no bottom left corner, but I've nearly finished the yachts in the harbour.

Lyn Valley Market 4th of May 2024

I completely forgot to post this earlier ....

I'll be at the Lyn Valley Market on Saturday, I will have the new Lynton & Lynmouth colouring book with me for sale, plus a few jigsaw's and lots of cards and prints.

You can find more details here ....
 https://www.facebook.com/lynvalleymarket

On being wrong June 2021

 I've always had my own level of perfection, if a colour was wrong in a blanket I would frog the whole thing rather than leave it imperfect, sometimes I'd frog 2 or 3 times until it was right. 
I don't think anyone else would of noticed that it was wrong, but I couldn't live with the mistake shouting at me every time I looked at it.

I've noticed the same is happening in my drawings. My "Cindy's Deck" panorama of Lynton is wrong, I don't like the tree's on Hollerday Hill, Countisbury isn't right and I'd like to redo it in black and white.

But....... maybe I'm wrong, maybe I should leave it as it is and move on to a new view of Lynton.

I've always believed you should never go backwards, even though that's exactly what I've done in the last few months. I've gone back 20+ years and started drawing and knitting again. Although the knitting is just as bad as its always been, 20 years life experience has changed the style, technique and level of professionalism of my art work. So its not really going back its moving forward with something that's been on hold for a long time.

The reason for this blog post is that I am working on my next panorama this time of Lynmouth, I've finished the first drawing and am over halfway to finishing the second. 

This morning I was really excited to lay them together to see the full effect, even though Im really happy with both drawing Im not happy with the way they fit together. 

I have several options, 

1 - Pretend they are 2 separate drawings

2 -  Redraw one of them completely 

3 - Just ignore the fact that the trees aren't big enough over the Bath, the slipway has a bump in it and the water in the harbour is flowing the wrong way

Normally I would scrap one and start again, but maybe I should leave them as they are and let the viewer either not notice the mistakes or think that they are intentional. 

When they are framed they will have a bigger gap between them and the mistakes might not be noticeable at all.

I think I need to leave them as they are and keep my fingers crossed that the 3rd drawing fits a lot better with the 1st.

Sketches of Lynmouth June 2021

I've been working on lots of sketches of Lynmouth in preparation of tackling another panorama.
I'm completely obsessed at the moment, all I want to do it draw.

I was awake at 3 am for no particular reason, so I'm giving myself the day off drawing complicated charts for my next crochet book, they'd only go wrong and I'd have to redo them and allowing myself to draw more pictures of Lynmouth instead.

The Tors & Rock House

Countisbury again!

The Rhenish

The Rising Sun

Rock House

The Bath

Lynton From Cindy's Deck May 2021

 

Something big is finished. Im really happy with most of it, but there a few things I have developed further, mainly my technique and symbolisim, I'd also like to do it in black and white.. The trees on Hollerday Hill are wrong and so is Countisbury.

I won't turn this into a print as I want to redo it at a later date, but I will sell the originals, message me if you are interested. They are Coloured pencil and acrylic pen on A3 paper.

Lynton, Something big April 2021

 For a long time I've liked the idea of making an image of the whole of Lynton. Its a tiny little toy town nestling in a little valley, behind a big hill, sheltering it from the Atlantic north winds. And its been my home for the past 9 years, I'm very proud of where I live, so when we went to see a friend who lives on the opposite side of the valley I took the opportunity to photograph the whole town.

When I say its a tiny town, it really is tiny town, smaller than a lot of villages, only just over 1000 permanent residents.

I started by joining all the photos together on photoshop, then divided it into 4 to make it easier to work on. So far I have finished 3 of them and just about to start work on the 4th.

They are not perfect and but I've learnt a lot and want to draw Lynton again from several different view points.