Painting Tulips

Thought you might like to see a couple of the tulip paintings that I've done.

Spring Tulips with Cherry Blossom (Oil on linen 12 x 12)

Purple Tulips in April (Oil on linen 12 x 12)

West Coast Weather

I'm off soon on a photo-taking trip to the West Coast of Scotland near Mallaig.

Usually there's a window of lovely weather in May (see above last year), but unfortunately the forecast isn't so good.  

The weather has been possibly even more unpredictable than usual over the last couple of weeks - torrential rain in Bristol the other weekend at my Lime Tree Gallery show, blazing sun back in Glasgow (for a day), and then a friend posting a picture of a snowman in the back garden of their cottage in Glenlivet at the May holiday weekend.  So the weather could be doing absolutely anything up at Arisaig...

Still, who believes a weather forecast?  Fingers crossed!!

Stuart Sutcliffe: Artist and Fifth Beatle

Seeing a 22 year-old painting of mine come up for sale on Ebay got me thinking back to 1990, and the events that were held during Glasgow's year as City of Culture.

One of the most memorable events was a show of Stuart Sutcliffe's work at the Barbizon Gallery.  The exhibition blew me away, and looking back now, I realise that there is a lot in his work with textures and collage that is of interest in my own work.

Stuart Sutcliffe: Untitled, 1961-62 (Oil on canvas, The Stuart Sutcliffe Estate)

 Stuart Sutcliffe, The Building Site 1957 (Ink and Watercolour on paper,The Stuart Sutcliffe Estate)

Stuart Sutcliffe: Untitled, 1961-62 (Mixed Media and Collage, The Stuart Sutcliffe Estate)

Then, I had only vaguely heard of Stuart Sutcliffe as 'the fifth Beatle' - not that I was really keen on the Beatles (too young when they were around), but when I saw the work, the exhibition made a really big impact on me.

This is Stuart Sutcliffe, photographed by his fiancee, photographer Astrid Kirchherr in 1961.  It's her favourite photo of him.

Stuart Sutcliffe (Astrid Kirchherr, 1961)

It's a very powerful image.  He has a very modern, almost androgenous look about him, and his eyes look confidently straight at you, no matter which angle you look at the photo from.  It's like he's almost glowing with an inner energy.  

This is him again, also photographed by Astrid.

Stuart Sutcliffe (Astrid Kirchherr, 1961)

It's a very potent and modern image, the sort that you could imagine opening a magazine today and seeing, with a timeless, ethereal white background.  It's Astrid's jacket that he's wearing, a softer leather jacket than the sort men wore in the 60s, so he's at once feminised, but also very masculine.  Take it from me - he's hot.

It's all about contradictions, and the energy and tension between those contradictions; masculine and feminine, confident yet with vulnerability, over half a century old but still bang up to date.

Stuart Sutcliffe was Scottish, born in Edinburgh in 1940.  His family moved to Liverpool in 1943, and, gifted artistically, Stuart entered Liverpool Regional College of Art at 16.  

There he received, by all accounts, a tremendous grounding in art as a craft, with the emphasis on life drawing and observation.  His tutor was Arthur Ballard, a skilled practitioner of non-figurative (not abstract) painting who encouraged promising students through extra drawing classes and tutorials.  He knew the London art scene and members of the St Ives School who were abstracting from landscape; Roger Hylton, Patrick Heron, William Scott and also Peter Lanyon (read more about him in my blog here), whom Ballard knew well.  Here's a drawing of Peter Lanyon's....

Peter Lanyon, Venice 1948

..and a page from one of Stuart's sketchbooks at art school....

In 1959, aged 19, Stuart entered a picture, Summer Painting, into the John Moores Exhibition at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool.  Apparently, he only entered half of the intended diptych, the other half getting left in his studio.  No matter - the painting not only got into the prestigious exhibition, but was purchased by John Moores, an incredible achievement for an artist who was still a student.  With the money, Sutcliffe was persuaded by fellow art student John Lennon to buy a Hofner President bass guitar, and to join John's rock 'n' roll group, the Quarry Men, as bass guitarist.

In 1960, the group toured Scotland, and Stuart graduated from art school.  In 1961, the group, now called the Beatles, visited Hamburg for the second time, and Stuart decided to enrol at the city's State School of Art, at the invitation of Eduardo Paolozzi.

Paolozzi was a Scots-Italian sculptor (see more about him in my blog here), and there is certainly a very sculptural quality to Sutcliffe's drawings.  His drawings, with their expoloration of form and texture, often resemble Henry Moore's sculpture studies, or Paolozzi's in their reference to mechanical structures. 

Drawing, especially life drawing, had been central to his Liverpool studies. In Hamburg, his painting style remained abstract, but became more atmospheric and textural, combining drawing, calligraphic marks, collage, different substrate supports, and monotype and lithographic printing.  The work has a more emotional intensity.

Stuart Sutcliffe, Untitled (Mixed media, paint and collage, 1962, The Stuart Sutcliffe Estate)

Stuart Sutcliffe, Untitled (Monoprint, 1962, The Stuart Sutcliffe Estate)

In this outpouring of art, he left the Beatles to concentrate on his painting.

It was in Hamburg that Stuart fell down the stairs from the attic flat in Eimsbutteler Strasse, where Astrid lived with her mother.  Afterwards, he suffered headaches, nausea and depression.  On 10 April 1962, aged just 21, he died of a brain haemorrhage.

When someone talented dies young, the question is always, 'what if...?'.  There are many artists who have died young, and they leave a sad, tangible ball of potential energy hanging in the ether.  Where was all this talent going?  Would Sutcliffe have been noticed if he wasn't connected to the Beatles?  Were there great things ahead?  The answer is, we'll never know.  

Astrid says she still thinks about him every day.

Stuart in the Attic Studio in Astrid Kirchherr's house, 1961 (Astrid Kirchherr)

Rosebay Willowherb, Morar

Here's another of the Morar paintings bound for the Affordable Art Fair at Bristol...

Rosebay Willowherb, Morar (Oil on linen, 12 x 12)

Can you see the little yacht in the distance...?

Preparing for the Affordable Art Fair

The Affordable Art Fair at Bristol begins in a fortnight, and I'm just back from my framers with the paintings for it.

The consignment will consist of a selection of lovely new 12 x 12 canvasses of the sands at Morar on the west coast of Scotland, and also some local work of Bath and Bristol, as well as some larger paintings.

Clouds over Gorse, White Sands (Oil on linen, 12 x 12)

The sands at Morar are famously a beautiful white colour, or also in places, a pinkish shade.  I brought back some samples of each just to remind myself that the sand really is that colour!

The sand has a gentle slope down into the sea, and because of the whiteness underneath, the water reflects the colour of the sky.  The sea therefore can have a really amazing Mediterranean luminescent turquoise look to it.

I thought I'd contrast the rural Morar paintings with a couple of urban ones of Bristol and Bath, so I've also included this one of cranes at the waterfront.  I really like the ship with its dusky pink line of colour.

Two Cranes, Bristol Harbour (Oil on linen, 12 x 12)

The Affordables are always big, exciting fairs to go to, and I'm sure this one will be no exception.  The AAF at Temple Meads, Bristol runs from 18th-20th May, and you can find more information here.

I'll have work with the Lime Tree Gallery (Stand A10) and the Wren Gallery (Stand D9).

For a half price ticket to the Fair, go to the Wren Gallery website here, click on 'FAIRS' in the middle of the bar at the top, then click on the pink Affordable Art Fair icon on the right of the page to print your ticket.

Her Majesty arrives...

Fanfare of trumpets!  

Fashionably late, but with an admirable sense of theatre, it's none other than the Queen of the Night herself, who's just regally popped up in my flower bed.

Painting for Sale on Ebay

A watercolour of mine painted 22 years ago has turned up for sale on Ebay here.

 Judith I Bridgland, Glasgow City Chambers (Watercolour, 1990)

The Ebay description says "Commissioned piece from Glasgow city council for there Glasgow smiles better campaign (sic)". 

Not the case!

Back in 1990, Glasgow was European City of Culture, and I was working as a typist whilst trying to start out as an artist.   I exhibited paintings with Art Exposure Gallery, who supported artists like myself who were trying to get a toe on the ladder.

The then Lord Provost of Glasgow, Susan Baird, was (as far as I remember) coming to look round the building where the Art Exposure Gallery was based.  The gallery owner suggested that it would be a great idea if I presented the Provost with a painting during her visit - good publicity both for me and the gallery.

Now, this was a big thing for me - I only took home £10 a day with my typing, so I was probably giving away the best part of a weeks wages, as well as the time involved in making it. 

On the big day, the Lord Provost smiled politely when I gave her the painting, and went away with it tucked under her arm.  I couldn't guauge how it had actually gone down. 

I can't say that I got any publicity, payment, or indeed anything else out of it, and I always wondered what happened to the picture.  Did the Provost like it?  Did it hang in her office?  Was it somewhere in the City Chambers?  Or did it just go in the nearest bin?

Twenty two years passed....and I heard no more about it until this week, when it popped up on Ebay! 

So just where has the picture been all these years?   Isn't life funny....