Rain And Racing In The Rhondda

Husb and I had a day off today, a rare thing when you’re self-employed and we went off to The Workers Gallery in Ynyshir for an afternoon of slot-car (Scalextric) racing with our young nephew. It was pouring down outside but we were warm and having a whale of a time inside, surrounded by gorgeousContinue reading “Rain And Racing In The Rhondda”

People Watching

  I tend to go through phases when I make prints, making a sequence instead of random one-offs. This helps me to focus on subject matter, developing a theme and also lets me explore the technique. I did this series a couple of years back, combining transfer prints with drawing. I have hundreds, maybe thousandsContinue reading “People Watching”

Build It And They Will Come

  Back in September 2015, my artist chum Melanie Ezra and I ripped up filthy old carpet, bleached what needed bleaching, filled the window of a semi-derelict dirty old shop with art and artefacts,  set up an event page on Facebook, opened the doors and developed our artwork in the premises during daylight hours. OverContinue reading “Build It And They Will Come”

The Ratter

I’m tired and haven’t had a chance to do any drawing today – I’ve been slaving over a computer since this morning so I’m blogging a drawing of Sparta Puss I did a while back. She’s a fanatical hunter and she’s one of those cats who brings their prey home alive and sets the unfortunateContinue reading “The Ratter”

Drawing The Stones

I’m continuing to work on a series of drawings of ancestral monuments across South Wales and here are the drawings I’ve done so far on my travels  with archaeologist Dewi and film maker Melvyn. I’m chuffed with the range of the drawings and the way my work is developing into a more expressive style overContinue reading “Drawing The Stones”

The Liminal Place

Out and about visiting ancient sites in and around the Rhondda Valley, we stopped on the way from Hirwaun to Treherbert to look around the Hendre’r Mynydd Iron Age settlement. It’s a bit more modern than the ones we’ve been visiting, probably less than 3000 years old. My travelling companion, archaeologist Dewi Bowen, described itContinue reading “The Liminal Place”

The Maenhir on Bryn Y Rhyd

Another site of ancient significance, a large standing stone in isolated magnificence in a field, this is the Bryn-Y-Rhyd maenhir/menhir near the village of Llanedi in Carmarthenshire. Maenhir is Welsh for long stone and this is a pretty massive specimen, towering over Dewi and Melvyn. I drew with carbon and white conte crayon onto a pieceContinue reading “The Maenhir on Bryn Y Rhyd”

Scribbling Sparta Puss

I haven’t been doing drawings in my sketchbook regularly for a while, so back to basics today with this sketch of Sparta Puss who occupies the footstool almost permanently. I drew with a Faber Castell Pitt drawing pen into a leather-bound, Steampunk style sketchbook. Richard The Bird, our family Senegal parrot, stayed a few daysContinue reading “Scribbling Sparta Puss”

Arthur’s Table

Up a mountain (Mynydd Llangynderyn), over a ridge, through a bog to a pair of small sub-megalithic burial chambers next to each other under a rocky outcrop. Together the pair is known as Bwrdd Arthur (Arthur’s Table). This is the western burial chamber, called Gwal y Filiast (Kennel of the Greyhound Bitch), which is theContinue reading “Arthur’s Table”

Ropes And Buckets

I caught up with an artist chum from way back when recently. Chris Bird-Jones and I were in Swansea Art College in the 1970s when the world was a very different place.  Chris recently came back from an artist residency at the University of Hawai’i where she had an exhibition of the art she createdContinue reading “Ropes And Buckets”