Another lockdown walk this evening and another charcoal drawing of a grand old yew tree in Cwmdonkin Park. There are loads of yews there, gnarled, ridged, wrinkled. Some of them have branches that have grown back into the main trunk of the tree, other branches wrap round the main trunk like they were ivy. I’m drawing into a lovely Khadi hand-made paper sketchbook. The paper is heavy, textured with deckle edges and it’s an ethical company too.
Husb and I are still following our lockdown exercise routine most days, even though the restrictions are much more easy going now. It’s a good system that’s kept us going for the past four months so we might as well keep it up. I stopped to do a charcoal sketch into my Khadi sketchbook of this formidable old yew tree in Cwmdonkin Park. It’s gnarled and twisted and the shapes writhing all over, in and out of it, trigger the imagination. If you click on the link, you’ll find information about the childhood of the poet Dylan Thomas’ in the park.
I also made a rhubarb crumble – our back garden is a rhubarb jungle – it’s been fantastic this year but I’m running out of ideas for using it up. Luckily it’s popular in my family. I didn’t get to take a photo of it before my nephew got his share – he’s a strapping lad and a massive crumble fan. Husb will see the rest off.
Husb and I drove up through mid and north Wales yesterday to go to a John Cale gig in Liverpool. It was awesome! On the way, we took an idyllic shortcut between Beulah and Newbridge on Wye and stopped for a spot of lunch at the venerable old Red Lion Inn at Llanafan Fawr. Opposite the pub is the church of Saint Afan and in the churchyard is an ancient yew, around 2,200 years old.
Of course, I had to have a scribble. It is huge and forms a dark cave around it’s enormous trunk, or network of trunks where there are fallen gravestones, so old that the carved writing has all but disappeared. It was very spooky and Gothic in there. I drew with black, sanguine and white conté crayon into my A4 brown paper sketchbook.
I have put my series of drawings en plein air of ancient Welsh monuments on Artfinder. If you want to see more, please click on the image below or the Artfinder link at the top right of this page. So did you know that Elvis Presley is descended from the Welsh? This drawing below is the legendary grave of Saint Elfys (Elvis) in Pembrokeshire, not for from the Presceli Mountains. Elfys? Presceli? Elvis Presley? Coincidence? hhhmmmm
Click on the image to see my series of silkscreen portraits celebrating great but often neglected women artists and to find out about their fascinating lives.
To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left.
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