Life Drawing Class

Posted on November 28, 2022 by Roland's Ragbag

LIFE DRAWING CLASSES

Life drawing classes in Chelsea
The chance of a lifetime fulfilled
A chance to perfect my technique
I should’ve been delighted and thrilled.

But it wasn’t quite like that in practice;
Whilst I became more and more zealous
I found to my utter dismay
My fiancé grew terribly jealous.

So I gave up these classes to please her,
My art took a secondary place
To a contented future with landscapes.
Yes, I gave in to her whims – just in case.

So, I never will be a Paul Rubens,
And Lucien Freud’s not for me.
I timidly gave in to persuasion,
All governed by wifely decree.

. Sketches by – WHB ©

TIME OUT

Posted on November 25, 2022 by Roland's Ragbag

Time out for Reynard.
He’ll just wait.
Eyeing up those chickens
To seal their fate

Time out, but wary,
On the qui vive.
Fodder for his family
Just about to thieve.

Time out for him now,
Night’s work done.
Taking a siesta
In the sun.

Say what you will, but
The urban fox,
Is part of Nature’s spectrum,
Not unorthodox.

Photographs taken in a Surrey garden … WHB: 2015-17

The Applegarth

Posted on April 22, 2022 by Roland's Ragbag

The APPLEGARTH

When morning
meets my melancholy
I must refocus
dispel my clouds
and reconnect to nature
through her glory

The garth gate invites
pledges enchantment
such memories harboured here
once the cloister garden
of my medieval monastery
now still the repository
of the priory’s peace
ancient orchard
now transformed
but still a place
to rejuvenate the soul
to touch
feel and taste
nature’s serenity

The morning mist
lingered low
over the once fallow fields
then no longer virgin earth
but become thick with apple trees
and those
long gone
and autumn dormant now
awaiting its wheat-carpeted
summer season

The morning advances
only half-appreciated
until the
the priory arch
proud against the sky
bursts through the mist
into the weak sun’s gaze
the veiled sky
allowing
the gathering sunlight
slowly
to prove its strength
and bring clarity
to a waiting world

And The pathway
its ancient course
piercing its length
into the shrouded distance
remembrancer now
of those Augustinian brothers
traversing
this ancient orchard

who with such care
tended nature’s gifts
now bare of fruit
but never fruitless
no longer cosseted
by priestly presence
and full of nuanced context still

For me …

The Applegarth
my own memory
of this sanctified place
sings of golden corn
bordering that arrowed path
where also was
the winning post
the last gasp
of those long-past
teenage
distance running races
marking my triumphs
measuring my success
against the countless strides
I had wrenched
from my straining body
to accomplish
to lead the race
the end of endeavours
signifying my own
my personal
accomplishment.

The Applegarth,
a trope
my metaphor
for my life.

Runswick Bay & Staithes

Posted on February 4, 2022 by Roland's Ragbag

These are my Pen & Wash sketches of two quite different but equally fascinating coastal villages of North Yorkshire, England. Below them is a short article about their history of attracting and inspiring artists.

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*Runswick Bay. N.Yorkshire – Wat*ercolour – WHB: 2013

RUNSWICK BAY & STAITHES

These two villages lie only a few miles north of Whitby and within the North Yorkshire Moors National Park. The villages, only about 4 miles apart, each grew up around an inlet of Yorkshire’s North Sea Coast. Both villages have a distinctive character and are fascinatingly atmospheric. At the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th Centuries they nourished separate artistic communities, which are now considered to be of greater significance than has previously been recognised because of the number of artists who worked there and the paintings they produced.

One of the best known of these was the Yorkshire-born artist Arthur Friedenson who visited Runswick Bay to work many times. Friedenson was initially apprenticed as a sign writer, before training as an artist in Paris and Antwerp. However, it was in this lovely Yorkshire coastal village that Friedenson met his future wife, and after they married in November 1906, he returned to Runswick Bay the following spring in order to paint the picture below. It was much admired at the Royal Academy that year, and purchased for the nation.

An interesting website, which contains a lot of material about the art galleries and museums in the area, can be found at: Staithes & Runswick Bay Art Galleries

ART by the SEA

Posted on December 10, 2021 by Roland's Ragbag

I include below images of just a few of my pen and watercolour sketches of a variety of waterfront scenes in different parts of Europe to which I have travelled. Click on any one to view a slide show of all the images and locations in larger format . . .

The NORTH YORKSHIRE MOORS National Park

Posted on November 29, 2021 by Roland's Ragbag

A Gallery of my sketches of notable scenes related to one of the two National Parks in Great Britain’s largest county of Yorkshire. It is where I grew up and where I first experienced the riches of Britain’s glorious countryside.

Click on a drawing to enlarge it and view the titles

Aberaeron & Wales – Pen & Wash

Posted on November 15, 2021 by Roland's Ragbag

*Pen and Wash watercolour from the harbour – Aberaeron … WHB – 2013*

ABERAERON is a small harbour town in Ceredigion, Wales. It lies on the coastline of Cardigan Bay looking out towards the Irish Sea. It has a small but vibrant harbour usually heavily stocked with pleasure boats of all sizes and shapes. There is much extremely impressive and beautiful Georgian architecture to be seen in the town. Many of the houses have taken on a distinctive look by being decorated in bright colours as can be seen in my pen and wash painting above. The town has the reputation of being “one of the best examples of a planned township of small scale in Wales”. Today the town, situated between Aberystwyth and Cardigan, serves as a touring centre for the Cardigan bay area of Wales. The town’s name is from the Welsh meaning “mouth of the River Aeron”.

I include below images of just a few of my pen and wash sketches and two photographs of scenes in different parts of Wales (titles below). Click on any one to view a slide show of all the images in larger format . . .

Fishing at Criccieth – Early Morning;
On the Abergavenny – Brecon Canal;
**Criccieth Castle; Bishop Rock Lighthouse, Pembrokeshire;**
**Foxglove nr. Brecon (Photo); In a Farmyard nr. Brecon (Photo)**

Skulls – A Halloween Meditation

Posted on November 1, 2021 by Roland's Ragbag

*A West Country Skull . . Photo: WHB* – *2021*

What better encapsulates
Life’s end
Dust to bone
In resolution
IlAnticipated
Never remembered
Indescribable experience
Expressed in an image

In memoriam
Deferring to Absent Guests
I give you
The Skull beneath the skin
The Quick extolling The Dead
A cadaverous resurrection
Memento More
Become Death’s Head
Where Is Thy Sting?
Heads You Lose
Tails? – I win
Bone Dry
Let Us. Pray.
All Bone – No Meat
Jolly Roger – Old Codger
Jammy Dodger
Brolly Bodger
Death’s Sting
Is corpsing
And, pared to the Bone,
Becomes Life’s Detritus
Leftover leftovers
Smile Of The Devil
Halloween’s halo
All Done and Dusted
Life’s slipstream
Dracula The Goth
Moonshine pale
Reborn as Life’s Dust
What Remains
Only the Death Mask
Wool Skull
To numb skull
Skullduggery again
Rebirthing as
Cranium geranium
Bonehead!