Venus and Mars

Me and the wife. She says it's accurate. See this also.
Pen and watercolour on Moleskine notebook 13cm x 21cm

Six years on

September 2000, friends and relations having tea after my mother's funeral. That's my brother in the foreground, somewhat dazed. I cope with pain by drawing, always have done. Now my aged uncle is very poorly in hospital, so I may need my pen once more.
Click pic to enlarge.
Pentel brush pen and watercolour on Cornelissen sketchbook 11cm x 11cm.

Old pals

Digesting dinner at a friends house. Topics of discussion included:
a) Whether mother accidentally fell from the motorised wheelchair, or was pushed.
b) The merits of camping in the Karoo.
c) Does a Dalek live under the TV?
Pen and wash on Moleskine notebook 13cm x 21cm. Click pic to enlarge.

Maddog

My dog is very thin and somewhat wiggly and needs to be drawn on a regular basis. A couple from 2003. Click pics to enlarge.
Pen and wax crayon / Pentel brush pen and wash 11cm x 15cm.

Haiku

I'm reading The Haiku Handbook and find it's stimulating my drawing buds. These are initial thoughts for a large scale work.
Pen and wash on Moleskine notebook 13cm x 21cm.

Murals

Inspired by the work of blu, I made this quick sketch to remind myself to do some experiments using photos of buildings. The idea is to paint "murals" on the photos rather than on the actual buildings...this saves loads of time and money. Just received a shipment of Shiva casein paint from USA and couldn't wait to try out a bit of that yellow.
Casein paint with indian ink, Rotring pen and graphite on Moleskine notebook 13cm x 21cm.

Noodler

A greedy noodle guzzler slurping the excellent miso ramen at Ikkyu in London.
Pentel brushpen and pencil on Winsor & Newton pocket sketchbook 10cm x 15cm.

The Seagull Hat

Three members of the Seagull Club.
Pen and wash on Moleskine notebook. 13cm x 21cm. Click pic to enlarge.

A30 to Exeter

I drew this to pass the time during a tedious car journey from Boscastle to Exeter. We got off to a bad start, suffering a puncture even before leaving the village. Dressed in suits and despite the torrential rain we struggled to change the wheel.
At the top of the page are designs for a phallic weather vane.
Pencil and biro on Moleskine notebook 13cm x 21cm. Click pic to enlarge.

Friends in the kitchen

People hanging around chatting in a friend's kitchen, Scotland. I guess the 2 crazy eyed cartoon figures must be me, viewing the scene.
Drawn in a sketchbook bound by Alfred Maltby & Sons on Saint Michael's Street, Oxford. It is a local landmark of literary history otherwise missed by tourists, a shop that C.S.Lewis himself most likely frequented.
Pentel brush pen with grey brush marker on cream paper, Aug 1988. 11cm x 16cm.

Test run

I painted this piece today to experiment with gouache on Arches paper, a rougher surface than I'd normally use. I applied a wash of watercolour first to see if that would reduce the paper's absorbency. As for the imagery; well, it just turned out like that. It's a present for my friend Marcus.
13cm x 18cm. Click picture to enlarge.

Doge Nadlero

Study for a print based on the portrait of Doge Leonardo Loredan by Bellini in the National Gallery, London. From a 1987 home made sketchbook. I never did complete the print.
Ink and gouache on Basingwerk cream paper. 125mm x 185mm.
Click pic to enlarge.

Fat Bowls Champ

I drew these people today in my local cafe. A bit tentative because I didn't want them to notice me. I pretended to be reading my book and drinking coffee. The man had very thick lenses and was a nice chap, talking loudly about his travels to international bowls championships. The elderly lady said she was now a great-grandmother.
21cm x 13cm. Click pic to enlarge.

Remote Staring and the Black Dog

I'm reading "Malignant Sadness" by Lewis Wolpert (he of the saying: "It is not birth, marriage or death which is the most important time in your life, but gastrulation.") His book is an attempt to understand depression and put me in mind of a drawing I made to illustrate Churchill's "Black Dog".
Click here for a recording of an amusing debate between Wolpert and Rupert Sheldrake. I once followed Sheldrake for half a mile on Hampstead Heath, trying his experiment of remote staring detection but he never once looked over his shoulder.
Pastel on Fabriano paper 13cm x 18cm.

Cut up and paste

A 50 foot tall sculpture....that moves....and makes noises...and eats small dogs.
Influenced by Tinguely and Picasso's "Une Anatomie: trois femmes" at the Beyeler Foundation. To see this and lots more, check out the fantastic Picasso on-line resource.
Collage, pen and ink. 21cm x 13cm. Click pic to enlarge.

El Frog

Drew this over coffee at Parliament Hill with a local bloke. We discussed the large number of votes for LePen in Royan , a disgrace in my opinion.
Rotring pen on Moleskine book. 21cm x 13cm. Click pic to enlarge.

Outraged of Tunbridge Wells

A portrait of my eccentric friend. This is an extract from a letter he wrote to the Ham & High newspaper today. I have not changed a word of it:

"To be against the eruv is not anti Jewish fear as D. Shepperd demonstrate
I am more concerned by the possible il effect of such an High-tech device on person non dispentiated or non believer as no study anddata has been provided on the magneto/psychic field beeing non detrimental to health similar to mobile mast. It has been argued that the device is purely passive "a reminder " , if it is the case it should be visible to work. Original Eruve were a natural enclosure at a hight no more than the threshold ofthe dwelling door . If it can be "invisible" can it be underground or virtual ?.
It seem that the specifications differ from one expert to another and are just made to suit the argument. Finally as the Earth is round I suggest that the Barnett inhabitants are not in the eruv but the Hampsted dwellers are explaining my feeling unwell pushing my grandson pram over the boundary last week"

Sepia watercolour on Waterford paper from St.Cuthberts Mill 14cm x 10cm.

Istanbul 17 Dec 88

The view over the Bosphorus from my seedy hotel on a miserable cold day, the stinking air polluted by the sulphurous coal smoke from a million chimneys. Drawn on 17 December, the anniversary of Rumi's death. In Turkey it is known as Şebi Aruz (the Wedding Night).
One of Rumi's descendants, a friend of mine, died there last Sunday after a long illness.

"Man's bodily senses are infirm, but within him dwells a mighty nature..."
-Mathnawi Book IV

Water soluble crayon and ink on Fabriano tinted paper. Home made book 22cm x 16cm. Click to enlarge.

Eruv solutions

The eruv controversy has broken out again in my manor. Judging by the letters in the local press, this one will run and run. As a contribution to the debate I have been thinking "outside the box". These sketches show various concepts for my patent Portable Eruv-o-Matic, worn by the individual believer, thereby saving huge sums spent on unsightly poles and wires. The one in the hat features a GPS device which would bleep near the eruv boundary.
UPDATE: This page now featured in a learned academic journal.
Pen and wash on Moleskine. Click on image to enlarge.

Welding micro poetry

"All Men Die" is one of my old Micro Poems ( a poem of three, 3-letter words, forming a 9 letter grid). My son was learning plasma cutting, so I sketched this simple design which he cut out of 5mm steel plate.
I'm trying to get hold of Prof.Frankfurter's On Bullshit and there were amusing scenes at my local library this afternoon when I requested this title in a loud voice.
The main drawing is a walking tank. Click it to enlarge.

The Oztrix

Mass extinction is underway, so I'm doing my bit for biodiversity by creating new species whenever I get a free moment. I came up with this creature called the Oztrix, so called because of its distinctive mating call of "How's tricks?" It's descended from a group of Thanksgiving Turkeys who escaped from Illustration Friday Island.
Watercolour 25cm x 17cm. Click on the image for a bigger picture.

A goalless draw

Two friends talk rubbish by candle light. Next morning a Jack Russell terrier at the cafe. Variations on a felt hat, the top left being a tribute to Barbara Hepworth hat. An old man in a suit.
Click on the image for a bigger picture.

Ken's back

Life model called Ken. Ink and gouache on tinted Fabriano paper. I bound this sketchbook myself. 27cm x 23cm.

The Bird Lady

A recurring image for me. Please feel free to psychoanalyse. The sketchbook ain't finished till the Bird Lady sings.
Chinese ink on Fabriano laid paper. 16cm x 12cm.

The Parkus

My old pal Marcus has been unwell lately, but the good news is he's getting spliced to long-time accomplice Gwenda. This is an old watercolour portrait of the man from a tiny (10cm x 7cm) sketchbook. I admit the hooter's too big, but I can't help exaggerating.

The Persian Hat

This rhyme (of sorts) just appeared in my mind, and a few days later someone sent me a fez. I'd wanted one ever since reading A Fez of the Heart: Travels round Turkey in Search of a Hat by Jeremy Seal.
Click on the image for a bigger picture.

The Philosopher's Egg

The Seaweed Crown.
Watercolour wash with pen and ink. 25cm x 17cm. Click to enlarge.

Walter Benjamin did my head in

Just finished Fire Alarm: Reading Walter Benjamin's "Theses on the Concept of History" by Michael Lowy and this drawing sums up how I feel about it.... It's one of those mysterious texts that seems full of meaning, but really nobody knows what the hell Benjamin was on about. I'm now wrestling with Volume 1 of his collected writings, but it's very hard going.
Pen and ink with wash on Moleskine 21cm x 13cm. Click to enlarge.