Blog Archive

Sketching with a dash of salt

I’ve led two arty holiday this year, both involving a certain amount of sea travel. The first was a shore based tour on the lovely Isles of Scilly in June, travelling there on the stately ferry Scillonian. She rolls in a big sea, and the sailing time was brought forward to get ahead of a continue reading »


Elephants on the quay

If you go down to the waterfront you won’t be at all surprised To see boats bobbing up and down and yachts of every size But you’ll also come across several highly painted elephants…. ‘Elmer’s Big Parade’ opened in Ipswich at the weekend, with 53 of the painted ‘Elmer the elephant’ sculptures all over town. continue reading »


Boats and bafflement

Do you ever get stuck for ideas? I was asked the other day. Well, no, not often. Not because I’m in a state of permanent inspiration (I’m usually in a state of bewildered panic at how each day slips through my fingers so fast), but because most of my time in the studio is spent continue reading »


Elephant in the Room

I’m still here. It’s February – admittedly a warm one – but I’m in the studio and on my boat, not sipping cocktails in mid Atlantic or huddled on the floor of the ladies being seasick when I should be teaching the finer points of watercolour techniques. I could have gone to sea of course, continue reading »


Oops, it’s winter

Blog posts are supposed to be short, regular and up to date. I’ve failed on all counts; how did we get from June to December so quickly? ‘Time isn’t what it used to be/I remember when a minute/had sixty seconds in it/now it seems there’s only two or three’ (words from a song that’s yet continue reading »