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MEMBERS' NEWSLETTER : June 2000 Our New President – G. John Blockley, PPPS, NEAC, RI The Society's Committee are delighted to announce that John Blockley has accepted their invitation to be the Society's President. John has agreed to a three year tenure of office. John is a fitting choice because the Welsh Border landscape has inspired many of his paintings. He was born and lived in Radnorshire until he was three years old. His grandparents lived at Weir Cottage, Llanfair Waterdine where John enjoyed many happy holidays as a boy; their house was eventually bought by Lord Hunt of Everest. Having John Blockley as our President also gives me pleasure because it was partly through membership of the Ludlow Art Society that I became aware of his work. One of the first meetings of the Society which I attended twelve or more years ago was a lively presentation on watercolour by Kath Edfryn-Jones—a name long-standing members will remember with affection. Kath used a print of one of John's watercolours to illustrate her talk and the distinctiveness of John's watercolour style was quite arresting at that time. There followed for me a period of trying to reproduce some of the paint effects John achieved by copying illustrations from his books. Then, having gained a little insight, there followed the problem of incorporating these effects into my work without giving the paintings the appearance of a John Blockley look alike. What was striking about John's watercolours of ten years ago was that he was prepared to push watercolour around in a quite daring way and wash it down under a running water tap to seek the effect he wanted. A former Art Society Chairman, Bill Hall, claimed that John was making the 'happy accident' part of his normal working practice by this procedure. John's work has always been characterised by an interest in textural effects and this tendency has become more apparent over the years. At the RI exhibition which the Society sponsored in 1997 John showed a painting in acrylic, a water based medium which extends the range of textural effects beyond those achieved in pure watercolour. It is this development in his work which makes John an interesting painter and one who is an inspirational role model for members. Impression, well after sunrise
A visit to Giverny can act as a tonic especially if, like me, you have become a bit tired of the coloured reproductions and the hype of dear old Claude, and feel the need to experience him again through his subjects and his paint surfaces. The garden has been managed and improved beyond what it was in Monet's day to make it a tourist attraction, and now it is the house which is an inspiration. It has the feel, like William Morris's Kelmscott, of a place loved and lived in. The hand painted yellow dining room was admired by visitors in Monet's day and it has been restored. The yellow paint on the chair backs is now worn thin at the edges just as it would be in daily use. You can imagine him dropping in from his garden studio at midday for a meal. While at Giverny he married Alice Hoschedé and he enjoyed a family life there with Alice and the children—reading aloud to the family in the evenings in the sitting room hung with several rows of his glowing canvases. It struck me that the needs of the creative artist are really very simple. 'I have always worked best in solitude and in response to sensations experienced alone.', Monet said. All he needed was a place where he could be himself. In the wilder bits of the garden it is perhaps possible to get close to him and to appreciate how revolutionary Monet's vision was. Looking at the raw material of his paintings, the wisteria and the water lilies in the water garden, it is difficult to see and interpret them quite as he did, or understand how he could have developed his unique vision. Monet's student years were enlivened by divisive debates about nature versus art that became particularised as colour versus line or even drawing versus painting. The painting methods of the academic tradition, where colour was added as an embellishment to idealised drawn forms, were questioned by radical realist painters like Courbet, Millet, and Corot. Monet was caught up in these debates and finally resolved them in his own way through the water lily paintings. When asked if he did drawings Monet replied,'Drawing … what do you mean by that? Drawings in black on white? Yes I had to do some, like everyone else, when I was young! … but I have never liked to isolate drawing from colour!' And the water lily paintings are essentially drawings in colour; as he paints he draws; the more colour harmonises, the more precise becomes the drawing. The Society's 'Children Drawing' Project Drawing is assuming some of its old importance in art education. It has a special role in creative life because the motivation to draw springs from experience which predates the ability to describe in words. As John Berger once wrote, 'Seeing comes before words. The child looks and recognises before it can speak.' All too soon for many children their natural mode of expression through drawing is lost; the excitement of creating visual images begins to wane as greater emphasis is given to language. So it is appropriate that the Committee has initiated an outreach programme which will encourage young children to draw. The first steps were taken in April when David Mace led a drawing workshop at Ashford Carbonell CE Primary School. The Society is fortunate in being able to call on David's expertise as a former lecturer in Art Education at Leeds University and I have to thank both David and his wife Elizabeth for organising the workshop. No less important was the contribution of Richard Kite who gave us admirable support in a classroom full of enthusiastic 9 to 10 year olds, an environment a world away from the quiet dignity of a Building Society manager's office where he once worked. Thanks largely to the appropriate activities which David had devised for the children, the workshop was very successful and was valued by the Headteacher and Governors of the school. David's scheme of drawing activities provides a model which could be used in other primary schools. The Committee would be delighted if the project could be continued in the coming autumn and spring terms. What we need are members who are prepared to give a day in a school holiday period to develop this worth while activity. If you can help and would like to know more please tell a committee member of your interest. The Autumn Programme The Society's monthly programme begins again in September with a visit to Upton Park, a late 17th century house near Banbury now in the care of the National Trust. The house contains a fine display of paintings and porcelain collected by Walter Samuel, 2nd Viscount Bearstead, the son of the founder of Shell Petroleum. The collection includes paintings by Stubbs, Breughel, Canaletto, Guardi, and El Greco. Also on show is a collection of 18th century Chelsea figures and Sèvres tableware. An exhibition of paintings and posters by modern English artists commissioned by Shell makes a refreshing visual contrast to the Old Master paintings in Viscount Bearsted's collection. Here you will see examples of poster designs, and the original paintings made for them, by Paul Nash, Graham Sutherland, E McKnight Kauffer, and Clifford and Rosemary Ellis. The outing will include a morning visit to Stratford upon Avon for sketching or sightseeing, non members and friends are welcome to join the visit. Further details and a booking form follow:- VISIT TO upton park, BANBURY - WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 6TH 2000. Coach Fare £8.00> Coach leaves Church Stretton, Easthope Road 8.00am Craven Arms, Harry Tuffins 8.15am Ludlow, Smithfield Car Park 8.30am National Trust Members excepted, admssion to Upton House is £4.50, Concessions and Children £2.65 payable at entry After the artistic delights of Upton Park we come back down to earth in October with the Annual General Meeting. The Committee is having thoughts about the future direction of the Society so I hope members will attend and make their views known. The AGM will also be an opportunity for members to show their latest work and share their ideas with others. In November we welcome back Valerie Briggs whose watercolour demonstration will be on Wildlife in Winter. I happened to meet Valerie at the Spring Flower Show at Malvern where she was demonstrating by painting a meticulous watercolour of a pair of field mice. I am sure you will all enjoy meeting her again. Here's a thought – or two! Year 2000 marks at least one important artistic event, the centenary of John Ruskin's death. Members will probably have seen BBC2's celebratory television programme about him earlier in the year and I know of at least one member who visited the Ruskin, Turner and the Pre Raphaelites exhibition at the Tate. Ruskin valued drawing as a skill which should be part of everybody's creative life not just an artist's. He supplied a singular definition of the art; 'all good drawing consists merely in dirtying the paper delicately. All touch and dexterous trick is barbarism.' Ruskin believed drawing was more than an artistic pursuit, it was a craft which had a wider application. Drawing, by developing observation and seeing, provided a way of understanding the natural world,. 'I believe that the sight is more important than the drawing; and I would rather teach drawing that my pupils may learn to love Nature, than teach the looking at Nature that they may learn to draw.' he wrote. No one is more enthusiastic about drawing than our President. John has given permission to reproduce some of his sketches in the new 'Gallery' feature. His commentary is an encouraging testimony to the merit of making frequent drawings. Do study them and enjoy following his example.
Robert Kirk. 31 May 2000. |