|
A great river journey:
Cycling along the Elbe July 2018 This was the last stage of a three part riverside journey of 500 miles, across fifteen days, in Germany from 2016 - 2018. A journey on electric bikes along a river that, as we started ran through alpine-like slopes and eventually broadened into a commercial shipping lane a mile wide. Along Elbe's banks are some of the most important nature reserves in Europe, so many fields and forests rich with wild life. Germany’s Elbe River that passes through some of the country’s most evocative cities: Dresden is so beautiful and now made whole again having been shattered in WW2. Meissen, acclaimed for it lovely ceramics. Magdeburg, this is a city so rich with Romanesque and Gothic. And a town called Wittenberg, where Martin Luther launched his Protestant Reformation in 1517. And, as we near the Baltic Sea, Hamburg, maritime power port and sex centre. Over 60 drawings were made along the way. Here are those made this summer |
A tour of my studio
Summer 2018 I was so pleased to welcome Alison and Tom into my ‘studio’ the other day. The result was a lovely two-minute film from Alison She commented 'Tim Baynes opens his studio in Beaconsfield to us – what a treat! My son has just taken art as a GCSE option in school and we thought a visit to an artists’ studio would be a perfect inspiration' Play the film from this link bit.ly/2timsstudio The full story from Aly is on the Bespoke Framing website |
|
WHITTENHAM CLUMPS
March 2018 Some places truly strike a cord. These are places that preoccupy you for many days after your visit. The place you really cannot wait to get back to. Whittenham Clumps is one of my places. I walked past it in July 2103 with two friends as we walked the Thames Path. I immediately created a linocut from the drawing I made at that time. It has been at the back of my mind since as a magic place, there, but not quite. Remarkable views are here, you look across Oxfordshire to the north, Chilterns to the East, South and West across the Berkshire Downs and Wiltshire. The artist Paul Nash, who first saw them in 1911, described the view from The Clumps: "a beautiful legendary country haunted by old gods long forgotten” Paul Nash repeatedly painted Wittenham Clumps. I hope to follow in his wake, in a more industrious fashion than I have hitherto. Painting the library November 2017 and in February 2018 were the first times I had engaged publicly about my painting. (Aside from muttered openings in my 2010 and 2011 shows). I finished the actual 'talk' in forty minutes and then we got into an exercise: I'd bought some gear and paper and a jar of Rudbeckia stems and we all got to work. It was a really exciting session! A big thanks to Beaconsfield Library for suggesting the idea and helping to make it fly! Three big learnings 1. People are more interested in how one does something more than why or what 2. People love getting stuck into something 3. Taking along some equipment so people could have a go with untried materials was a bonus - for they love experimenting with something new |
|