East from the Millennium

Southwark Bridge

The original sketch from St Paul's side of the Millennium Bridge. I returned the next day to finish off the drawing. On Saturday, even though the sky was a greenish blue with ominous grey clouds, the early afternoon sunlight turned the buildings to lovely ice cream colours. Unfortunately, I had to hold that thought, as on Sunday our weather returned to normal.

East from the Millennium

Courts of Justice

Courts of Justice in Strand

This is a rather long sketch done with red pencil. Royal courts is a very interesting and challenging piece of architecture to draw from!

Courts of Justice

Rising Sun over Carter Lane EC4

   Rising Sun over Carter Lane.                             Pencil and watercolour 149 x 210 mm

I went out to paint from Blackfriars Bridge this afternoon but spotted this cosy little group before I got there. Bright and rather cold but I know I wouldn't have survived very long over  the Thames today. Alright, it wasn't that bad ... I shouldn't be so weedy.

Rising Sun over Carter Lane EC4

Two sketches from Islington

Saturday morning in Upper street

Evening near The Crown pub, Cloudesley Road

The first sketch is with pencil, and a second one is ballpoint pen, both done in the streets around Angel Underground.

Two sketches from Islington

The Heron and some Cranes

 The Heron and some Cranes. Pencil and watercolour 149 x 210 mm

I went down to the Tate today, to see the Klee's, and after that I popped up to the 3rd floor to paint (as you do.) Then I dropped my rigger brush down one of the grates by the window. I asked the staff to run a recovery operation so I could finish up. If you can't ask an art gallery assistant to get a brush back for you, who can you ask? Needless to say, I didn't use it.

The Heron and some Cranes

Cambridge Heath Road

Cambridge Heath Road Pencil and watercolour 149 x 210 mm

I drew this on soggy afternoon at the start of Nathan Brenville's Bethnal Green Sketchcrawl. Whilst working on this sketch, I kept in mind that intentions matter. I used to make  pencil drawings and then wonder why they appeared to lose something the moment I took a brush to them. Here, I wanted the pencil to be part of the work. This means that the lines here, have a different quality to those in a piece where the intention is a line drawing in its own right.

Cambridge Heath Road

Thamesmead

Thamesmead's Southmere is now being demolished - a place where Kubrick's 'Clockwork Orange', 'Misfits' from Channel 4 and some of Aphex Twin's music videos were filmed, and a nice place to be at! We visited it not so long ago to discover its community spirit, - while there, we have actually felt ourselves in a very unusual London. That's a sketch from the cafe in the middle of it, near the lake.

Thamesmead