This year I have given first priority to writing and developing the ideas behind holistic political economy but have not abandoned painting altogether. I attend a weekly life class, maintain the sketching habit and always take my paints away with me.
The pictures from February 2019 in Askrigg are in the previous post. I did put some well received work up on my facebook page, for example my notebook sketches of the XR protests in Leeds reached over 1500 people. This lead me to join both Urban Sketchers and The Plain Air Society groups on Facebook.
What follows is a very brief resume of the year and I am not repeating everything that I posted on facebook.
At the end of February we took a trip to Northumberland and surprisingly despite the time of year I managed to do some en plain air painting.
I didn’t realise at the time just how difficult a year it would be for painting outside (when I had the opportunity the weather was poor, and frustratingly seemed to be good when I was busy with her things)
In June we joined family and friends for our traditional week in the Lake District and then carried on with an extended trip taking us to Dorset, Devon and Cornwall, rounded off with the Isles of Scilly. I had my notebooks and paints with me here are some highlights;
Generally speaking the weather was dreadful until we got to Scilly. This precluded en plain air work for most of the time – the painting of Fleetwith Pike we completed in the utility room of Bank Barn using sketches. Dorset, Devon and Cornwall yielded plenty of sketches but it wasn’t until Scilly that I managed to do some work outside.
In both August and September we had visits to Rosedale in the Yorkshire Moors.
And we rounded off our week long trips with another visit to Askrigg for bonfire night andd the week following. Both of these were completed in the flat we were staying at – it wasn’t rain all the time but was windy and cold which, combined with short days kept me walking rather than painting.
