Paintings from New York- Manhattan

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 Chelsea, New York, Jewelry Store, oil on card, 18.5 x 17 cm  unavailable

These cubic buildings, on corners in Manhattan are very satisfying to paint. Painting a set of them is would be an enjoyable project. Perhaps next time I`m in New York  I`ll stay in Manhattan to be able to really concentrate on this. 

I have been to New York four times now. It wears its meanings on its face. This is what I first liked about it, this frankness,expressed in bold architecture, grand bridges and  gigantic museums. This is what attracts me as a painter.

In New York a rich neighborhood is very obviously rich. Your don`t need to de-code people in N.Y.  as you do with the (much) more subtle British class system, in which a rich man might dress in simple clothes and drive a bashed up mini (the American idea of wealth is a poor man`s idea of wealth- ostentation, bigness, obvious luxury symbols). 

Contrariwise, of course, you can get to know it fairly quickly and as you do you  find it less and less curious. And, as Kenneth Clark points out Civilization, it is much better at a distance than close- at a distance it is grand, but up close the lack of human scale considerations taken by architects can make one weary. 

In the great steeplechase of best cities- London N.Y. or Paris,  Paris has moved to the fore- it offers more long term pleasures.

 New York- on Lexington, oil on card, 17 x 19.5 cm - available

Washington Square Park- the arch, oil on card, 17 x 18 cm  SOLD

This is the third time I have painted the arch- this picture is larger and more simplified than the others. Arches are extremely satisfying to paint- and the simpler they are, the better.

 In Central Park, oil on card, 19 x 17.3 cm - unavailable

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April in Britain and France: Part Two: Paris

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 Paris, oil on card, 16 x 18.5 cm    AVAILABLE

 Montmartre, oil on card, circa 18 x 16 cm     Available at No 31 Gallery

The two above are the result of my perambulations in central Paris: not an especially easy place for painting, given the crowds of tourists who make it difficult to work peacefully. And, as a generality, famous landmarks rarely make for good paintings, as it is very difficult to develop an original attitude to them. But I am very pleased with my Eiffel Tower picture.

I would have been better off with an easel: I have since acquired a portable one: rather heavy.

The three below are from or near my little apartment in the 12th Arrondissement, Bercy, which I found more satisfactory, partly because there is so much space to work, and partly because it is not really part of the museum city, and has industrial and railway features that, aestheticised, have a definite anarchic visual appeal.

For many painters, French painting is a touchstone: this is certainly the case for me, and a trip to France is in some way inevitably a homage, specifically in my case to painters such as Utrillo or the Impressionists. I think my picture of Montmarte has sufficient Utrillo in it to count as a homage.

Railways, Bercy, oil on card 16 x 18 cm  - available

This picture, above, has many damp spots

 Bercy, looking West, oil on card, 16.5 x 22.5 cm  AVAILABLE

Near  Bois de Vincennes, Paris. oil on card, 16 x 18 cm     AVAILABLE

Rooftops, Bercy, Paris, oil on card, 16 x 18 cm  AVAILABLE

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Many thanks to Frédéric Glorieux for his kindness in Paris.

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April in Britain and France: Part One: London

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 Hampstead Heath, oil on card, 18 x 16 cm   SOLD

 Berkeley Square, North side, oil on card, 17.5 x 17 cm   AVAILABLE

The colours here are gaudier than is truly the case

 Here are my first offerings from April's painting trip, which took me from Brazil to London, then to Paris, to Scotland, Somerset and back to Brazil via London.

London is not a good painting city. It lacks dramatic landscapes. The weather is both bland and unpredictable and the season changes lack force. The architecture is often good, but is also often fussy or indecisive, as is the street plan which rarely accommodates grandeur. And the city is uncontained,  rolling lazily in from endless suburbs and shires, undefined.

At the same time it lacks the sort of street life that makes Morocco, say, fascinating. In London, the private is utterly hidden. It cannot be intimate with you. It's true that you can sometimes get interesting views into the backs of people's gardens from railway lines but its hard ever to be able to find a place to paint them. And they aren't that fascinating anyway.

I never really "got" London, though I lived there for ten years, I seldom found it mysterious or enchanting except in old books or through the eyes of others such as writers like Ian Sinclair or painters such as Auerbach, though I came to love the more obscure stretches of Kensington and Bayswater. But most of it makes me shrug my shoulders.

Princes Square, Bayswater, oil on card, 14.5 x 16 cm  - available

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Many thanks to Lise and Felix for their generous hospitality in Westbourne Grove.

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April in London, Paris, Scotland and Somerset.

I'm pleased to say that I'll be travelling in April: London- Paris- Edinburgh- Glasgow- Somerset and back to London.

I am most concerned about Paris, which I fear might have totally transformed into a museum city.

There is also the fact that my notions of Paris are so heavily informed by black and white photos of the 1930' and 40's, and by paintings by Utrillo. This is a problem as part of me is inclined tops seek to interpret and represent Paris through the pictorial devices used in a previous epoch by artists to communicate to another generation.

What can one do about this? Not much, except to be conscious of inauthentic responses. I had thought in the past of developing a self-consciousness about this by very deliberately painting touristic, postcard pictures, but I am not sure how successful this was: a steroptypical view remains one, regardless with what spirit it is seen or represented.

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Do join me for a drink in any of these places if you feel like it.