Servidao Rodolfo Rodrigues Feijo, Itacorubi, Florianopolis

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Servidao Rodolfo Rodrigues Feijo, Itacorubi, oil on card, 12.1 x 8.8 cm

Another of the lanes near here:  in the distance blocks are constructed, relentlessly.

I find these places mysterious, and think of Ultravox's Quiet Men:

Waiting, we were waiting
As the traffic moved through all our hearts and our heads
But things were different then
For the quiet men

Shifting, things were shifting
Through the walls and hall, there were no walls at all
For the quiet friends
Of the quiet men

Oh, the quiet men
Oh, the quiet men

Springtime, there was sunshine
Through the window panes, down all the English lanes
Where they walked again
The quiet men

Talking, they were talking
Of the times to come, and all the time that's gone
And they smiled again
The quiet men

Oh, the quiet men
Oh, the quiet men

Listening, they were listening
As the season changed and all the reasons changed
And people came and went
By the quiet men

Walking, they were walking
Through the rainy days, looking at all the faces
But no-one ever noticed them
The quiet men

Oh
Oh, the quiet men
Oh, the quiet men
Oh, the quiet men
Oh, the quiet men

(Ultravox, Island Records, 1978)

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I thought today about how I should plan a journey through Santa Catarina, driving west and painting along the way: a test run for the USA road trip, which I intend to do in the years to come.

It would be nice to meet other artists on these trips: please contact me if you want to meet for a drink somewhere and are not a psychopath.

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The big green hill; travel sketching; USA trip

The big green hill, oil on card, 11 x 8.5 cm

A heavy day; my mood awful throughout.

Beautiful heathland in Lagoa, under threat of suburbanisation but still a pleasant place to escape- the smell of the damp grass very pleasant and larks and butterflies everywhere.

I thought of Leonard Cohen's words from, "True Love Leaves No Traces," as I worked:

As the mist leaves no scar

On the dark green hill

So my body leaves no traces

On you, and never will

Through windows in the dark

The children come, the children go

Like arrows with no targets,

Like shakles made of snow

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A couple of days ago I passed the morning reading through an exhibition catalogue of Edward Lear's watercolours, painted on his travels: I have the idea of doing much the same on my USA trip, which is still in it's embyro stages (any help/ advice gratefully accepted: I'm especially interested in linking up with other painters in the USA, and the possibility of showing work and ideally selling some to help pay for the trip).

What is delightful about Lear is that his work is so closely tied to his experience, and even if conpositionally the pictures are often using the jaded formats of Lorrain or Poussin, it's possible to access his personality through his handling of pencil and wash.

Sketchbook work is often so; I have previously mentioned Ardizzone here, I might also mention Zymunt Turkiewicz's "Montecassino" , a very immediate album of drawings illustrating the Polish fores assault on the german stronghold in Italy (pub. 1944) and the drawing produced by Mervyn Peake as an official War Artist.