Tunis- the French Quarter

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Tunis, French quarter, oil on card c. 12 c 14 cm, 2012

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Five previously unpublished pochades from Tunisia

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El Jem, oil on card, 2012, 13 x 13 cm - available

El Jem, mosque, oil on card, 14 x 12 cm - available

Douz,from the hotel roof, 2012, oil on card, 13 x 10 cm - available

Douz, from 23 Mars Hotel, 2012, oil on card, 11.3 x 10 cm - available from No31 Gallery

Douz Cemetery, oil on card, 1.5 x 7.6 cm - available 

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Nocturne - 2012 - Lagoa

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Nocturne, 2012, Lagoa, oil on card, 13.5 x 8.8 cm  - available

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Tozeur, desert station, 2012

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Tozeur, desert station, 2012- oil on card, 12 x 13.5 cm

 

 

This was from the Tunisian trip ten years ago, and for some reason wasn't catalogued at the time. 

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Studio sale

 Pochades in a rack.

For the next four weeks all the pictures labelled "Pochades" available on this site are offered at a special reduced rate of 70  pounds sterling or other currency equivalent plus 20 pounds post and packing for up to three pictures.

Payment is by Paypal, cheque or SWIFT or direct transfer from a UK or Brazilian Bank.

Please contact me if you want more details or wish to see the pictures here in Florianopolis.

Beiramar XXII, session 10, 11 am

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Beiramar XXII, session 10, 11 am, oil on card, 13 x 11 cm  - unvailable- damaged

A good session. A clammy day.

 I am looking forward to going to the mountains at the weekend. There is something wrong with the island, something that makes it unhealthy, lending it a static, moribund atmosphere.

A folding chair and an open book

A folding chair and an open book, oil on card, 14 x 14 cm - unavailable

Like beds, chairs seem rarely to have been used as artists as motifs: I can only think of van Gogh`s wonderful pictures.

Perhaps you can think of some others?

A week in Serrana 3

 Serrana, earth, houses, oil on card,  14 x 12 cm unavailable

 Serrana, earth, houses in carrier

 Serrana, heavy weather, oil on card, 9 x 13 cm - unavailable

Serrana, chaveiro, oil on card, 10.5 x 12 cm - unavailable

The last grouping from my Serrana trip. The region around Serrana has a very dark red soil.

The last picture, of the Chaveiro, or locksmith, illustrates the sort of jerry-built buildings that are almost usual in parts of the town.

 Next trip: Egypt.

A week in Serrana 2

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Serrana: a single tree, oil on card, 9.7 x 8.5 cm    SOLD

Serrana: a distant factory, oil on card, 14 x 14 cm

Serrana, a distant factory in carrier with phone for scale

The second group from my days last week in Serrana.

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A week in Serrana 1

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Serrana, Aveunue, in carrier

Serrana, Aveune, oil on card, 14 x 13 cm

Serrana, yard at the back of a hotel, il on card, 10.5 x 8.7 cm  - available

Farmland, Serrana, oil on card, 14 x 12 cm - - available

The first entry from a week in Serrana, S.P.

Serrana s a small town, set in rolling hills and containing a huge number of speakeasies- little bars using the front rooms of houses- and churches. Both are popular with the locals, as is driving battered cars up and down the streets playing country music at great volume.

The place is slummy, even by Brazilian standards, with junk lying here and there and a general atmosphere of squalor as soon as you get away from the central church square.

 Everyone there seems very content.

A visit to São Francisco do Sul

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São Francisco do Sul, a railway crossing, oil on card, 14 x 9.5 cm  - available

 

 

 

 

São Francisco do Sul, a yacht, oil on card, 11 x 9 cm   available

 

 

 

 

 

Pictures from a trip up to São Francisco do Sul: the port has a touristic charm, with many well preserved, charmingly painted buildings in various eclectic, quasi Art Noveau or Deco styles.

It also has a pleasingly Waitsian element: great freight trains move continually transporting something or other from a giant and noxious factory , near which are bars with varying degrees of seediness. 

 

 

Train Song by Tom Waits:

 

Well I broke down in East St. Louis on the Kansas City line
Drunk up all my money that I borrowed every time
And I fell down at the derby, the night's black as a crow
It was a train that took me away from here
But a train can't bring me home
What made my dreams so hollow was standing at the depot
With a steeple full of swallows that could never ring the bell
And I've come ten thousand miles away, not one thing to show
It was a train that took me away from here
But a train can't bring me home

 

 

 

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On Moçambique beach

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On Moçambique beach, oil on card, 12 x 14 cm

This is a wonderful beach for painting, often empty of people and with its own peculiar light.

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Joaquina, oil on card, 14 x 12 cm    SOLD

Painted from the dunes, looking down. I am not sure if I perfectly captured the way the dunes cut into the vegetation, but I'm happy with the sense of the scale of the place.

Fields on the way to Santo Antonio de Lisboa

Fields on the way to Santo Antonio de Lisboa, oil on card, 12.5 x 15 cm  unavailable

I'd wanted to stop here for a while but never did. 

I am reverting to a smaller format again. I miss the intensity that comes from working small.

A road in the North of the island

A road in the North of the island, oil on card, 14.5 x 10.5 cm  unavailable

Very hot, almost unpleasantly so. I am counting off the days until I go to the UK and Egypt: six weeks exactly.

Nocturne, Lagoa, November

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Nocturne, Lagoa, November, oil on card, 15 / 12 cm  AVAILABLE

It's been so hot recently that the only thing I can do some afternoons is sleep. But the evenings are cooler, so more nocturnes are in order.

Boats, Lagoa, 11 am

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Boats, Lagoa, 11 am, oil on card, 14.5 / 10.5 cm   available

Painted at near the moorings in Lagoa. One of a number of yacht paintings I've done- an obvious subject, and for good reasons.

 As so often in painting the secret is knowing how much to say and how much to leave unsaid, so the viewers imagination can play,

Urubici: three more

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 Urubici: bright sunshine, oil on card, 18 / 13.8 cm   SOLD

 Urubici, bright sunshine, oil on card, 16 / 14.5 cm

Urubici- street oil on card, 13 x 9.4 cm - available

More landscapes from my recent trip.

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Urubici: two recent paintings

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Urubici, boys playing football, oil on card, 14 / 14 cm   AVAILABLE   

Urubici, ploughed field, oil on card, 12 / 13 cm   AVAILABLE

I spent the last two days in Urubici, in the mountains. I painted eight pictures, I'll show the rest tomorrow.

Something I like about Urubici is the fact that it has a street life, with children playing football or in groups conversing. I like the people who seem unpretentious and industrious, and are a relief from the people of the island who are rather fond of themselves. I also love the smell of woodsmoke drifting down the town's solitary high street, and I love the towns mysterious setting among woods and surrounded by mountains.

And, as a painter, Urubici is great for having an especially sharp clear light: you occasionally get that in Florianopolis but it's much less common. 

I guess these are the most German Expressionist influenced pictures I've done for a while. I'm playing about with new methods: working more quickly, but also discarding more, the idea being to maintain a sense of energy within each picture.

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The Stories of the Street

 The stories of the street, oil on card, 17 / 15 cm  NOT FOR SALE

A man walking in Santa Monica, oil on card, 14 / 13.5 cm    AVAILABLE

Two new pictures: I stole the title from Leonard Cohen's famous song from his 1967 album, Songs of Leonard Cohen.

The stories of the street are mine
The Spanish voices laugh
The Cadillacs go creeping down
Through the night and the poison gas
I lean from my window sill
In this old hotel I chose.
Yes, one hand on my suicide
And one hand on the rose.

 Cohen's is one of a number of late 60's street songs: there are also good ones by Springsteen and Dylan.

Santa Monica is not really the place, it's much too prim: I want tenement blocks, grandeur, disorder: Harlem, Glasgow, or even parts of Estreito here, where'll I'll soon go to paint similar.