Two from Naples

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Naples- Piazza Dante, oil on card, 12.2 x 9.6cm  - available

Naples- Capodimopnte Museum, oil on card, 9.3 x 12.2 cm

Two from Naples, with bruah for scale.

Like Catania, Naples is a great city for painting, with a splendid bay, super Baroque architecture, atmospheric alleys and hills offering all kinds of views. And like Catania, it hasn't been annexed by the tourist industry.

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Cemetery Junction (2010): review: 7.5/10

In a small town in 70s England, a young man attempts to advance himself in insurance sales, attempting to rejecting the culture of his group of friends.

Amiable black comedy which reveals much about the English distrust of strivers.

Kiss Me Deadly (1955): review: 7.5/10

A private investigator picks up a hitchiker, leading to all kinds of mischief.

Violent, long, diverting noir with a confusing plot and great photography.

Peter and Vandy (2009): review: 8/10

Ennui and irritability wreck romance.

Witty and observant with much good, if occasionally stylised, acting, and an interesting use of flashbacks. It has something in commpon with Linklater's romance films.

It also includes splendid arguments about the tipping of bar staff and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

The Answer Man (2009): review: 5/10

In middle class Philadelphia, the charmless author of self-help books assists a bookshop owner and begins a relationship with a chiropracter.

Coy, somewhat preachy offering, albeit made with a definate efficiency.

Four from Catania, Sicily; tourist painting

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Four from Catania, oil on canvas with coins for scale

Catania is a strinking city- dilapidated, dirty and gorgeous. As I walked from the train station past the seedy harbour area to the fish market where my hostel was, lines from Tom Waits' Tom Traubert's Blues  played in my mind:


"No one speaks English, and everything's broken", or "And it's a battered old suitcase to a hotel someplace, And a wound that will never heal."

It's a great place for painting, there's that variety of textures and sensations you get in places with haven't been sterilised for tourists- the mess, the squalor: the wounds unbound - lending you intimacy. The baroque architecture of Catania is fantastic and the city has hills that variety of levels which allows for varied perspectives. And at night the city has a sinister allure.

View near the Garibaldi Gate, oil on card, 10 x 11.5 cm   - available

Catania- view of the city from the south, oil on card, 11.5 x 9.6cm  - available

Catania- opposite the Agora Hostel, oil on card, 9.5 x 11.5 cm - available

 

Catania, Sicily- view near Piazza Curro, oil on card, 12.4 x 9.5 cm  - available

I had been thinking of doing some paintings in London which specifically tackled known tourist sights- Houses of Parliament, Nelsons Column etc- but I think that the idea is poor, because these places so control resposes, denying intimacy and nuanced responses from visitors. They are propogandist, like official portraits lacking personality, and it would be better for me to do a series set in London's non- touristy neighbourhoods, such as Brixton or Battersea, where it is easier to locate one's subjectivity.

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Paintings from this site are generally available for purchase. Pplease see label "buying art" , below, for details.

Eat, Pray, Love (2010): review: 2/10

A narcissistic woman, played by Julia Roberts (whose mouth is incredibly wide) leaves her husband, then proceeds to Italy to eat, to India to pray and to Bali to discover love.

Stange, overlong offering which illustrates the self-obsession of contemporary western women without analysing it, and which features pretty, if obvious, touristic imagery of various places and a pleasant soundtrack.