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 The Last Mouse (in Bankside)
Oil and Acrylic on wood panel.
Circa 2009.
"En plein air" is a French expression meaning "in the
open air" and back in 1972 Peter sold his very first professional
painting, a watercolour created "on the spot" of a dumped pink
mattress, stained with rain, laying against a decrepit decaying
Bankside warehouse wall with a bright green weed sticking out of a
window ledge above; painted as part of an Art School extra-mural
project and an unlikely picture for a sale you might think?
"When
his mother visited the exhibition, at nearby Southwark Cathedral in
London, the Dean of Southwark told her "I could have sold that picture
ten times over" . . . . . . . . and, perhaps it is time now to square a
circle (or is it circle a square; whatever . . .) so - new "En plein
air" paintings (that chronicle the changing face of a city Peter knows
inside out and backwards) - London, "the smoke" (from when it had smogs
back in Peter's childhood in the 50's) and "down south" as they say
here in the Midlands of England, and that makes Peter, as the local
window cleaner calls him, "Cocker-knees" (Cockney). You have to be born
within the sound of Bow Bells to be a real cockney, and Peter, on cold,
still, Sunday mornings, as a child, could hear the sound of Bow bells
blowing on the wind and the sound of barge and Tugboat horns on the
River Thames even as far away as his makeshift easel (the kitchen
table) in North London, Kentish Town, in Islington.
That was then, and this is now . . . . .
THE RIGHT KIT FOR THE JOB
The Artist first painted outdoors as a child, sitting
in the back garden of a terraced house in Islington, North London, in
the early 50's, and, far later, art school training required project
work to sometimes be "outside drawing", the idea being to "toughen-up"
the artist in preparation for industry because, back in the day, in the
70's, artists still found themselves working for magazines and
newspapers on occasion and "drawing on the spot" as reportage, on
location; indeed, one of Peter's art school tutors was Linda Kitson who
taught the technique of "drawing very fast and not stopping to
deliberate" and who went on to be the official artist for the UK during
the Falklands War which necessitated that skill, which was Linda's
specialty, of fast reportage drawing, in that case, on the battlefront.
Peter recalls her asking a soldier how she'd manage to get all her
drawing materials around to which she was told "don't worry, there'll
be no shortage of people to hump your kit". But when Peter decided, in
recent times, to re-visit and paint his roots which necessitated some
images had to be done "En plein air" a different tack was needed, and
he developed a way of traveling very light yet able to work in as wide
an array of techniques as back in the studio.
In
the late 19th Century the French Box Easel was invented, a highly
portable easel with telescopic legs and built-in paint box and palette
that enabled "plein air" works to be carried out effectively but Peter
has developed his own methods that are more flexible and portable. He
has a "field kit" that he has spent years developing that ensures
direct, highly effective focused work can be carried out, unhindered
and comfortably.
In
the late 19th Century the French Box Easel was invented, a highly
portable easel with telescopic legs and built-in paint box and palette
that enabled "plein air" works to be carried out effectively but Peter
has developed his own methods that are more flexible and portable. He
has a "field kit" that he has spent years developing that ensures
direct, highly effective focused work can be carried out, unhindered
and comfortably.
A tough but casual Jacket, with multiple pockets, to house various materials.
Pocket sized specially designed essential paintbox and palette to fit the jacket.
Shoulder bag, with multiple compartments for ancillary materials. .
Paint - a
specially created minimal palette of studio-made paints.
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU GO OVERSEAS?
"If
one has to travel overseas then a different approach is called for.
There are all sorts of restrictions on carrying materials, be they
turpentine, plastics and more, and I prefer to buy the materials once
I've arrived at the destination. Even if you make your own paint as I
do it can still be done, you just have to be very organised as to how
to set up where you are. I've made oil paint in hotel rooms and then
chucked away newspaper I've used as a work surface. It's no big deal
really. Creating painting mediums is trickier but still feasible. There
are no "rules" as to how you work, that's up to the individual Artist.
Of course, times change, and the idea of using some sort of sketching
easel is "just so yesterday" for me and contemporary pursuits are not
laden with danger as in earlier days, unless through personal choice.
Back then, naivety could get you in serious trouble."
THE HAZARDS OF WORKING "EN PLEIN AIR"
In
Peter's case, "induction" to "front line drawing" was perhaps somewhat
less risky than Linda Kitson's Falklands assignment, but still
dangerous. While drawing in Bankside on the Thames in London on an art
school project he was sitting on a wharfe wall, drawing a derrick, when
a friend shouted "look out" and Peter narrowly avoided having a large
crate of Bananas dropped on his head from a crane net that was snapping
and spilling its contents! This, and the experience of sitting at the
entrance to a platform at London's Liverpool Street Station in the rush
hour to draw the panorama of the station was a "baptism of stress" he
has never forgotten.
"On
another occasion, tutors thought it was "useful" if we were sent to
Brick Lane in the East End to draw. I have clear memories of two of the
"nice" girls on our course, sitting side by side on the kerb, drawing
in the main street. A car drew up, two guys got out, and set about each
other over the bonnet of the car. Needless to say, the girls left in a
hurry. All this was, of course, way back before the financial services
explosion in the Isle of Dogs which would change forever all the
surrounding areas. In those days it was still a pretty rough area and
you needed to be mindful of that.
"If
people think real artists lounge around in berets and striped T-shirts
with their heads in the clouds then I'd recommend trying a year's worth
of that sort of art school training and assessing how you feel at the
end of it . In the 80's I even once nearly fell out of a helicopter
over the Isle of Wight in the UK on a BBC video reference-gathering
shoot for a local news slot and I once stood "lashed to the mast"
(actually it was a gun turret) on a British warship in the Bay of
Biscay in mid-December to get some reference drawings for a project and
was it ever cold - brrrrrrrrrrr!" Still, it was fun chasing Russian
Warships."
THE JOYS OF WORKING "EN PLEIN AIR"
So
it is "nice" now to finally be able, as a self-published Artist, to
plan "En plein Air" sessions more effectively and it can be very
pleasant. "It was a really wonderful stay in London creating this
painting with great exploration ideas. We walked all over the City
taking coffee here and there and dining royally - traveling by Oyster
card on the "Tube" and on Buses. We did a long hike that day and ended
up at Bankside and the River (Thames) where Peter chanced on this
riverside derrick - a warehouse loading bay from "back in the day". Cat
and mouse were siting there pleased as punch and it made a fantastic
picture. Hide and seek on a London crane with ideal colourings for
Peter's palette. What you can find when you are not looking (I am not
looking, he is always looking!).
HOW IT ALL BEGAN
At
the hands of the Impressionists in the late 1800's Plein Air was a
technique intended to capture the effects of sunlight and different
times of day on a subject, it was quite revolutionary then; Peter's
response is more about looking for scenes of character, but in the
1950s, as a child, he knew nothing of such Art history nor had a
history of his own so was merely "doing what I seemed to need to do -
paint - what was around me - and "I have clear memories of painting in
the park and on holiday at the beach but also of painting the view
outside of my bedroom to alleviate the boring grey atmosphere of London
in the post WWII era" in a kind of half-way house of "not quite Plein
Air". Thus, the word "bedroom" is used loosely since "studio" is how he
tended to think of it even if he'd never heard of the word then.
Deborah Susan Jones
About "Artist"
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