painting – derrickjknight

Somewhat Disconcerting

With paintbrush and roller, after replenishing some of yesterday’s filling, Nick brought light into our sitting room.

Particularly evident was how he has brightened the ceiling;

the walls also glow.

Unfortunately, with the windows open, a number of wasps buzzed around our decorator’s ears. This was more than somewhat disconcerting, so we supplied him with a fly swat and a spray can containing gas lethal to these creatures.

I read another sizeable chunk of “Eyeless in Gaza”

Late this afternoon we visited Milford Supplies to purchase a new starter for the strip light in the library, then drove on to catch

the sunset at Mudeford harbour.

Other photographers, including the couple on the bench and the woman watched by her faithful hound, had the same idea.

Gulls, as always, reflected on the the calm water in the fading light.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s spicy lamb jalfrezi and cream coloured haldi rice with which she drank Hoegaarden and I drank more of the Faugeres.

Drawing, Painting, Retouching

My ten year old granddaughter, Imogen sent me these drawings by e-mail yesterday. I think her line, her shading, and her composition are exceptional.

Today we had a visit from another artist, in the form of John Jones making one of his occasional paintings of the garden.

The day was seriously hot and humid as John set about his drawing in the Rose Garden. We had been predicted a 78% chance of a shower at midday. Sure enough, a brief spell of rain arrived on time. Fortunately our friend was soon able to continue.

Raindrops adhered to several of the roses, especially For Your Eyes Only.

The agapanthuses in the Palm Bed had opened more than they were yesterday.

Jackie produced a splendid salad lunch, after which we enjoyed John’s Lindeman’s Chardonnay 2018 on the patio.

John needed a cap as the sun beat down this afternoon while he developed his painting.

Today’s retouching of the 1926 prints is one of Grandpa Hunter, Mum, and her brothers, our Uncles Ben and Roy. No-one looks very happy.

John, on the other hand looked quite pleased with his day’s work.

This evening Jackie and I enjoyed a second helping of Hordle Chinese Take Away’s excellent fare with which she drank Blue Moon while I finished the Fleurie.

Shadows On The Paper

CLICK ON ANY IMAGE IN A CLUSTER TO ACCESS ITS GALLERY, INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS OF WHICH CAN BE VIEWED FULL SIZE BY SCROLLING DOWN AND CHECKING BOX AT BOTTOM RIGHT. THE TWO SINGLE PIECES OF ARTWORK CAN BE ENLARGED WITH A CLICK OR TWO.

When our friend John Jones visited to paint and draw in our garden last September, the day was so wet that he was confined to the greenhouse to avoid unwanted drops diluting his watercolour painting.

Today, even John would not have minded a little rain. He arrived on time, and, with Elizabeth, we sat for a while on the patio, drinking fizzy lime cordial. Jackie then repaired to the kitchen to prepare a splendid salad lunch which the four of us later enjoyed; and I took John on a tour of the garden so he could choose his vantage point. He said he was spoilt for choice

and settled in the Westbrook Arbour looking down the Phantom Path.

One of our first Japanese anemones stood just in front of him, and an accommodating hosta gathered up fallen geranium petals.

Over lunch we shared memories of childhoods – ours in London, and John’s in Southampton. Horse drawn carts were just one of the similarities we all identified. Many of mine feature in ‘An Historic London Borough’.

After lunch, our artist continued with his work. He spoke of how, in some ways, working in the steady light of a rainy day, had been simpler than with grappling with shadows on the paper.

Having taken this first piece as far as he could today,

John transferred to a shady corner of the Rose Garden. His necessary expressions of intense concentration were softened by his engaging smile.

He left his drawing at this point.

The four of us settled into the Rose Garden with pre-dinner drinks. Then it rained heavily, we got wet and eventually fled indoors. Then the rain stopped.

After drinks Jackie drove John to New Milton station to catch his train home to Southampton.

Jackie, Elizabeth, and I dined at Lal Quilla this evening. Elizabeth enjoyed korai chicken tandoori masala with pilau rice; Jackie chicken shashlik with an egg paratha; and I chicken jaljala with special fried rice. We all drank Kingfisher. As always, the food was excellent and the service friendly and welcoming.

Plein Air Painting

A BT engineer spent most of the morning with us. He found a fault in the line up the street, a faulty hub and possibly a faulty TV Box. The good news is that this was all the provider’s equipment, so we will not have to pay £130 for the privilege. The engineer would put all this in his report. He thought we might be able to use BT on our laptops. We tried after he had left. We couldn’t. Neither could we access Players and Apps on our TV.

We just had time to collect our Antipodean dollars from the bank at Lymington before it was James Peacock’s turn to administer to our internet. He brought a new modem for the EE line, and activated Players and Apps through that. Everything is now working brilliantly.

BT Broadband clearly has to go. I now had a dilemma. I could ring BT and cancel their package, or we could drive to Tanner’s Lane and catch the sunset. There wasn’t time to do both.

No prizes for guessing that we caught the sunset over the beach;

honking swans flying across the backdrop of the Isle of Wight;

along the lane itself;

Donkeys

donkeys employed in pruning a holly hedge;

Sunset 11

and masts of yachts in Lymington harbour.

Sunset painting

Whilst walking along the shingle at Tanner’s Lane beach I admired the plein air painting of Barry Peckham. My camera lens at deep dusk has failed to do justice to this friendly man’s accurate rendering of a painting executed in the short time available. The delicacy with which he has captured the skies, and reflections on the water is most impressive.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s pork baked in mustard and brown sugar, topped with almonds and served on sautéed mushrooms and onions; boiled potatoes, carrots, cauliflower, and runner beans. She drank Hoegaarden and I finished the Cabernet Sauvignon.

An English Country House

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Yesterday I featured a porcelain restoration class held at Fulbeck Hall.

http://www.visitoruk.com/Grantham/fulbeck-hall-C567-AT215.html tells us that

‘Fulbeck Hall is a fine country house dating from the early 17th-century, but largely rebuilt in 1733 by Francis Fane whose family had lived there since 1632.

The house, now a Grade II* listed building, was completely refurbished following World War II, by Henry and Dorothy Fane, having been left in a desperate state of repair by the army who had requisitioned it during the conflict.

The house, with 11 acres of formal gardens, has beeen restored back to its former glory and is now a private residence. It is not open to the public.

Visitors to the nearby Church of St. Nicholas will see monuments to the Fane family, residents of Fulbeck Hall for nearly 400 years.’

A more detailed history is provided by Wikipedia. From the following extracts I have deleted those sections in need of reference citations.

‘The hall was purchased, in 1622, by Francis Fane, 1st Earl of Westmorland, 8th Baron le Despenser and de jure 8th and 6th Baron Bergavenny, of Apethorpe Hall, Northamtonshire, from Sir George Manners, who remained in residence until he became the 7th Earl of Rutland in 1632.^[11] The hall then went to the Earl of Westmorland‘s son, Sir Francis Fane,^[11] a courtier, Royalist and commander of the King’s forces at Doncaster and Lincoln.

Under the Commonwealth, the estate was confiscated, however, Sir Francis Fane was allowed to buy it back, and before the Restoration of Charles II in 1660, he and his wife Elizabeth Darcy, daughter of Sir Edward Darcy MP, grandson of the executed traitor Thomas Darcy, 1st Baron Darcy de Darcy, occupied much of their time in rebuilding the Hall in Restoration style. It was burned down 30 December 1731,^[11] and was rebuilt 1732-1733. His son, also Sir Francis, married Hannah Rushworth daughter of John Rushworth MP and private secretary to Oliver Cromwell .

In 1767 Fulbeck Hall was left to Henry Fane of Brympton owner of Brympton d’Evercy who was a grandson of Sir Francis Fane, the second of Fulbeck and Hannah Rushworth. Henry Fane of Brymton made a fortune as a successful Bristol privateer and he left his Wormesley estates in Oxfordshire to his younger son Henry and his estates in Somerset, Dorset, and Lincolnshire were left to his eldest son Thomas Fane, 8th Earl of Westmorland Thomas, 8th earl inherited the estates of his father and his cousin the 7th Earl making him one of the richest landowners in England. He left Fulbeck Hall to his younger son the Hon Henry Fane MP in 1783. (This man) followed a long list of Fanes as Members of Parliament for Lyme Regis the famil[y’]s pocket borough inherited from an uncle, John Scrope MP, Secretary to the Treasury and grandson of the executed regicide Colonel Adrian Scrope. The constituency at times provided the Fanes with two members of parliament at the same time and between 1753 and 1832 twelve separate members of the family represented Lyme Regis in the Tory interest. Throughout this period the Fane family also represented Constituencies in Somerset, Lincolnshire, Kent, Hampshire, Northamptonshire and Oxfordshire. In 1777 Henry Fane married Anne Buckley Batson, heiress of the Avon Tyrrell estate in Hampshire, by whom he had 14 children.

During the 19th century the house was home to General Sir Henry Fane MP for Lyme Regis who was Commander-in-Chief, India as well as his brother General Mildmay Fane. Sir Henry bequeathed a life interest in the estate to his eldest son Col. Henry Fane(d.1836).^[12] His nephew General Walter Fane who raised Fane’s Horse a regiment of volunteers to fight in China during the Second Opium War succeeded him at Fulbeck Hall. This regiment still exists as part of Pakistan’s armed forces. General Walter Fane is not to be confused with his brother Colonel Francis Fane of Fulbeck Manor, who raised the Peshawar Light Horse in 1857 as an irregular cavalry unit to fight against the mutineers during the Indian Mutiny. This regiment was disbanded in 1903.

During the Second World War 1939-1945 the house was requisitioned by the British Armed Forces and it was the location of the 1st Airborne Division before they left the United Kingdom for the Battle of Arnhem.

Many of the contents of Fulbeck Hall were sold by Sotheby’s in October 2002.’

Soon after the porcelain restoration event, in February 1993, I returned to make photographs to feature in a brochure for Mary Fry, the then owner. Today I scanned a selection of the prints.

Here Mary stands at her open door

leading to the entrance hall,

off which is found the reception room.

A sundial can be seen standing before the main door in the initial picture. The avenue drive leads the eye from this to the gates.

The elegant drawing room is beautifully furnished with fine furniture, ornaments, paintings,

and a grand piano.

Here is one corner of the room.

My accompanying text is written in the present tense, as in 1993, but I have no idea whether this vase, seen beneath the mirror above;

this painting; or any of the other contents in my pictures, survived the sale of 2002.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s succulent sausage casserole, perfect roast potatoes, and crisp cauliflower. I drank more of the malbec.

“An Artist In My Greenhouse”

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This week we have enjoyed three fine days. Tomorrow with also be fine. Today it drizzled most of the time. This, however, did not phase John Jones, an artist friend who had planned to depict the garden and was duly delivered by Paul Clarke this morning.

John happily became ensconced in the greenhouse where he drew until lunchtime. He didn’t seem to mind the cockerel following progress.

Jackie laid on a splendid lunch of cauliflower and stilton soup, crusty bread, cold meats salad, and cheese and biscuits.

Afterwards John applied watercolour.

Remembering what I was always prone to do when painting, I instructed the painter not to dip his brush in his tea.

“How exciting!” observed Jackie. “An artist in my greenhouse”.

Despite his difficult vantage point, John managed to produce excellent compositions in pencil,

and in watercolour.

As, early this evening, we drove John to New Milton to catch the train to his home in Southampton, the rain had stopped and,

especially across Christchurch Bay, the sun blazed in the sky.

Walkers strode along the cliff path at Milford on Sea.

The Isle of Wight was in clear view.

It seemed as if the crumbling edge is further approaching the pedestrian thoroughfare.

This evening we dined on Mr Pink’s fish and chips, pickled onions and gherkins. I finished the Cairanne.

P.S. Note Jackie’s reply to paolsoren in comments for the soup recipe

Ramadan

Somewhat against the clock, Jackie sped me to Southampton airport early this morning for a trip to Sigoules. The reason for the haste was that once again there had been a problem with the on-line check-in and I anticipated the same difficulties as last time when, because my surname had been registered as JohnKnight, the airport machine had been unable to read my passport. In the event there was no queue and a polite young woman saw me through immediately.
In the lounge I overheard a conversation between three people I initially thought must be Dutch. One turned out to be a Geordie, one a Liverpudlian, and the third from Northern Ireland. My confusion was compounded in the boarding queue where I entered into an exchange with a gentleman with a Scots accent who claimed to be Australian and was wearing an American T-shirt. My difficulties with the local French parlance almost paled into insignificance.
Only almost, because I spent a couple of hours with Saufiene and his team, and I really needed his English to help me understand the others. The now customary champagne was produced, but Saufiene did not partake because he is observing Ramadan. He cannot eat, drink, or smoke until sunset, which, in France at this time is not until 10 p.m. It is a long fast for him.
Apparently my next door neighbours are so impressed with the painting Renov Conseil 24 have undertaken at the front of the house, that they want similar work carried out on their property.
My flight was uneventful. We had a smooth crossing above the clouds, and the landing, implemented by a female captain, was the gentlest I have experienced.
Sandrine, of Taxi Eymetois, met me at Bergerac airport and drove me to rue St Jacques, where the builders were in attendance.
This may be the last post I can publish in the next day or two, because my Kensington universal charger does not fit my new HP laptop.
I am also having trouble uploading photographs, so they may have to follow later too. Otherwise everything is hunky dory.
PS. 11th July 2014
I have now sorted out a bit of garbling that was done with this post. My technical problems were compounded by a very intermittent signal in Le Code Bar where I was working on it.