June 2011
4 posts
4 tags
June foliage
I’ve been in the clean, cool freshness of the Cumbrian fells for a while. It’s a place of rocks, of shale and granite and quartz. Of igneous intrusions and volcanic plugs. And over all this hard surface tumbles water. Fast moving becks, clear swirling rivers, deep cold lakes. And then there’s the space…. Miles and miles of air between you and the horizon. To draw the...
4 tags
June, Damselflies
Damselflies, so insubstantial, so bright, so horizontal and so difficult to draw. I love these strange insects. They flit round the edges of summer like shards of electric blue glass. They live for two or three years under water, rapaciously gorging themselves. Hungry, grey, ugly larvae which then emerge into the light as slim, polished darts. With only two weeks in such splendid guise, they...
5 tags
June, Grasses, Sedges, Rushes and Reeds.
The River-god Tmolus gave King Midas ass’s ears as a punishment for disagreeing with him at the musical contest between Apollo and Marsyas. Embarrassed,Midas managed to concealed them under a hat and the only person who knew about them was his barber. But the secret was too much for the poor man and in desperation he dug a hole in the river bank and whispered into it,“King Midas has...
5 tags
June, Nettles
Nettles, stiff and upright line my path through the wood to the big field. I’m the Queen inspecting my troops as I walk past. Or, as they’re all in khaki perhaps I’m Winston Churchill and it’s the second world. Is that my grandfather over there? Or maybe I’m a military dictator. I’m Kim Jong-il, and these are North Korean troops. Now the idea of nettles being...
