Morning

Morning

It tickles my cheek, this flicking furry tail. I snake a hand out from under the duvet and rub his head.  Fumbling, I struggle to see the luminous glowing hands on my watch face. 05.55. Early but light is coming under the curtains and cat is doing the ‘I’m starving’...
An English Village

An English Village

There are, apparently, 3 churches in Sussex with round flint Saxon towers. I am constantly passing two, the charming little church in the hamlet that is Southease , and, glimpsed as I drive by over the flint walls and behind conical building which I took to be an...
Westward Ho!

Westward Ho!

The only town in Britain whose name ends in an exclamation mark sits on the North Devon coast. Nearby is the beautiful little town of Bideford, perhaps one of the most beautiful places I have visited in recent years. It was here in the 19th century that the novel...
Sussex Lakes?

Sussex Lakes?

As the rain continues, one commentator remarked that “Alfriston is afloat”. Flooding from the Cuckmere is commonplace around the village and its church, the ‘Cathedral of the South Downs’, and only increases as the Environment Agency allows the sea defences at the...
Looking Ahead

Looking Ahead

Do all artists go through creatively sterile patches? Maybe it’s a bit of creative exhaustion having made and exhibited so many paintings based in the decay of local sea defences, or maybe it is my increasing physical handicaps, but I haven’t been in the studio...
Childhood in the 1950’s

Childhood in the 1950’s

Recently my partner and I took a drive into deepest Devon, so deep we stood on a Hartland cliff looking at the Bristol Channel. My mother hailed from Devon, although that was south Devon. She was born in ‘John’s Cottage’ in Churston near Torquay, and one of my uncles...