Wednesday 9 June 2010

The English Country Blogger



When I'm affecting my urban cool mode, I tell rural types that I only like to see the countryside through double glazing because I know it teases. Except that they look at me witheringly and uncomprehendingly. By then it's too late to say that we once bought a coastguard house on top of a cliff in Dorset, without electricity or running water ten years later. That big blotch in the picture represents the row of seven grimly but solidly built dwellings that look so out of place on the footpath that we frequently met the gaze of walkers down the other end of a pair of binoculars, leaning against our wall.  The painter Augustus John once stayed there but so did some IRA bombers on the run, before our time.  For many years there was an old rowing boat parked outside, confiscated from smugglers pour encourager les autres. The story goes that they were made to carry it up there (where the coastguards made it unseaworthy) - no mean feat up 500 ft of precipitous smugglers' path. Thomas Hardy's short story The Distracted Preacher is a rollicking tale of the Revenue men versus the smugglers who took this very route.

I have just returned from staying nearby for a couple of days and much regret that we didn't get to walk up there.  The first day it was shrouded in mist; the second day I fell to painting it instead. And then I  fancied myself attempting The Diary of An English Country Lady with a sketch of some bois trouvĂ©.  I found it in on a lush secret path from the beach, the trees dripping and glistening after the rain.  I was taken by the radioactive green of the lichen and the alien fungus growing out of it.  I wish I could pretend I wasn't in the East End of London as I write this or that I won't be back to compulsively drawing shoes now. (I am such a poseur.)


15 comments:

  1. Lovely work, Rose. The lot of it.
    The lower drawing reminds me of (Rembrandt?) Peale's watercolors of butterflies.
    I liked urban life, but the farm was somewhat cheaper. It's the ranch house suburbs where I grew up that I still find nauseating.

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  2. I miss the English countryside, shrouded in mist or not, and your pictures and text are very evocative of exactly what I am missing about it. Your bois trouve could easily entitle you to the "diary of". I am envious of your talent.

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  3. rurritable -those are kind words from a very good artist himself. I rather thought John Ruskin would be proud of my attention to detail to the twig!
    I don't normally linger like that. Waiting for the paint to dry each time is a must and a good excuse for a smoke in the sunshine, or if my computer is nearby a mindless game. Not very academic, that.

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  4. columnist - thank you. I am relieved you are safely back in Bangkok. Fingers crossed it doesn't kick off again.

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  5. Good morning, Rose. Beautiful objay troove (as it was known in the 60s in my college). I imagine you sitting under a large umbrella, rapidly dipping brushes in your paintpots, fag pendule on lip and humming "Keep right on till the end of the road..." Wet, misty days, here so rare, make me so happy. Too much sun pisses me off - that an Englishman could make such a statement ..... !

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  6. Blue, thank you. And it is a good morning as it turns out to be my birthday! Full of happy adrenaline and flowers everywhere. You got the picture of me as an artist but I hope my American friends understand the 'fag pendule' bit! Always lovely to hear from you. Are you still coming over to misty moisty London?

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  7. Beautiful, Rosie! You know how much I love your watercolors. They are heaven.

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  8. Happy birthday, with or without a hat.

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  9. Thanks Home - I've had a glorious day!

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  10. Good morning again, Rose. Happy belated birthday wishes, and many, many happy returns. It is mine this month so if you are in atlanta towards the end of the month come to my party. I've just been ditched by the piano player so am reeling from the shock - terribly bad in conjunction with knowing the age I'm going to be.

    London is put off, mostly because and old friend from there came here and Rory and I have been to New York once to and Pittsburgh. Possible visit in the autumn when I have a five-day weekend, I get homesick - surprising after all these years (30) but those darkly rainy days get to me sometimes.

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  11. Don't shoot the piano player, Blue! I'd adore to come to your party but sadly I can't make it to Atlanta. Autumnal London and I await you.

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  12. Happy birthday, Rose. I'm late to the party as usual.

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  13. Magnificent watercolor of the cliffs!
    WOW

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  14. rurritable - late is lovely! It gives a warm after glow to a birthday. Thank you.

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