The Woods

I found myself with some of my students on what now seems to be an annual excursion to the Lickey Hills Country Park in Worcestershire yesterday afternoon. They are working on a painting project, ‘From Cezanne to Abstract Expressionism’, with me at the moment, so the plan was to make some drawings and take some suitable reference photographs to work with back in the classroom. I asked them to make just five drawings in the two hours we were there, and thought it only right to do the same. I don’t ever really like to set work that I wouldn’t be willing to do myself, so I set off too with my sketchbook and i-pad into the woods too.

It was good to get out of the stifling atmosphere of the college and into the cold, fresh air. Things are difficult at work, and I constantly seem to find myself battling with someone or something at the moment, which feels exhausting.  I'm sick of it. So it was great to sit under the trees drawing and walking through the woods, largely on my own. Some students did join me at one point, which was nice, as despite everything else at work, the students remain inspiring. Doing it for ver kids and all that...

Trying to create five drawings was a challenge. I did two sketchbook drawings and three on the i-pad which I was really enjoying working with yesterday. There are a couple on this post. My right hand felt painful with the cold by the end of it though. I’m not sure if it was circulatory, as my hand was purple, or arthritic, as it also ached a great deal. The pain stayed with me into the evening. 

Cold, cold, cold...

It’s been freezing today. It was just the perfect weather to take fifteen students up to the Lickey Hills in Worcestershire, on a drawing trip this morning, which is what I foolishly did. Having gone to a bit of trouble organizing things I was loathe to cancel, and to be honest early this morning, the sun was shining bright and it seemed like it was going to be a nice crisp March day, just right for walking the woods sketchbook and camera in hand.  I couldn’t have been more wrong. When we got there, the milder Birmingham breeze had been replaced by a biting bitterly cold wind up on the higher ground. It was long before everyone beat a hasty retreat to the nearby Visitor Centre café to warm up.

I was really fed up with the students though, as, despite the cold weather, most of them in a typical teenage way had dressed so poorly for the outdoors in flimsy tee shirts and the thinnest of jackets, if they wore a jacket at all, that it made working impossible. I was determined to lead by example and I headed off with my sketchbook and I-pad and made these two studies, the second one finished at home from some drawings I had made. My example failed, and most of them stayed put in the café. I felt they had wasted my time and their own as we headed back onto the minibus, and like the grumpy old man that I felt, I told them so….