The Man with the Chair Painting

My earliest work in Indian ink and watercolour involved paintings of people's homes which I attempted to sell on the doorsteps of affluent Kensington West London.Happily they were all in easy walking distance of my own W8 hovel.In cold weather the owners sometimes brought me soup which I consumed while seated on the kerb,all very Dickensian. I performed a similar activity involving breweries.That is to say I was compelled to visit every hostelry between Edwardes Square in Kensington and Sloane Square in Chelsea,to this day it remains a blur in my memory.Yet not entirely so.I do remember encountering the author of Cider with Rosie when I was trying to sell a picture of The Roebuck pub in Chelsea to the landlord.Said author referred to the Roebuck as his 'office'. My chief desire was to illustrate books and my first three publishing commissions arrived on the same day,whacking out illustrations for three books at the same time was not without its problems. I mainly illustrated children's books for some of the big London publishers but after fifteen years of line and wash I decided to reacquaint myself with oil pastels. It took a further five years or more for me to become anywhere near proficient...this learning process continues. As to the present.I like bright colours and sunny days,I love the sun and heat of Egypt.Oil pastels (the best ones,there's only one brand)seem to get it done for me in terms of colour and application. My pictures may appear on the wild side,I can assure you are measured to the inch,hence my reluctance to chop bits off to accommodate the recent prints crisis. In terms of content,my contemporary female forms crazily intermingled with figures from the 1920s(the era of the great Tutankhamun discovery)contain the essential humorous element for what are meant to be fun pictures. Ancient Egypt providing the most spectacular imagery and the best hats.