This month’s spread from the Dalesman. The morel growing from the foot of a wall just down the road was a new species for me.
Morels and Scurvygrass
Tag: Dalesman
Tales of the Riverbank
On the news stands now, my latest Dalesman nature diary.
Sketching by the Pond
I’m working on my July issue of my Wild Yorkshire nature diary for The Dalesman using Adobe InDesign and Photoshop to fit everything in.
Being pressed for space I’ve tried to fit the swarming bees into the margin and, to add to the drama, instead of my usual smiling mugshot, I’ve tried a cartoon of Barbara and I on bee alert, blocking holes with steel wool and masking tape. This might not make it into the final cut, but I like to experiment.
The View from the Boathouse
Just a taste (in this case a Bakewell and a latte) of the research that I’ve put into my article The bear, the bulldog and the boathouse, celebrating the 200th anniversary of the Boathouse at Newmillerdam, in the March issue of The Dalesman, out today.
That chair is on the spot where sharp-shooting French bulldog enthusiast Lady Kathleen Pilkington (see article) sat 121 years ago in 1902.
My thanks to Experience Wakefield, www.experiencewakefield.co.uk for their support when I was researching this article.
Links
Cross Country
Memories of wintry cross country ‘runs’ (actually my friend and I strolled once we were out of sight of the school, which didn’t take long on a foggy morning) in my ‘Wild Yorkshire’ nature diary in this month’s Dalesman.
Addingford Steps: green spaces
My Addingford show in the Redbox Gallery in Horbury comes to an end later this month but I’m following up its theme of the importance to us all of having a ‘local patch’ in my November ‘Wild Yorkshire’ column in The Dalesman.
Rather than it being just me saying how much I value this stretch of the Calder Valley, I thought I should quote one of the many studies that suggest that being in nature can benefit our physical and mental health. This study from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA was made before the pandemic, but seems even more relevant now:
Green space can provide mental health benefits and possibly lower risk of psychiatric disorders. This nation-wide study covering >900,000 people shows that children who grew up with the lowest levels of green space had up to 55% higher risk of developing a psychiatric disorder independent from effects of other known risk factors.
Residential green space in childhood is associated with lower risk of psychiatric disorders from adolescence into adulthood, PNAS, 2019
Yorkshire Rock
The July Dalesman arrived in this morning’s post and my ‘Wild Yorkshire’ nature diary has a suitably rocky theme, as this year my British Geological Survey paperback, Yorkshire Rock, a journey through time, celebrates 25 years in print.
Watercolour Border
I’ve redrawn this border from my Dalesman nature diary featuring the walk around the lake at Newmillerdam Country Park, near Wakefield. In the first version, I thought that the pen and ink was competing too much with the text. To soften it I’ve gone for:
- soft B pencil instead of black ink
- textured watercolour paper instead of smooth cartridge
- loose brushwork, all with a no. 10 sable round, instead of trying to define what textures are
Wakefield Words
My illustrated compilation of William Stott Banks’ Wakefield Words, ‘A List of Provincial Words in use at Wakefield in Yorkshire 1865’, is featured in my Wild Yorkshire nature diary in the October edition of The Dalesman magazine.
You can order it through your local bookseller or direct from me, price £3.99, post free in the U.K.
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And please let me know if you would like it sent further afield by air mail.
By the way, Yorkshire Rock, featured in the September Dalesman is still available:
Yorkshire Rock
Dalesman Nature Diary
The September Dalesman magazine just dropped through the door and I’m delighted with how my Wild Yorkshire nature diary has turned out this month. The drawings have a bit more room to breathe than usual and the daisies and germander speedwells, photographed in Thornes Park this summer, give a suitably relaxed frame for my Pink Pig A5 sketchbook.
As usual the lettering and drawings were dropped in later, as it would be so difficult to get the exposure just right for each element.
Sketchbook v. Notebook
I’ve been using the sketchbook format in my articles for a year now but starting in the new year, we’re going to try something different as it so difficult to tell a story in the few paragraphs of hand-written text that can be comfortably fitted in amongst my drawings.
I’m hoping that I can still keep some of the quirkiness of the visual joke of popping a sketchbook down on the turf or on the beach, so perhaps I’ll go back to my regular text and illustrations for the diary but incorporate some element like a real feather or fossil resting on the page or a ladybird crawling across it.
A Curious Cat
September’s issue of the Dalesman is, as usual, full of all things Yorkshire: the Wakefield’s Mystery Plays, Leeds Library (wish I lived nearer, I’d join), the dolls houses of Newby Hall and bird of prey conservation.
And yes, also as usual, my sketches are upstaged by watercolours and oils from Yorkshire’s artistic talent –John Harrison’s Healaugh and Chris Geall’s Mallyan Spout – but my favourite image in this issue is Stephen Garnett’s double-page spread photograph of a back alley in Robin Hood’s Bay village.
How did he manage to find that comically curious cat which so perfectly matches the sun-dappled stone of the cobbles and cottages?
Links
John Harrison: Drawn in Yorkshire