 Our first Fred. Olsen cruise to the Norwegian Fjords is over and here are a few of my early thoughts about the experience. Setting off from Liverpool was a unique experience and the first two days were at sea. On the first morning, when reading the daily activity sheet, it mentioned that there was a 'meet the resident artist' so being curious as the what kind of art work she produced we wandered down to the event. We met her, sitting at a long table, where she was working on one of her paintings from a past visit to the area. There were about five people there and others came to ask questions about what was happening. Several were disappointed because they wanted to attend art classes like they had attended on previous cruises. Unfortunately, she informed them that she was just an artist in residence and not there to run classes. We were invited to visit the studio in the afternoon. At 3pm I went up to the studio and met about four other people there. I was surprised to find that it was a large, well-lit room at the top of the ship. There were a few limited materials, or you could buy a kit from her. I was a little disappointed that when I read about the facilities on the ship this wasn’t mentioned, and I had only brought my usual limited art materials. Natalia let us copy one of her images and we could do a painting of that. My style was vastly different from her more traditional watercolour style, but I was pleased with the result. Again, several people came up looking for a class and were disappointed when they found out there was not one on this cruise. The next day I concentrated on my digital art, preferring to wait until we visited some of the fjords and small towns so that I could collect images to paint. A couple of these appealed and I managed to paint them. I did visit the studio again to use a colour I had not brought but it was such a shame that this superb resource was under used in the afternoons. In the mornings there were craft classes taking place and these were well attended. The cruise proved to be one of the most relaxing holidays we have ever been on. In the evenings, early twilight, we sat watching the mountains on both sides as we cruised down the fjords. The evening skies were a delight. Norway certainly lived up to its reputation as the 'land of the midnight sun' as these sunsets show. On sea days, whilst sitting in one of the cafes, I did manage to do a few digital drawings of some of the passengers enjoying a quiet break. In future we hope to venture further North, and pass through the Artic circle, having enjoyed this first taste of the area.
0 Comments
Recently, I have become aware of a couple of items that made me realize that I started my artistic journey nearly fifty years ago. On a newsfeed I saw that a local school was using one of my early paintings as a teaching resource, and I also saw that some of my early cityscapes were coming up for auction. Over the years, being an artist from Salford, I have often been asked by researchers, publicists etc. to comment about L. S. Lowry and at times how my work relates to his. I never really thought deeply about this until recently when I was asked to give a talk about my paintings to the art club. Before I began my talk, the organizer introduced me and talked about my links to Lowry and his artwork. Afterwards, he gave me his notes and now a couple of months later, having thought about it, I decided to make this video which sums up my feelings. |
AuthorPhilip Westcott Categories |
RSS Feed