England will (fingers crossed) have snow for Christmas!  I can only remember, how much I laughed last year in Germany when I heard a furniture store ad on the radio, betting buyers that if it snowed in the town on Christmas day, all their purchases would be repayment-free!

Of course, it being near Christmas, I hope my lack of blogging can be excused. 

My painting is nearer completion – the planned tree is now a dark silhouette against a beautiful deep red background, sunset on a deep summer sky.  However, it does seem a little incongruous with the snow falling outside – if only Britain had real mountains, I would definately be skiing!…  

It does all seem a little more like winter than it usually does here, even the early darkness seems darker and colder.  Perhaps my next painting will be all dark?   A vast canvas, painted first with dashes of luminescent colours – left to dry and then covered with the thinnest varnish of black or extremely dark blue… then rubbed or sanded down to reveal the colours beneath… 

I imagine it’ll be a little like the universe: – how arrogant! – a 2D vaccum of darkness intersected by pleasing brilliant coloured objects.  I always feel that the more depth a painting has, the better. 

However, I’m always open to inspiration – so if you feel genius has hit you like a ton of bricks: please comment!

The background is a deep red colour – as if a storm has just finished and dusk has arrived a little too early.  I kind of make it up as I go along – there is no brilliantly defined method; no photo to copy; no deep theory – just a slightly blurry vision in my head.

A bit like interpretive dance, I believe.  You don’t know what on earth they are doing or trying to portray – but the dancers have obviously put a lot of effort and practice into the choreography; so you grudgingly go along with it.  Personally, I’ve never been that into ballet (despite doing it as a child) – the very tight tights on the men have always put me off – I mean seriously, where do you look?  That reminds me of other embarrassing theatre productions – has anyone see the Othello production set in a US-army base on Cyprus?  They get naked and shower on STAGE!!!

But worse was to come – at least during the shower, the lighting was reduced – but afterwards Othello, Iago and some others just stood at the front of the stage in their boxers.  Now if you are in the front row, one must needs look up…

yes. terrible.

what people will do for money…

Part of the problem is the fear of messing it up – sounds stupid! – surely you can always just paint  over…

But it is extraordinarily difficult to transpose your vision into reality – mine currently is of a tree infront of a deep red sunset with hills rolling in the foreground.  I am a very slow painter – so to start a new painting is a big commitment for me.  Nevertheless, the desire to conquer fear must needs fight the fear of failure.

Taking inspiration from modern Brit-pop artists is difficult, because so much of what they do seems to require no talent, only imagination.  And when they try to demonstrate this talent to their critics through more traditional media – like Damien Hirst – they fail.  Is it a lack of practice?  A too-large an ego that prevents them from seeing their own failures?

Nevertheless, I imagine it is a little like writers-block.  You can see what you want to achieve, but getting started is difficult.

The way to get over it, I think, is to lower your standards temporarily – trying to do something is better than nothing.  And with that, I’m off to get started….

Some of them are there to fulfil community work orders – one guy has 350 hours to do – although I’m not sure what for… Others are simply different – the stamp & coin specialists for example: collectors come to buy specifically from them. Most peculiar to my mind are those who buy out of date foreign currency notes!

Until a few days ago, I had no clue that there was anything you could possible do with these because no currency-exchange will accept them. I know that I have old money hanging around, mostly francs, marks, old turkish lira – but there was a guy who spent £6 on about 30 old notes with no value at all.

But it was really fascinating to watch the bargaining – the pretending not to be interested, when both my colleague and I could see the gleam of greed in the buyer’s eyes; then claiming to have no money despite the fact that he comes every week especially…

So are charity shops the ‘good & acceptable’ face of capitalism? Where greed is truly transformed into a profit for society?

Anyway, charities are damn lucky that people still feel rich enough to give away such great, sellable stuff. I learned another thing – there is nothing that cannot be sold for the right price.

They have several exhibitions inside the house – one on Churchill and the WW2 years – and another interactive one on the house itself.  The latter is the best – particularly for kids – you are guided through the rooms by Lady Sarah’s (the first mistress of Blenheim Palace) maid, who as a ghost guides guests through the ages.

Best of all though must be the Versailles-inspired gardens

Blenheim Palace from the gardens

and the fact that we could get the day-ticket (£17.50) transferred into an annual pass for FREE!