Gear Review: the Tilley Hat

Summer has finally hit southern England and, as those of you who watched Wimbledon will know, it has hit hard. Judging by what I've seen of the Tour de France and heard on the news about the USA, the sun has now come out across much of the northern hemisphere after a long, cool and squally spring. In fact with temperatures inside my boat/studio hitting the mid thirties (thats 90º for the Americans here) I've been working outdoors so I thought that instead of a paint review this month I would tell you about one of my essentials, a very particular sunhat.

To an extent, any sunhat would do but the Tilley hat is so much more, especially if you are around water. Designed and developed by sailors, it is water resistant with some in the range being designed as rainhats rather than sunhats. They come in a choice of fabrics and brim sizes, have ventilation holes that double as a holder for your sunglasses and have a pocket in the crown. From my point of view the best points are that if it goes in the river it floats long enough for me to fish it out again and that it doesn't go in the river in the first place because it has a very simple but very effective way of strapping onto your head in the wind.

I  used to work somewhere that sold these and was trained up by the rep, so a word about fit. Don't buy a size that is tight. Many people seem to want a hat they can ram onto their heads to make sure they don't lose it. With the retention system there's no need for this - trust the special tape measure. You should be able to wiggle it a little from side to side comfortably because your head swells and shrinks during the day. When trying one, fit your first 2 fingers inside the hat and flat against your forehead. You should be able to get them there easily, and when they're there the hat should then be tight.

I've been using a hemp one with a medium brim for a couple of years now and I swear by it. I went for the hemp because it gets a worn-in look much quicker than the other fabrics but still lasts and lasts - by nature I'm a bit dishevelled! It'll be going with me to this painting contest on Saturday because you have to keep the sun out of your eyes, but sunglasses mess with the colours.

En Plein Air - Windsor & Eton Quick Paint

I'm off to Windsor next weekend, Saturday 13 July, to take part in a speed painting en plein air competition - I'll have three hours at a given point somewhere outdoors in the town centre to make (and frame) a painting of Windsor on the theme of the 60th anniversary of the Queen's coronation. The challenge and the fun isn't just down to the speed, its down to the interruptions there will be from the public and the fact that, not knowing where I'll be painting, I won't be able to prepare much so it will be seat-of-the-pants creativity. Hopefully it will be fun, certainly it will be intense - find out the location at 10:30, start painting at 11, stop painting at 2, hand in work for exhibition at 2:30 and collect work again at 5, hopefully with a prize as well! With a £500 first prize it will be a mix of people doing it for fun and people taking it very seriously; I don't know which camp I'll fall into yet.

The long range weather forecast looks perfect so come and cheer me on, or else join in!

Save the Dates: No Naked Walls & the Runnymede Gallery

Well, there's no backing out now for either me or the gallery!

Some of my work will be on show from 25 July to 29 August in Chertsey and some more during the first weekend of August, the 3rd and 4th, at the gallery in the National Trust Lodge at the Windsor end of Runnymede.

Since Chertsey is in effect my professional debut, the next two or three weeks are your last opportunity to buy from me at negotiable prices - thereafter my studio prices will be consistent with what I fetched at the gallery because to do otherwise would be unfair on the dealer and any collectors - so have a look at my website and if anything catches your eye contact me to find out about availability and pricing, you might be pleasantly surprised. I'm happy to ship worldwide but remember, when the show starts the prices will become more fixed!

A temporal landmark

As you know, I've been thinking a lot about landmarks over the last couple of months and I've also begun to think about time. Well, current events have made realise that there is a certain type of landmark that doesn't just tell you where you are, it tells you when you are as well.

From my posts here, you could be forgiven for thinking Runnymede to be a timeless pocket of nature which ebbs and flows with the seasons but fundamentally stays the same and to a degree you would be right. Ultimately however it is not a natural environment but a collaboration between man and nature that has developed over two millennia or more. As with anything managed by man, there are occasional, sudden changes and there have been two such changes this week.

Firstly, the first crop of hay of the year has been cut, left for a couple of days to start to dry, baled and taken in. Second, the fairground has arrived.

Seeing the hay being cut tells you that from a weather point of view, given the particular spring we had this year, it is midsummer. The fair turning up, in Egham at least, means its around about midsummer from a calendar point of view as well. The fair gives an extra level of precision - is it open? are people coming or going? are the lights in the caravans on? The hay gives us extra information too - the farmer thinks the weather is going to be fine for a few days.

A particular hay meadow isn't distinctive unless it is in isolation; its hedges may be but the grass isn't at first glance. I wonder if its a landmark at all, or if its actually a timemark.

Sir Francis Barry

It was recently suggested to me I should take a look at an artist unknown to me, Sir Francis Barry, Third Baronet of St Leonard's Hill and Keiss Castle. Now that is a mouthful. Would that he had had the other title in the family, Baron de Barry of Portugal, which rolls from the tongue more elegantly. I'm glad I did look at his work, although even after several weeks I remain a little nonplussed. I have sat down and read a book, but it was the sort of book that left me none the wiser. It is based on correspondence found in a briefcase after Barry's death and conversations with his descendants and yet it so full of gaps as to be barely there at all.

So what can we say with confidence? He was born in 1888, his young years featured domestic difficulties and he became a painter against the wishes of his family. He spent years in Cornwall and in mainland Europe and as a painter prioritised colour above all else, claiming Matisse as his major influence. He spent many years working as an etcher and this shows in the graphic simplicity of his paintings. At different times his work shows the influence of the Newlyn and St Ives painters (at which time he was associated with the Royal Academy), the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists, the Pointillists and the Fauves, even the Surrealists and de Chirico. So I guess he drifted on the tide of fashion to a degree as many artists did at this time; it is difficult to know as the chronology of his work is unclear and his early work missing. What I take to be his mature style is full of colour in simple rhythmic compositions. It is at times almost psychedelic although, since he painted until the late 60's, it is impossible to know if he foreshadowed this or reacted to its rise.

Anyway, a perplexing mixture of pictures, with no indication of date or scale to be found: