Do you ever notice how people walk along the streets looking down? Eyes fixed to the floor, or phone, or even their i-pad.
I walk around looking up.
My inspiration comes from all around me as I walk.
"WANDER...RECORD..." is an ongoing project and is a collection of drawings and notes concentrated on scenes collected as I wander. The drawings are made on the pages of a journal, but whereas sketch books record quick drawings and ideas, I wanted this book to have a finished piece on each page and the fact they are all in a book is also a personal challenge as no mistakes can be made.
6/3/14......High Street....10.18am
brown sleeping bag, black hair, wet, mumbling, change please, dirty nails, cup, bark, never looks up, slam, phone, down here trev, blonde hair, fast walk, gold coat, big earrings, limp, clip, clip, clip, shout, three, red coats, white shoes, yellow shoes, fifty pence, laugh, bald, dark shades, coat with blue stitching across the back, big bag, stares at me, mcdonalds, shady eyes, looks at floor, massive teeth, boost, rubbish dropped on floor, eats with mouth open, singing, pedals turn, long grey hair, dog, cap, yellow tracksuit bottoms, two kids run, scream, smack, cry, thomas tank engine bag, his vis coat, white hat, huge stomach, mouthfull, tea cup, loud voice, phone box, staring at me, give that camera to me if you want, piss off.
11/3/14... The alleyway stinks. it reeks. the smell floats through the air in bursts of steam forcing its way into my nostrils. The taste stains the back of my throat. Grease oozes from the small holes in the wheelie bins. It drips down onto the damp cobbles and grows into white mounds of leftover human consumption ready for the rats to gorge on once I've gone. Their black twitchy noses poke from the dark walls as they stare at me and wait for their chance to scurry amongst the shadows. Large machines click and hum above my head, extracting stench filled oxygen from the row of overheated food-house kitchens. A silhouette in a darkened doorway, 'Hey, why you taking photo's out here, nothing here". The door slams shut as I raise my camera. A shout echoes inside. Time to leave....
24/3/14...The
Lanes...2.15pm...
Hum,
Constant drone from the pub extractor fan, stale beer aroma gushes through,
wind blows constantly along the old house fronts, sun shines, highlights a
Greggs cup on the step of a building, 1873, 5A, still occupied, double yellows
lead to the cathedral, huge, grey, majestic, drills pound the floor, cranes
lift the blocks, the lanes are tight, claustrophobic but comforting, vans,
cars, constant and loud, dust drifts around, litter sticks to the damp floor,
15, to let, stickers plastered to the car park sign, half peeled, graffiti,
scribbled tags, business suit strolls past, bright yellow high vis jackets,
windscreen full of newspapers, loud voices, shopping bag splits open, bong,
bong.
29/3/14...Car park
roof...3.25pm
All life
is here, below me, looking down.
The noise
is distant and chaotic.
It builds
amongst the buildings.
Movement
in the office window, flicker of computers, filled with bored clockwatchers.
The
council building looks old, grey, full of issues.
The trees
get further away each year. The green disappears.
We grow,
we build, we multiply.
The space doesn’t.
3/4/14...E-State...2.15pm
Along the blue fence, chewing gum, through the broken gap, smashed bottle, under the concrete walkway, tags, along the line of concrete posts, dog shit, into the stairwell, piss, up two flights, bin bag, along the front doors, smashed bmx, who you after mate, keep walking, down the stairwell, oi mate, through the fence gap, don't look back...
1/4/14...High Street...3.10pm...
The shops line up, waiting to be emptied, to let, for sale, closing today, final sale,
The shells remain, empty, not let, not sold, closed today.
.GREEN
GREEN SPACE
GREEN SPACE
SPACE
BUILDING SPACE
BUILDING SPACE
BUILDING.
The streets hold my interest every time I wander them. I'm slowly being drawn towards the structures and buildings that most people don't even notice but to me they are intriguing. Who designed them? What goes on inside them? How old are they?
The actual outline of the buildings has become my main focus and the angles, perspective and size is starting to feature strongly in my work coupled with whatever happens as I make my way through Leicester.
As the book grows I take elements from it and make new drawings on larger single sheets of paper.
Untitled, Wall paint and pen on Fabriano paper, 80cm x 70 cm, March 2014.
This drawing is the basics of a really complicated alleyway behind some restaurants in the centre of Leicester.
Its easy to miss, tiny small and even on a sunny day its still really dark and dingy.
The idea was to take everything away and be left with the skeleton of the scene, almost an
x-ray of what I was looking at, cut out the crap, no detail at all, just pure lines of drawing.
Untitled, wall paint and pen on fabriano paper, 80cm x 80cm, March 2014.
This drawing is the skylines of a wander collected over a 30 minute period. All the buildings are blocks of flats, different sizes and shapes just like the people inside them.
Untitled, wall paint and gloss on Fabriano paper, 80cm x 60cm, March 2014.
This drawing captures the city at night.
Just the blurred, shimmering lights of the streets, the buildings and the movement of people and vehicles can be seen through the rain.
Its drawn in white household paint on top of black wall paint and is not a painting.
