Picnic in the park

An annual assembly at a commemorative bench on Ham Common - the weather was good this year, and the company as agreeable as always.

I was busy chatting and forgot to take photos! Just that distant view, and these two - footwear and nail polish -

 ... and "man's best friend" -

On the way home, jackdaws havig a good squawk on the train tracks at Richmond -

 ... and a glimpse of unrelenting construction in the cityscape at Vauxhall station -

Places to go, things to see - part 1

Gdansk, a "fair-tale port city" (reconstructed after being 90% bombed in WW2), is rumoured to have a wonderful engineering museum, and is the birthplace of 17th century astronomer Hevelius, who mapped the moon ("The sketched topography reveals that as more of the moon is illuminated in its cycle, the features visible one night are not in the same location the next."). He and his wife Elisabeth, also an astronomer and born in the same year as Selenographia was published, are buried in St Catherine's Church. After her husband's death in 1687, Elisabeth went on to compile their star catalogue, which was published in 1690.

One of the 40 engraved plates in Johannes Hevelius's 1645 Selenographia (via)

In Norwich, the Sainsbury Art Centre has an Elisabeth Frink show, "Humans and other animals" till 24 February. A version of "Mirage II" was shown at the Royal Academy for many years and I liked to see it there -

(via)

Birmingham, for Matthew Krishanu's several shows (he teaches painting at Camden Arts Centre and I have benefitted from his demonstrations and patience) -

The Sun Never Sets, MAC, Birmingham My solo exhibition The Sun Never Sets is showing at Midlands Arts Centre (MAC), Birmingham from 12 January - 10 March 2019. All are welcome to the opening event at MAC: Saturday 19 January 2 - 4pm On the same day there will be an opening event for my show A Murder of Crowsat Ikon Gallery, Birmingham from 5 - 7pm. A catalogue for The Sun Never Sets is available featuring texts by Jenni Lomax (former director of Camden Arts Centre), and Ruxmini Choudhury (assistant curator at Dhaka Art Summit). Jenni Lomax writes in her introduction to the exhibition catalogue: “Autobiography plays some part in all Krishanu’s work, whether populated by figures or uninhabited like his landscapes. However, his paintings are given a deliberate edge of uncertainty that folds reality in with the collapsing of time.” Midlands Arts Centre, Cannon Hill Park, Birmingham, B12 9QH

Exhibition dates: Saturday 12 January - Sunday 10 March 2019 Opening times: Tuesday - Sunday, 11am - 5pm Admission free. Opening event: Saturday 19 January 2 - 4pm Artist Talk and Tour: Thursday 21 February, 6 - 7.30pm Website: www.macbirmingham.co.uk   A Murder of Crows, Ikon Gallery, Birmingham A murder of crows is roosting around Ikon Gallery (39 of them in total), spread across the ground floor. Ikon Gallery, 1 Oozells Square, Brindleyplace, Birmingham, B1 2HS Opening event: Saturday 19 January 2019, 5pm - 7pm Exhibition dates: 8 January - 10 March 2019 Opening times: Tuesday – Sunday, 11am - 5pm Admission free. Website: www.ikon-gallery.org   Too Cute!, Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery My painting Boy and Mask, 2017 (Arts Council Collection, Southbank Centre, London) will be showing as part of Too Cute! Sweet is about to get sinister, curated by artist Rachel Maclean. Rachel Maclean examines the world of cuteness by curating works from the Arts Council Collection and Birmingham’s collection to reveal how objects and images can have the unique ability to be simultaneously sweet and sinister. Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, Chamberlain Square, Birmingham, B3 3DH Exhibition dates: 26 January - 12 May 2019 Opening times: Monday - Thursday 10am - 5pm | Friday 10.30am - 5pm | Saturday & Sunday 10am - 5pm Admission free. Website: www.birminghammuseums.org.uk

Drawing Tuesday - Southwark Cathedral

Southwark Cathedral provided lots of subject material, from the full length of the nave to a corner with candlesticks and columns, as well as colourful glass windows and even a horse (and dragon). Plus, in the background, a bout of organ music and regular short prayers, as well as a cafe attached to the cathedral - with a cathedral cat roaming the premises.

The cathedral has been a place of Christian worship for 1000 years. In addition to the association with Shakespeare (the Globe theatre was and is again nearby)

Memorial to William Shakespeare

there are memorials to other local residents -

The Treharne Memorial (via)

The Humble Memorial (via)

and events -

(via)

Not to forget the stained glass - this is the latest addition, designed by Leifur Breidfjörd for the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II in 2012 -

(via)

And now for the drawings -

Carol and Sue independently chose bits of that window

Carol added the coloured light falling on stone

Sue was definitive with the leading

Stonework by Joyce

Pillar bases and candlestick base by Mary

A grand vista by Mike

Janet found a horse - and St George hard at work

My struggle with foreshortening ...

... and pleasure in letter shapes (drawn upside down)

Strolling in Hillingdon and Harrow

Yesterday's walk in north-west London started at Northwood (Metropolitan Line), a pleasant-looking place -

We soon got off the roads, past a golf course, and into the fields and woods - Ruislip Woods Nature Reserve -

and came to the 60-acre lake known as Ruislip Lido -

which has a sandy beach and large cafe - and little railway, though it's not so little as it's Britain's longest 12-inch gauge railway -

On the trail round the lake you can "walk the planets", with signboards  about each planet spaced proportionally to their position in the solar system (we never did get to Neptune or Uranus) -

Then along part of the Celandine Route, which goes along the River Pinn, passing through lovely woods -

 In Pinner Memorial Park, the Heath Robinson Museum will be opening on 15 October -

 From Pinner, trains back to central London are also on the Metropolitan Line.

When I go on the walks I have no idea where we're actually walking, so writing about them is a chance to find out about where we've been.

Strolling ... up two hills in the west

A lovely day for a walk. This one was part of Walk London, an offering of guided walks by Transport For London ... the idea being that people use public transport to get to and from the walks.

Leafy suburbs

 The lift at Greenford (Central line), starting point of the walk, is a sort of cable car -

 We set off down a meandering path, shared with bicycles -

...and along a stretch of the Grand Union Canal -

White beaks=coots, red beaks=moorh

 The name of this narrowboat brought back a twang or two of remorse mixed with nostalgia -

 ... whereas this strange boat seemed part locomotive, part submarine ... and all wrong -

 We filed along to Horsenden Farm -

... and up Horsenden Hill -

Note the Capital Ring signpost - we were walking part of  Section 9
- only 70-some miles to go to complete the ring!

View to the west, with Windsor Castle somewhere near the horizon 

View to the northeast - that's the next hill we'll be climbing

 Here's one of the things I love about England -

Deciduous forests with very little undergrowth

 ... and this is another - the way the name of the street can suddenly change -

London Road becomes Sudbury Hill

 Reaching Harrow on the Hill, we found a small market on the green. Most of the houses in the village, our guide said, are part of or connected with the school. The gabled building at the rear was once a pub called The King's Head, and when it changed use its sign and gantry was erected on the green -

 A gilded Victorian postbox -

 At the top of the hill is St May's Church, the highest building in Middlesex. It dates back to 1087, but little of the original building remains.

Victorian stained glass

The poet Byron was a pupil at Harrow School from 1801 to 1805 - he would sit in the churchyard and see this view -

 "...he sat dreaming by "his favourite tombstone" (the "Peachy Tomb"), as recorded in "Lines Written beneath an Elm in the Churchyard of Harrow", which is reproduced on a memorial in front of the Peachy Tomb, erected by the son of one of Byron's school friends in 1905. The Elm burnt down sometime prior to 1935. Byron's daughter, Allegra Byron (by Clair Clairmont), is buried in an unmarked grave outside, very near to the south porch."

 Down the hill, past this sculpture in the park -

... and heading home from Harrow on the Hill station (Metropolitan line).