Design Sketch

I can’t help mulling over various energy issues. This sketch arose from a recent meeting with an inventor friend whose electronic device matches the output of a solar PV array to a heating load such as an immersion heater, under any conditions. It is relatively simple, and operates “off grid” – no connection to the electricity mains: I like that!

Pencil sketch Size A4

Design Sketch 1

High tide on the Gann

Painted in September 2010 over three evenings, when the biggest spring tide of the year pushed up so far, it didn’t just flood all the saltings but poured into adjoining meadows and even partly covered the roadway: I had to stop work and climb onto the bridge parapet for about ten minutes, each session! The view is southwards from the original Mullock Bridge; very calm each time, with both little river noises and even small sounds from afar easily heard.
Just below the far ridge is Slatehill Farm – at the time of writing, up for sale.

Oil on panel
16″ x 24″

High tide on the Gann

Song: Dances With Mermaids

Friends recently described their delight at how their daughter has taken to swimming from such an early age: she just adores the water, and loves ducking under to burst back to the surface. Within a day, this song had come to me; I have no tune for it yet, so feel free to experiment. But if you do go on to make a fortune with your version of Dances With Mermaids, do please at least credit the lyrics to me!
It is thought that Marloes is derived from the Welsh Moel Rhos, which means Bleak Headland… makes sense!

DANCES WITH MERMAIDS© Christopher Jessop  May 2025

Verse 1
O she is a Marloes girl, grew up with the sound of the Sea:
A proper girl of Marloes, always must feel free.
Take her from Moel Rhos, even just to town…
Anywhere up country, this girl can feel down!

Chorus
  Dances With Mermaids is her hidden name,
  Dances With Mermaids, in the blue and green again!
  Dances With Mermaids, all times of year
  Dances With Mermaids, never any fear.

Verse 2
So do they come, those sirens, every time she swims?
Only if she’s all alone, beautiful and slim.
Then she will dive, knowing they’ll be there,
Waiting below the waves: Farewell, dull care!

Chorus

Verse 3
She will dance with mermaids all her blessed life:
Still trysts with those sea-girls, if she becomes a wife.
No man will ever understand all that this girl is:
She’d be mysterious to a sister, such a secret bliss!

Chorus x 2

La fille et la falaise 2

(See previous post) When the girl had come so far up the tideline, she stopped and looked out to the sea for so long, her family caught her up; so, I had time for this sketch. I wondered, was this the last day of the holidays? She and the “oldies” were delighted to see both sketches.
One day, I might work out how to combine both sketches in one painting!

La fille et la falaise 2

La fille et la falaise

Or, The girl and the cliff; but I think it sounds better in French. Sketched on a warm late afternoon last August. Her family were preparing to head home; possibly to be sure of not having to carry anything, she started very slowly sauntering along the tideline. The scale of this youngster compared with the cliff, with a foreshortening (“telephoto”) effect, made a compelling composition.

Pencil sketch
Size A4

La Fille et la falaise

Moon

With so much clear weather at the moment, we are getting good views of the moon as it waxes towards the full on Monday.

You could call this found art: it is the very thick skin of an old tin of oil paint, stuck onto a piece of beach-salvaged plywood, and then painted with artist’s oil paint… But for all that, I hope you feel it works!

Oil on panel
Approx. 12″ x 8″
Private Collection

Moon

Seaweed for the earlies

Today’s sketch – from the imagination, of course.
Very late, I know, but I have just finished planting my potatoes and I usually gather seaweed to lay between the rows: technically it may not be much of a manure, but it definitely enhances the flavour of potatoes; tomatoes, too.
Having been looking at some art books recently, I had the idea of portraying a typical coastal village children’s task in previous generations: seaweed was free, so it must be fetched for the kitchen garden in large quantities.
Quite a few artists of the later Victorian/Edwardian era well portrayed busy children: one feels for those girls in their heavy long dresses, probably the same patched handmedown worn every day except perhaps Sundays! As for the mothers, many of whom felt obliged to put their daughters in starched white pinafores, regardless of how grubby their work…
The Newlyn artists Stanhope Forbes and Harold Harvey typically showed girls charged with looking after their younger siblings or doing lighter tasks such as gathering apples; but George Clausen’s subjects raked hay, picked stones, and joined in with other tough jobs like gleaning. And the photographer Frank Meadow Sutcliffe certainly showed the hard side of life around Whitby from an early age.

The lower sketch, done yesterday, hadn’t worked so well because the poses weren’t right; today’s effort, though completed faster, works better I think because I carefully worked out the “framing” of the figures before clothing them. Plus, those forward leans give a better impression of effort.
Maybe a painting one day…?

Seaweed for the earlies 2
Seaweed for the earlies 1

MARLOES in flags

Yesterday I added this picture to my Welcome page. If you hadn’t realised, those are International Code of Signals letter flags.

I created this design for a postcard; a separate post about that coming to my Cards section soon. It has no meaning as a communication: traditionally flags were flown in four letter vertical groups to convey a huge variety of predetermined signals. Meanwhile here are the meanings of the individual flags – together making a rather inconsistent message…

M MIKE My vessel is stopped and making no way through the water.
A ALFA I have a diver down; keep well clear at slow speed.
R ROMEO (Pre 1969:) The way is off my ship; you may feel your way past me.
L LIMA You should stop your vessel instantly.
O OSCAR Man overboard.
E ECHO I am altering my course to starboard.
S SIERRA I am operating astern propulsion.