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ANTON of Gibraltar
ANTON of Gibraltar July 27th 2025
A hairdresser? A famous chef? A businessman with a shady past? Actually, an oil/chemical tanker, built in 2010 and previously named HEATH and before that SARAH DEE. She was anchored off Musselwick Sands yesterday, having left Antwerp on July 24th. IMO number 9514456, length 123m, according to AIS destined for Milford Haven. Not an attractive vessel; alas, few ships are these days. But there, so I sketched her.
Black Conté stick, pencil, and fine black biro Page size A4 July 26th 2025
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Cartwheels
Cartwheels July 22nd 2025
This girl and her sister have Indian ancestry, I assume, with their rich skin colouring and hair looking blue-black in the summer sun. Perhaps they both learn traditional dancing because each has a great awareness of their balance and pose as natural gymnasts but, also, between moves, they strike poses with hand gestures one might see on temple carvings. Of course this sketch isn’t accurate; but it’s good exercise for any artist, trying to “freeze-frame” a fast and most graceful motion.
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Pottering
Pottering July 18th 2025
This girl was supposed to be leaving the beach: it was home time, and the tide was returning. But like many children, she had so many things left to do: their beaches are always busy places. So, regardless, out into the shallows to rinse the sand off a piece of driftwood, and see how that made it look… with no sense of urgency, naturally. In the end she splashed her way round the rocks, following her father who carried her younger brother slung across his shoulders, out of the reach of the waves.
Black Conté & pencil Sketched July 13th 2025, Musselwick Sands 6” x 6”
Yesterday’s drizzly grey sky cleared in time for the afternoon low tide. You don’t spurn such opportunities – so, to Musselwick Sands for a swim. As I was walking back along the beach, from a large family group having great fun in the waves came one girl, who sat herself at the sea’s edge… I don’t normally try doing fast sketches in full colour, but luckily I had the wherewithal: such a wonderful contrast, with the bay’s blues and greens so strong thanks to the air having been recently rain-washed. She wasn’t there long, looking out to sea; you can see from the marks how I hurried. I think the cropped composition is best – although with that red catching the eye so, one might manage a painting with the figure small in a great expanse of beach. The title works nicely in Welsh: Gwisg Goch
Breaking from gardening tasks this sunny afternoon, down to Musselwick Sands for a low tide swim. A team of children were working very hard on sea defences; of course, the rising water was going to defeat them. As the waves started to seriously attack, the older siblings began piling sand even more furiously; but littlest one decided that they’d be most use scooping water up from the castle walls, and racing out into surf to indignantly fling it as far as they could. Talk about hard work! The first image is the full scan; I thought I’d include a cropped version which has more punch…?
Various pencils, fine biro, some scratching out
Throwing back the sea!Throwing back the sea! (Cropped)
Having written this piece for our local newsletter, Peninsula Papers, I thought I would share it – with some minor edits.
The Greek philosopher Heraclitus said that one cannot step into the same river twice: it’s never the same river, and you won’t be the same person. Similarly one cannot visit the same beach twice, because each tide changes things. The late May sand levels at Musselwick (Marloes) have been very high because of offshore winds; furthermore swimmers are finding it shingly underfoot, even rocky in places. Lumpy Beach Syndrome has been reported here before: from a friend’s archives comes a Western Mail front page article of June 11th 1984 headed Riddle of vanishing holiday sands baffles the experts. The photo shows Steve Marsden, then proprietor of Marloes Post Office (which was in The Square) surrounded by stones, his backdrop that unmistakeable black cliff. The Mail had consulted Prof D Q Bowen (Aberystwyth University) about the situation – which was however different 41 years ago, for then the general Musselwick beach level was very low and there were reports of “lost sand” from locations all across Wales and England. Normality will probably return with a weather change; but, it’s well to be reminded that Nature is good at surprises. While summer visitors struggle to picture No Beach Syndrome, we year-round shore explorers have witnessed on different occasions Musselwick, Albion, Marloes, and West Dale completely scoured to the bedrock – and then, sometimes only a day later, everything back as before!
From August last year (2024). Conte pencils can set ideas down quickly, perhaps with more “personality” than graphite pencil. And with judicious rubbing, you can produce a good area of mid tone. The tricksy wind was making the bowling erratic, and the fielding hard work too!
