Otmoor: Moonlight & Myths

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I was born just after WW2. My parents had moved to Noke when they married in the early 1940s. We lived in a tiny cottage totally lacking modern amenities. No electricity, water from the well and an earth loo in ‘The Elm Barn’, a shed with a grand name, all set in a third of an acre of orchard. An artist’s retreat from the hurly burly of war torn London. This was my world – apple trees to climb, a stream to splash in, a duck pond beyond the gate where my brother and I launched catamaran boats whittled from elder sticks. The village was a place apart – a road petering out on the edge of the moor, smelling of cows and cow parsley, deep ditches fringed by pollard willows and a huge sky. This is the place my life started. Continue reading “Otmoor: Moonlight & Myths”

Frames of reference

Jitterbug Waltz

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Here’s a wonderful new album by the Frank Harrison Trio, recorded live at The Verdict in Brighton. It’s not very hi-fi, Frank simply put his digital recorder on the stage and pressed the record button, but it manages to capture the enthusiasm and the energy and the empathy between the three musicians. It’s available free from Frank’s website, but if you want my favourite track you should buy the CD. And there’s a great drawing by Andrew Walton on the cover. Here’s a little taste…

Jitterbug Waltz: Frank Harrison, piano; Dave Whitford, double bass; Enzo Zirilli, drums.

Frank Harrison Trio | Live At The Verdict

Frames of reference

Wittenham Clumps

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A couple of weeks before our walk around Burnham Beeches, I walked to Wittenham Clumps with Andrew Walton. We’d done the same walk five years earlier and afterwards Andrew had painted this little watercolour as a memento, here brightening up my sad old workshop wall. That was in the days before this blog; now I was keen to retrace our steps and record them for Frames of Reference. Continue reading “Wittenham Clumps”

Frames of reference

Moon Arc

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This large watercolour was painted by Andrew Walton to celebrate 12 walks with David Attwooll on Oxford’s Port Meadow. Their journeys were documented in Ground Work, an exhibition of painting and poetry earlier this year at Art Jericho. Moon Arc was not included in that exhibition but it is now on view in the window of The Rowley Gallery. Continue reading “Moon Arc”

Frames of reference

Lunaris

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The new CD by the Frank Harrison Trio arrived yesterday. It’s an album of acoustic trio music, piano, bass, drums, with echoes of Keith Jarrett, Esbjörn Svensson, Fred Hersch, but mostly it sounds like the Frank Harrison Trio. The CD cover features a watercolour by Andrew Walton (which appeared in an earlier Frames of Reference post here), Moon Arc, the moon over Port Meadow, Oxford’s answer to Grantchester Meadows. Frank’s father, Michael Harrison, was director of Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge until 2011, and a great friend of Andrew Walton. The album is dedicated For Moikal.

Frank Harrison Trio – Sunrise (Port Meadow)

As well as working with his own trio, with Dave Whitford on double bass and Enzo Zirilli on drums, Frank Harrison also plays piano and keyboards with Gilad Atzmon in the Orient House Ensemble, and he was also involved with Robert Wyatt’s mesmerising For The Ghosts Within.

Frames of reference

Walton’s Treat

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Tucked away around the back of Oxford’s Walton Street is the delightful Art Jericho gallery where a visual treat awaits the curious trek-cyclist, art-lover, flâneur, passer-by or Port Meadow pilgrim. An exhibition by Andrew Walton celebrating the Thames riverside from Jericho to Wolvercote. Continue reading “Walton’s Treat”

Frames of reference

Ground Work

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An exhibition of paintings by Andrew Walton and poems by David Attwooll, presented by Jenny Blyth Fine Art at Art Jericho, 6 King Street, Oxford, OX2 6DF from 23 January until 23 February 2014.

GROUND WORK is the product of twelve monthly walks through the course of a year on Port Meadow and Wolvercote Common, an area of uncultivated floodplain that lies between the city of Oxford and the Thames. Continue reading “Ground Work”

Frames of reference

Palettes

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Andrew Walton kicked it off: Dear Chris, I thought you might like this palette. I came across it in my shed. I had half cleaned it some time ago and left it as it looked so nice. I have always liked the working stuff which artists use. Turner’s paint box etc. I might think of a blog posting on this, what do you think? Each of your Rowley artists could send in a photo of their paint boxes and palettes! Continue reading “Palettes”

Frames of reference