Richard Baker

Thank you Sean!

An oil painting with pelargoniums and a wooden lizard

Another still life, this time featuring pelargoniums, a wooden lizard and a wooden bird with a long beak, poppy seedheads and autumn colours in the leaves outside the studio window. That old earthenware pot with twisty handles is a favourite. Oil on gessoed board, 2019.
#oilpainting #stilllife

A thick build-up of paint sometimes applied with a palette knife (but I don't do that - I just use brushes)

Very nice work Harvey! Good to have a theme. Looks like you have some lovely locations to inspire your painting.

Still life drawing of flowers and an African carving

Still life drawing of flowers and an African carving

This flower still life includes my favourite African bust (bought years ago from an antiques fair). They had two and I wish I'd bought the other one. It has superb artistry and I can't do it justice. The hanging spoon in the background is really rough-hewn. I love that too. #stilllife #flowers

An oil on canvas painted in my garden 2021

My garden, oil on canvas 2021, found a buyer at a Cambridge Drawing Society exhibition
#oilpainting #patioflowers

A Sunday morning In Eastney, Portsmouth. It is the view from Ferry Road to Lock Lake with a fella and his Jack Russell dog. it stretched on his lead to partake in the rarefied feast of an abandoned KFC box. He never did quite make it.

Great painting! I used to know this area well but haven't visited for ages.

Yes! You can see the splodge of blue beside the telegraph pole (I mentioned it in the alt text). The beer there used to be very special! Haven't been for a long while.

I have to say that the ancient village of Trumpington has nothing to do with the tangerine-faced felon who is temporarily using the White House as a crime den. Last time I mentioned it there was literally an outpouring of protest!

I think this old watercolour of Grantchester sold but I don't remember to whom. You can see that the cars parked along the road include an orange Citroen 2CV. Also more or less central there's a blue blob beside the telegraph pole and that is the pub sign for the Blue Ball, a wonderful pub that we frequently walked to and headed unsteadily home after a few pints.

A happy reminiscence this dashed off #watercolour of #Grantchester. This was before our son was born and we were living a short bike ride away in Trumpington. It must be autumn and I remember finding a spot among the cowpats to sit down with my watercolours (see alt text)

Artificial intelligence won't repair declining human intelligence.

A heavily worked oil painting still life on gessoed board. The ceramic owl on the windowsill and the African carved bust on the right have both appeared in various paintings and drawings.

Still life in oil sold at a Cambridge Drawing Society exhibition in 2020. This one shows quite a bit of impasto built up during the process of composition.
#stilllife #roses #studio

I'm glad I never bothered with TikTok (I installed it briefly a couple of years ago and quickly decided to get rid of it).

Can't any contractors considering taking on this job be told that Trump never pays his bills and that it's illegal to demolish this building and that they'll be arrested when the regime collapses?

Yes, I have painted views in Ely. I'll have a look for an example. Here's an old one, painted on location (on a non-market day). There are quite a few others. I'll probably do more because I no longer have a car and I can get to Ely easily by train.

Alas, no, I'm a low energy old person who needs to concentrate on doing some more artwork on my own not engaging with a team of studio assistants. There's precious little time left after I've spent most of the day on Bluesky!

The barbers in the lively and multicultural road nearby where I live advertise eyebrow weaving. I'm sure they'd tackle nose hair too!

An interesting suggestion! There's not much room even for me in my little studio and art income is tiny so funds for staff are non-existent!

Cambridge has been an important trading hub for centuries but wasn't made a city until 1951. Having a cathedral used to be a requirement for city status (until the 19th century). The two Cambridge deaneries fall under the diocese of Ely. It's so complicated! "All Gas and Gaiters" comes to mind.

Flickr is a good place though it's a bit of a jumble over there. You'll find a lot of my work sorted into albums www.flickr.com/people/baker...

This was a lovely place to paint and I've been there a couple of times and also painted the nearby mill pond several times. The Old Vicarage garden is known for its beauty and the current owner Lord Archer has added many features. Unlike many of my sold paintings I know the person who bought this one very well.

Watercolour drawing done at the Old Vicarage, Grantchester in summer 2019 and sold later. Rupert Brooke lived there for a while in 1909 but wrote his most famous nostalgic poem about this place later in 1912 when in Germany.
#watercolour #Grantchester #OldVicarage

Thank you LeeAnn. I looked up pan pastels: interesting and I'm sure you'll get some good results. Pastels (the stick kind) have always been one of my main mediums. I'll be using them less in future though because I'm getting too old to handle large sheets of glass when framing.

Ely Cathedral from on high. My photos from July 2008

Ely Cathedral from on high. My photos from July 2008

Ely Cathedral from on high. My photos from July 2008

Ely Cathedral from on high. My photos from July 2008

I used to be one of the organisers of a degree ceremony there that required lots of visits, access to non-public areas and a climb up to the top of the Octagon so I got to know it well. A memorable experience (my photos). I was well-acquainted with Winchester Cathedral decades ago. #elycathedral

Not just national criticism but international horror. I certainly felt it.

Ely Cathedral from on high. My photos from July 2008

Ely Cathedral from on high. My photos from July 2008

Ely Cathedral from on high. My photos from July 2008

Ely Cathedral from on high. My photos from July 2008

I used to be one of the organisers of a degree ceremony there that required lots of visits, access to non-public areas and a climb up to the top of the Octagon so I got to know it well. A memorable experience (my photos). I was well-acquainted with Winchester Cathedral decades ago. #elycathedral

Thank you taylordauthor!

Thank you!

Here's another from this series (I think this was sold in Japan by a gallery owner who took several of my paintings back with her from her visits to Cambridge. #helebores #watercolour

Can they fix it? Hardly likely as Reform is filling itself up with the rejected politicians who over 13 years of misrule caused all the problems. They must be relying on voters with short memories.