Cahors

I went to shop in Cahors early one morning. A student demonstration was planned for that afternoon and I knew the place would get busy. As it was I had the space and time to take a number of photographs but it was only this one that interested me.

Autumn

It's Autumn and the colours around me are breathtaking but still I'm obsessed with taking photographs of the sky. The fields which were covered with sunflowers in July are now reduced to stubble. The colours are muted and streaked with black. The trees and bushes lining the roads are extraordinary in contrast. Pinks and reds, bright blue berries, all shades of yellow and dashes of orange. I am frustrated because my paints are packed away and all I can do is store these images in my head and hope to carry them with me back to Wales. I've tried taking photographs but I just can't seem to capture the vibrancy of the landscape on film.

New paintings

After the Rain.

Summer Breeze.

Walking on Sunshine

Reasons to be Cheerful.

Lazy Afternoon.




I have completed six paintings in the four months I have been here. A lot of time went into each canvas and that in itself is very satisfying. When I look at them hanging on the wall now I can remember the events of the summer and enjoy the memories they evoke.
By the time I leave in November they will be dry and ready for framing.
Now my paints are packed up and I've moved the studio table onto the terrace so that on the sunny days I can breakfast outside for the remainder of my time here.

Yesterday evening.

Yesterday I wanted to capture something of the evening just outside my window. It will remind me, when I leave here, of the changing colours of the leaves and the blue sky above the roof of the house. The colours are there in my paintings but back in Wales in the depths of winter I need to know that here, in October, the sky really was that colour.

I have learned a new word -autan - it's the wind that blows around the house hurling pots from terraces. It's a hot wind and this is the strangeness of it. I expect any minute to see a sand storm!