How I made my painting of the shipping forecast
Read moreDiscover how I made my painting of the UK shipping forecast, ‘Attention All Shipping’ in this blog which includes lots of photos of the work in progress.
Shipping forecast wins award!
Read moreTo my utter surprise and delight, my shipping forecast painting, ‘Attention All Shipping’ has won a British Cartographic Society award!
The Eynsham tea towel
Read moreA 100% cotton souvenir tea towel of Eynsham, a beautiful village in west Oxfordshire, designed in Eynsham and made in Britain.
The death of Jane Digby – 11 August 1881
Read moreHere’s a bodice-ripping love story of sex and adventure: the story of Jane Elizabeth Digby, Lady Ellenborough. She died on this day 1881. I celebrate her as a woman who did her own thing, when doing one’s own thing was very much not what women did. During the course of her lifetime, today’s average British woman will have sexual contact
The death of Frida Kahlo – 13 July 1954
Read more“They thought I was a Surrealist, but I wasn’t. I never painted dreams. I painted my own reality.”
Artist Frida Kahlo was born in 1907, the daughter of Hungarian Jewish father and indigenous Mexican mother….
Scilly Automatic
Read moreWhere is Scilly Automatic? In June we had a lovely holiday in the Isles of Scilly. You can read about the trip in ‘The Isles of Scilly‘ blog, but while we were there enjoying the peace and the nature, Jane had a special project on the go. Having painted her map of the Shipping Forecast ‘Attention all shipping’ last year,
Speaking at the Charlbury Beer Festival
Read moreJane astonishes herself by speaking in public! Last weekend Jane appeared as a guest speaker at the wonderful Charlbury Beer Festival in their Culture Club tent, as part of ‘a programme of mind-expanding talks’. Her subject was ‘Maps, Shakespeare and me’ to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, and the completion of her maps and paintings of Shakespeare.
The Isles of Scilly
Read moreIn June we took the 20 minute flight from Land’s End to the Isles of Scilly. Ever since visiting as a 13-year old, Jane has seen the islands as a little slice of paradise, just 28 miles from mainland Britain.
Constellations of the Northern sky
Read moreRead about Jane’s painting ‘Heavens Above’ a map painted in watercolour of the constellations of the Northern sky.
The Shakespeare triptych
Read moreThree paintings in praise of Shakespeare: 1 a map of Europe with the plays shown in their approximate location, 2. the British plays, and 3 the Italian plays.
The death of Mary Leakey – 9 December 1996
Read moreNo matter who we are and what we think, the beautiful truth is that we are all children of Africa. It was in no small part the painstaking work of Mary Leakey that revealed this. For more than 50 years under hot African skies, archaeologist Mary grubbed around in the earth searching doggedly for clues that would reveal the truth
All the plays of Shakespeare
Read moreA painting of all the plays of Shakespeare as a map with the plays shown in their approximate location.
The death of Alfred Russel Wallace – 7 November 1913
Read moreHow and why do species change? Why do some occur in some places, but not in others? Why do they die out? These big questions didn’t scare intrepid British explorer, biologist and geographer Alfred Russel Wallace, who died on this aged 90. He wanted answers. Wallace’s achievements have since been obscured by those of Charles Darwin. But be in no
The death of Dr Jane Elizabeth Hodgson – 23 October 2006
Read moreThere are many reasons why a pregnancy may be unwanted. A woman may have no access to contraception or already have too many mouths to feed. It may endanger her health, even her life. She may have been raped. The foetus may not be viable. No matter what the circumstances, the decision to terminate a pregnancy is one of the
Amelia Earhart disappears – 2 July 1937
Read more“…first lady of the skies, she had no guy holding her down, no one could clip her wings, she was no bird in the hand, she is no living thing now…” from the poem ‘Amelia Earhart’ by Patti Smith When 10-year-old Amelia Earhart saw an aircraft for the first time at the 1907 the Iowa State Fair, she wasn’t impressed.
Guernica – 26 April 1937
Read moreOn 26 April 1937, it was market day in Guernica, a small town in northern Spain considered to be the spiritual capital of Basque culture. In late afternoon, without warning or provocation, Luftwaffe aircraft swooped down over Guernica. Wave after wave bombarded the town with huge bombs and more than 3,000 incendiaries.