96 weeks to go before I cycle around the world

Still looking for a publisher for my paintings but hoping to exhibit soon.
Almost finished slating the roof of the new extension, we're hoping to rent the house out next year so that we can save more money and get rid of things we don't need...I can feel a big car boot coming on. There's not much that I want to keep apart from my hundreds of paintings.

97 WEEKS TO GO

Application came out of the blue from Bondi beach in Australia, asking me if I want to enter the painting competition...so all I need to do now is send a cd with images and some cash.

98 WEEKS TO GO BEFORE CYCLING AROUND THE WORLD

To get around the world I'll need some money. There will be some money for a rainy day but I need to work. I want to work and feel that working will give me a better feeling of the places I visit.
I also want make some money from painting.

My intention is to complete a sketch or painting for every week of the countdown, illustrating aspects of the planning and also how I feel about the way things are going...the fact that I'm counting down already annoys me slightly, it's like wishing life away, which is not the best way to work positively.

I've also contacted various publishers of greetings cards to try and raise some sort of income from my back catalogue of paintings
(take a look at this link http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidjfrench/ )

We're also looking at various websites that cater for people looking for work in return for a food and lodge. Any sort of building work would suit me, but it would be interesting to get involved with eco or work of some architectural importance.

100 WEEKS TO GO BEORE CYCLING AROUND THE WORLD

The 100 week plan has started. I've started this blog to log my plans and to get in the habit of writing a diary, so that I'll continue doing it whilst traveling around the world.

I'm a couple of weeks late in starting it but we intend to set off on the 30th o June 2013.

I have travelled extensively over the past two years, gathering images of towns, landscape and people, going about their day to day lives. Recreating the atmosphere through the use of light, colour and movement. Recently I have found that paying more attention to detail gives the viewer a central focus allowing me to draw them in.

I am constantly developing my style and painting skills to achieve the ultimate in communicating experience and ideas. Working with AIM has helped me to develop my awareness of local issues and the place of the artist within the community. Focusing on a theme and developing the ideas with the other members of the group has enabled me to move forward with certain aspects of my painting. I have recently turned my attention to painting people in everyday situations and also portraits. This has helped to develop my eye for detail and how to capture the personality of the sitter.




Morecambe has changed beyond recognition to those of us who have always lived here. The community has suffered from the down turn in the tourism industry and the bay has changed greatly due to the new sea defenses.


I’ve depicted the place as I perceive it to have changed, over the past thirty years. The decline crept in over a period of fifteen years. Holiday flats became bedsits for the Heysham Power Station workers during its construction. This relatively prosperous time took the focus away from the future of tourism and as a result the bedsits slowly filled up with the migrant unemployed, some of them being bussed in by desperate landlords. The place has become a trap for those living there, no work, poor housing and no hope of escaping. This has led me to associate it with a kind of open prison or rehab centre for those who have hit a low in their lives. Morecambe doesn’t offer any more than an opportunity to tread water for a while. This concentration of problems has led to tragedy in the bay. Things need to change, demolition and deconstruction is the answer. The authorities have recently come to realize this… only twenty years too late!