Route 66 Exhibition opens 22 November, 6.30-7.30, at Light House, Wolverhampton

Simon and I had a photo shoot in the park in Wolverhampton. The sun came out but it was freezing cold. We rode around in this fabulous car












for a while afterwards. Great experience!

It's not long until the opening of the exhibition. We are booked to speak on the radio on Thursday.

The whole Route 66 project has been fun and joining together with photographer Simon Larson, to have this exhibition has proved to be a good idea.

I'm amazed at the number of people who seem to be interested in Route 66.. We'll get a better idea at the opening of the exhibition, of course, but I think it will be well attended.

Finishing off my evaluation

I've been adding things to my Arts Council evaluation - it's just about ready to be sent off.

Also thinking of another project I'm working on - Poetry with Punch - a collaboration with Emma Purshouse who's written an amazing contmporary, poetry play with characters that link to the traditional Punch and Judy show. I watched a run through last week. Great performance: dialogue, puppet booth, puppets... it's going to go down well when it goes live.

Back to the studio to do some drawing.

August

The warm, sunny weather on Monday tempted me outside to make some large charcoal drawings in an artist friend's garden. I haven't used charcoal for a few months and I enjoyed drawing the structural plants and sculpture outdoors.

Returning to Route 66 work, I started re-sizing photo files ready to have them printed in lightfast ink for November's exhibition. Simon and I met about 10 days ago and selected the images that we'll use. It's boring work re-sizing files but listening to music has helped. I discovered "Loney, dear" this week - good despite the strangely punctuated name.

I still need to re-print the 3 plate photopolymer gravure of the old petrol station- it's exacting work and these photoplate are very sensitive and easy to mess up. The colour mixing is tricky too as you need to allow for the changes of colour due to overprinting. I don't think I'll be able to do this 'till the weekend.

I've added to the Arts Council Evaluation and I'm easily on schedule to hand it in by the end of August. I had considered printing out the blog to add as an appendix, but that's going to be too many pages do I'll have to select some.

Change of routine this week

It's been strange this week changing my routine from spending each day in my studio printing and re-printing and then working on Photoshop selecting, adjusting, cropping... my photographs of Route 66 trying to decide which ones to include in the November exhibition.

I have so much to write in my evaluation for the Arts Council - it's going to take a long time.

However, it's been good to see staff, students and the work they have produced at College while I've been away.

Selecting photographs and printing

I've been reviewing and selecting photos for an exhibition entitled "Route 66 and Beyond" to be held at Light House Media Centre, Wolverhampton, West Midlands. It opens on Thursday 22 November, which seems a long way off at the moment but will probably arrive much quicker than I'd like.


Printmaking has also been occupying a large amount of my time. I've been printing some of the photopolymer gravure plates of Route 66 images and also trying out some in monoprinting.

The artichoke plants, tree peony and other structural plants outside the studio have also been demanding my attention and I've been drawing them and trying out different ways of making prints of them.

Some photos from Santa Rosa (NM), Williams, Kingman, Gallup

Over the Sitgreaves Pass - Arizona (a route avoided by the new interstate highway)

Cool Springs Camp, located in the Black Mountains on the approach to Sitgreaves pass in 1927. The original buildings were constructed out of stones gathered along the highway. In the 1930s the chicken dinners attracted tourists and locals for 20 miles. In the 1950s when traffic moved to the new Interstate the traffic crawled to a halt. Cool Springs has only recently been opened again!

Very few cars travel past Ed's Camp these days.

Ed's Camp is located at the approach to Sitgreaves Pass from the east, one of the most feared and dreaded sections on all of Route 66. Lowell "Ed" Edgerton purchased the property in the late 1930s hoping to lure the increasing number of tourists to buy from his grocery store, gas station or souvenir shop. There was a trailer camp but motorists would pull in and sleep in their cars or tents. For $1 they could sleep on a camp bed (Am. cot) on a porch which was screened to keep insects out. Water was sold by the bucket. (R Olsen's book Route 66 Lost and Found)

You can see why this route was avoided - zig zag bends and increasing gradients through a desert landscape.