To paint… to travel… to combine the two… is to celebrate life. Jack R. Brouwer
“A traveller without observation is a bird without wings.” — Moslih Eddin Saadi
When travelling the long distances across South Africa, it is advisable, as a passenger, to have an entertaining pastime. For some reading, napping or listening to the radio helps while-away the hours. For me the most appealing options are; photographing the passing landscape or sketching it, depending on whether it is a small country road or a main highway. The highway is usually smooth and therefore I choose to sketch, while the small roads are too uneven for painting, so I photograph interesting scenery as we speed past.
Occasionally we have to turn around and return for some better shots of particularly inspiring scenes. On this last trip to Johannesburg last week; we took an alternative route up and therefore found several reasons to turn around: a suburban dam beside the gold mining town of Odendaalsrus with hundreds of feeding flamingoes; a little donkey cart loaded with passengers, on the road from Klerksdorp to Ventersdorp; a colourful cottage with an old grandmother and a toddler sunning themselves on the front steps; and a gravel driveway with some lovely old trees.
On our return from this particular trip to Johannesburg to visit our son, John; I realized that I was missing some interesting scenes as we sped by at 120 kms an hour on the main freeway. Usually much of the sketch is completed from memory, when it has passed us by at high speed, but I decided to photograph the good scenes, and finish the sketch from the viewer on my camera. This has made it possible to include more detail than would be possible from memory alone. (more…)