'This Country'

Old Tracks and Blue Bridges are the old railway tracks converted into cycle paths that run up and down from urban to rural landscapes. It is all part of my experience of coming to 'This Country', Germany. I left the little rainy Devon town, Ashburton by the Moor four months ago. An old and dear friend brought me and all my pruned essentials in a rented Mercedes Van. After 24 hours we got to Hamburg. Crossing the ocean was a good way to stretch my goodbyes. The luminous sunset arrived and gazing at the churning sea frothed up memories, some good, some sehr schlecht! There were last minute calls from friends as the ferry steamed away and then just the white trail we left in perspective lines as we chugged into the night.

With a small amount of savings I was leaving England to be with my Löve, Conny. Secondly I came to paint and write and get healthy again after my experiences of being a Social Worker for the last ten years. Originally I had trained as an Artist. I came with an agenda, settle with Conny, learn German, get fit and start painting as soon as the inspiration got me fired up. I started with writing, writing about this place, this country. It's similarities and it's differences. Little things like the different cooking smells, the bigger space between houses and land and people. The cute little individual duvets for couples in a double bed, pathways for bikes on every road (watch out for series cyclists), series dunkel bread, parking on the pavement. I neglected the tourist options for the sea of details that glittered every day in this most ordinary of lifes treasures. As for the German people, they seem most like the English than any other Europeans, well, that is how it seems to me. If the English are a nation of shop keepers then the germans are shop keepers with a BMW in the garage. I found the people I met really curious and willing to speak English with me. Quite quickly I began to feel at home, home in my inner world. I  rediscovered the  neglected places of my imagination and inspiration I had not felt for a while. Now it only remained  to find a way to  bring these inner qualities out into the open, into painting.

Cycling along the Tree paths to my German lessons by the river Elbe began the process of imagined paintings. I was cycling about a hundred kls a week. I soon got fit. It was July. On my bike I felt like a child again, free. It was a hot summer I can hardly remember now. Then Atumn and Winter came. But, it was Autumn that really got me inspired to start painting from what I had seen on my way to the Elbe! The wild life too showed itself greatly on every journey I made  along the cathedral of trees and burning leaves. Wild deer came from no where, suddenly spooked onto the path, lumbering and clumbsy, awkward like a big fish out of water. Red, brown and bosky! Gentlemen Herons suddenly rising up into the sky making a terrible noise. Eagles (Yes Eagles) circling the tops of trees and Red Squirells or slender Weasels slipping, ticking  past the rubber tyres of to my bike, suddenly, then gone! And then the pungent smells of cider from the sweet rotting apples and plums and the finally the Elbe, wide and green in the Summer wind!

So, the results of all this is a series of paintings I called, 'This Country' from Old Tracks and Blue Bridges that I cycled along so much through the Summer and Autumn and now less and less as Winter sets in and everything starts hurtling towards Christmas. That is something they are really good at here, Christmas. There are Christmas Markets, Rum Glüwein and potato pancakes, Advent chains and beautiful Advent candles and decorations! All this can be seen on this site I have prepared, johnarts.jimdo.com as a special treat for Christmas, enjoy! Have a very Merry Christmas.

John bram Leigh