Moleskine - Van Gogh, Picasso and me

So I am in legendary company, as the leaflet inside each Moleskine sketchbook reminds me.

Over the years I have used many sketch books, in all sizes and shapes. Given a choice, I have a preference for paper with a bit of "tooth" but in truth will draw in whatever comes to hand, just to get an idea or observation down. I have a collection of half-filled and empty sketchbooks in various formats which I choose from, like trying on different shirts before going out.

On a recent trip to Lyon in France, I opted, for the very first time to go for one of the Moleskines, in the format a bit narrower than A5, and slipped it into my bags with a couple of drawing pens and 4B pencils in my plastic Muji pencil case. On my way down the A6 autoroute I stopped for lunch in an "aire de repos", motorway services which are really just picnic areas with toilets. They can be quite picturesque settings with tables scattered in the shade of woodland trees, sometimes with stunning views and very tranquil - a welcome respite on the long drive down from Le Havre.

The one at Parc Thiery didn't disappoint. And it was there that I pulled out the Moleskine and start sketching. The paper is thick, very smooth and creamy coloured, almost yellowish. But best of all, I found that, because of the way the paper is sewn in, you can open the double page up and it will lie flat. So you can draw on a page 10 by 8 in. (260 by 205 in mm.). It was a busy stay in Lyon and I didn't get a chance to do as much drawing as I would have liked but I did get the chance to take advantage of the Moleskine's double-page spread while sketching a puppeteer in the Place du Change with an audience of bystanders watching on.

Whilst in Lyon I also came across Lyra Aquabrush pens which have two ends. One is a very fine drawing pen and the other behaves like a brush allowing you to vary the weight of the line and create very gestural marks. And they work great on the Moleskine sketch-book paper. On my return to the UK I found that they were readily available here too on the internet but I had never seen them before.

So when I decided to do some sketches of the performers at the Marlborough Jazz Festival in early July I took a couple of the Lyra brush pens with me alongside the 4B's. The jazz festival was very lively at most venues and it wasn't always the easiest environment to draw in but I found the Moleskine's hard cover allowed me to draw using the two page format even when standing jammed in a corner. I am particularly pleased with the use of the Lyra pens which I feel helped to capture the movement of the performers and the energy of the music. For me, the ones of the Dutch College Swing Band were particularly successful in capturing the enthusiasm of the musicians which belied their age and appearance. They wore grey pin-stripe suits, like bank managers, but with bright red ties!

I have posted some of the sketches from Moleskine Sketchbook 2009/1 and the ones of the Jazz Festival up on Flickr if you want to take a look. My Moleskine has definitely become my sketch book of choice when out and about and I plan to continue to add to my Flickr library from time to time. You can bookmark my photostream or sign up for the RSS feed on Flickr if you want to keep up with what I've been up to.

RA Summer Exhibition - an artist's view

The Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition runs until 16th August 2009. It's a bit like the FA Cup for the art world where the work of the "journeymen" of the art world can rub shoulders with that of UK and international stars like Damien Hirst, Sir Anthony Caro, Frank Stella and Cy Twombly.

And to pursue my footballing analogy a little further, the minnows are often blown away by the scale, ambition and sheer class of the Premiership players. But sometimes there are bravura performances by the lesser known participants whose work stands up well in this august company. So, here are my own personal selection of pieces which caught my eye, and I hope might catch yours on your own visit.

The first is 26 Enchanteresse by Allen Jones RA, the sculptor and painter. A half-life size bronze female figure standing on a stainless steel plinth, her body is painted to look as if she were wearing a green skin tight body suit. Very much in the style of his sensual mannekin figures, this sculpture greets you in Room I as you enter the exhibition.

There are two large woodcut prints by Katsutoshi Yuasa, 79 28 and 85 Echoes, which stood out for me in the Large Weston Room. Both are large in scale but have a delicate quality about them which give them the air of a faded photographic image, or memory. On the adjacent wall hang the etchings of academician, Norman Ackroyd; 112 Sybil Head - Co Kerry, 113 The Cliffs of Moher and 114 From Sutton Bank - Vale of York. His etchings always have a wonderfully moody quality about them.

The Small Weston Room defeated me as usual. Every square inch is covered virtually from floor to ceiling and my eyesight just isn't up to working out what is going on in these small paintings as I crane my neck heavenwards. Terribly popular with the public, looking for affordable purchases and able to put up the cramped viewing space, I lasted only a few minutes on a hot and humid June day. But during that time I did hover, perhaps predictably being a sculptor myself, over James Butler RA 's relief bronze 438 Portrait of a Girl Sitting in a Chair.

Very different to this traditional form and medium are two sculptures by Yoshimi Kihara, intriguingly made of folded newspaper; 680 Transmission .F in Room IV and 982 T. Circle in Room VII.

Room V offered a big, bold, dramatic, conte drawing by Jeanette Barnes, 753 Sheikh Zayed Road, Dubai, which buzzed with the energy and activity of the construction activity captured in the drawing. This room also contains my own choice for "best in show", the sculpture, 766 Deep Red Line by Jay Battle. A pure white, simple egg-like organic form in alabaster it is incised with geometric lines of red pigment, capturing my attention with it's originality and simplicity.

That leads into the Will Alsop curated Room VI, for the architecture exhibits. Will Alsop has had the room painted black to show the architectural models, amongst which he has also included some small sculptures, to best effect. A great innovation, my only complaint might be that some of the exhibits were exhibited too high to be seen properly and that there were perhaps just too many exhibits for the space. Highlights for me were: 780 L'Ex Monastero by Lidia Palumbi, 811 Embodied Contours by Ben Cowd and Tobias Klein, Renzo Piano's study model for the roof of California Academy of Sciences 842, Sir Nicholas Grimshaw's models for the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Centre in Troy New York 839 and 928 Remodulated Environment by Alexander Mills. All in all, I found this room to be the most stimulating and refreshing in the whole exhibition and well worth visiting for this alone.

Julian Opie had an interesting computer animation, 1073 View from my Kitchen Window in Room IX, which perhaps signals some possibilities in digital art but for my last two recommendations I return to more traditional media. The Lecture Room contains the well over life-size, disturbing sculpture in carved limewood by Michael Sandle RA, 1200 Iraq, The Sound of your Silence and an oil painting in the classical tradition of some engimatic monkish heads in white hoods all facing an unseen focus off, 1119 Silent Reflection, by George Underwood.

The Summer Exhibition offers something for everyone amongst its 1200+ exhibits and I am sure I missed some great work but I content myself with having having the opportunity to have seen the gems above. I hope you will be intrigued enough to seek them out on your own visit and I am sure you will find others.