Memories of summer under the beeches… these trees line the side of a minor road that snakes up Nuthanger Down. We’re looking at them from the side that the road is on; on the other side, there is a steep, grassy slope down to the valley floor. The hanger proper looms on the other side of the road but the trees on the side of the drop are, generally, larger and more mature than most of the hanger trees. I’m not entirely sure why this should be, but it may be related to access to sunlight. A beech canopy tends to create a lot of shade – very little can grow under it. While beech saplings do survive in shade, they don’t object to sunshine and I’m sure that a beech in a sunny aspect will grow quicker than one shaded by its parent.
There certainly isnt much vegetation under any of these trees. There is a wide embankment, topped with a wire fence, between the road and the drop, with plenty of room for a pedestrian. As you walk, the layers and layers of discarded red-brown beech leaves rustle and shift softly underfoot, punctuated with the occaisional >crack< of a stick breaking. The sun shines hot on the green valley below but it’s refreshingly cool here.
I used coloured pigment inks with watercolour (for a greater range of colour and increased subtlety) on hot press (smooth) watercolour paper. The title, Driftwood, is partly a pun on the homophones beech and beach, partly a reference to the fallen branches floating on the sea of leaves, and most importantly, an indication of the dreamlike state that these trees, and others like them, seem to engender.
Driftwood, ink with watercolour on paper, 50 x 70 cm
Framed size 59 x 79 cm. Float-framed in dark grey wood with perspex glazing.
