A spring in my step

The bluebells are beginning to flower, which means my spring delirium will soon be in full flood and it's time to catch up on how early spring played out in my Bristol haunts.

Actually, Cwtch the Collie was unimpressed with our first bluebell. The initial signs are pleasing, though. This was Badock's Wood this morning.

And not just bluebells, obviously. 

Mill Tut round barrow

The River Trym

And here it is a couple of weeks ago, when the blackthorns were out in force.

Of course, not all our walks have been sunny. There was an atmospheric walk around the floating harbour early one grey morning ... 

... and another down Boiling Wells Lane and up onto Narroways, while I was waiting for new tyres to be fitted on my car ...

... but on the whole, March was definitely more a lamb than a lion. Here are some more of the flowers that are popping out all over.

white violets; alexanders; alkanet and larch buds; dog's mercury; scilla; blackthorn; celandines; comfrey; speedwell; wild strawberry; fumitory; lady's smock (cuckoo flower); pussy willow; wood anemone; honesty; yellow archangel; wild garlic; greater stitchwort; violets; herb Robert; dead nettles; lungwort  

Cwtch in the primroses

The Trym meets its main tributary, the Hazel Brook, downstream on the Blaise estate. I don't go down there that much, on account of all the well-heeled locals clattering past with their walking poles, pretending to be in the Alps, but I did nip down to the Henbury village end and wandered along the banks of the brook to Bradford Mill.

I also hobnobbed with two of my favourite trees in the open space above the valley:

oak

veteran sweet chestnut

On the other side of the Hazel Brook, blackthorn on Castle Hill. I love this spot in the early spring ...

... and also the area between the two hill forts on Castle Hill and Kings Weston Down, that always feels to me like a place where time is wonky and ghosts are on the move.

 

There was plenty of blackthorn out at Winterbourne too, when Cwtch and I went for one of our favourite walks out by St Michael's Church and Monks Pool and Bradley Brook nature reserves ...

Monks Pool nature reserve

Bradley Brook Nature Reserve

... though just the general viridification of everything is exciting enough.

The River Frome at Snuff Mills ... 

... Wickham Glen ...

... and Purdown

With the earth becoming less slippery, it's easier to scramble about on the look-out for bits of pottery. 

In one of the lanes leading down to Wickham Glen, some of the above sherds had been dug up by a fox ... 

 and at Purdown I came across lots of bottles outside a den on an old dump.

With the demise of all the scarlet elf cups, there isn't much fungi in evidence:

On the other hand, the local birds are now at their busiest and much in evidence, particularly the wrens. I managed only a few poor photos of a crow, ring-necked parakeet, and the kingfisher we often see down on the stretch of the River Frome between Eastville Park Lake and Wickham Glen.

There was also a magical afternoon when the wood was filled with jays, their wings catching the spring sunlight.

I found a rather tatty, bedraggled tawny owl feather, which is a very early outlier of the moulting season.

We even saw a rabbit up on Purdown, which ran into a thicket of brambles when it noticed Cwtch. 

Each morning in spring

I conduct with a baton

my dog's Ode to Joy

Gwen John: Strange Beauties

Time for another jaunt, this time by train to Cardiff's National Gallery with my friend Cathy, to see the exhibition of art by one of my favourite painters, Gwen John.

First thing we saw upon entering the Gallery was Bristol-based artist, Luke Jerram's 'Museum of the Moon', which we both found a bit underwhelming, though interestingly, it looks far more impressive in photos than in real life. 

It's decades since I first encountered Gwen John. At that time, her brother, Augustus, was the more famous sibling, and I particularly liked his famous portrait of a very young Dylan Thomas, but I was soon drawn more to Gwen's portraits of women who gazed directly out of the canvas - or sat with their backs to it - and her repeated paintings of a sunlit attic room, furnished with a chair and a book. I dreamed of having a space to myself like that.

Self-Portrait, c1902

Self-Portrait, 1905

Self-Portait, Nude, Sketching (1908 - 1909)

La Chambre sur la Cour, 1904 - 1907

A Corner of the Artist's Room in Paris, 1907

A Lady Reading, 1910

To his credit, Augustus was also aware of her genius, declaring 'Fifty years after my death, I shall be remembered as Gwen John's brother'.

                            

Portrait Group, 1897

In the above watercolour, Winifred John, Gwen's sister, is seated at the table in white; Augustus John is the figure wearing the hat; the artist is the woman visible through the window.

'Gwen, the Artist's sister' by Augustus John

Gwen was born in Haverfordwest in Pembrokeshire in 1876, moving at the age of 8 to Tenby, following her mother's death.

Landscape of Tenby with figures, 1896-97

In 1895, she left Wales to study at the Slade School of Art in London, never to return, and by 1904 she was settled in Paris, working as an artist and an artist's model. Before long she was modelling for Auguste Rodin, and in a relationship with him.

Head of Gwen John, by Auguste Rodin

This is the famous association everyone remembers, but John had intense, intimate relationships with men and women throughout her life. She acquired her first cat in 1904 and named her Edgar Quinet, after the street she was living in. Around 1913, she entered the Catholic Church. She lived her life on her own terms.

Study after 'Spirit of Eternal Repose', 1905

I have to say, I had hoped the exhibition might have been rather more extensive than it is, though the artworks the museum assembled to exhibit were thoughtfully displayed. For instance, I loved seeing five of the ten versions of 'The Convalescent' John is known to have painted between 1918 and 1924 side-by-side ... 

... and also certain paintings displayed above their studies:

  

Girl with Bare Shoulders and Nude Girl, both 1910 

It's been many years since I read Sue Roe's biography, Gwen John A Life. Time I think, to read Alice Foster's Gwen John: Art and Life in London and Paris (2023).