Anyway, the weather deterred me from my usual trips to the chalk downs, but not from visiting Bath. The Victoria Art Gallery had a Bath and GWR exhibition on - more fascinating for local history than artistically stimulating, but that's ok because it was fascinating - and I just made it to the Holburne Museum on my way home. It was always my intention to go - I wanted to see Simon Brett's exhibition of wood engravings. My ambivalence about wood engraving remains firmly in place and yet at the same time I always want to see what it is that I'm so unsure about. I suppose it's so akin to other relief techniques and I am after all primarily a linocut printmaker, that I can't resist. And mostly it's the images I often find uninspiring, many of the artists' frequently finicky approach. The level of skill, on the other hand, I cannot deny.
It was a lovely little exhibition. Some of the images I liked (landscape, trees, obviously story illustration, my usual sort of thing), some not so much, and I can always appreciate a display of tools of the trade.
As for my brave new year, um, I've decided it starts in February instead. I'm not surprised that January didn't work out, though I'm ashamed of just how much it didn't, but better late than never? Then there's a facebook page encouraging people to do a drawing for every day of February, 28 Drawings Later, and while I wouldn't commit to something I'm so unlikely to complete, I think I'll give it a go privately since drawing regularly is another of my never-realised good intentions. Who knows, I might even manage it - but I'd better get a move on or today will have turned into tomorrow before I pick up a piece of paper.