One Sketch #116) The Prince Regent

After Thomas Lawrence

A Prince he was
But when he had the chance
To be a husband too,
Well, he was pants.

I couldn’t resist this one. In another life, 11 years ago, I played in the UK’s highbrow quiz show “Mastermind”. If you’ve never seen it, the contestants – called contenders for the purposes of the show – nominate a specialist subject to be quizzed upon. Each in turn sits in a black interrogation chair for two minutes and tries to answer questions on their own subject. After each contender has done this, they return to the chair in turn for another two minutes to answer general knowledge questions. The contender who has answered the greatest number of questions correctly wins. Well, it’s a tiny bit more complicated than this, but that’s the gist. For my semi final appearance I chose “The Prince Regent – later King George IV” as a specialist subject. Today, 19^th July, is the 197^th anniversary of his coronation. 

George’s Coronation was one of the more eventful in British history. As Prince of Wales, George rightly had the reputation of a terrible spendthrift, gambler, womaniser and generally a drain on the country’s resources. It didn’t help that this was all happening at the same time as revolution in France. He did make an illegal marriage to the Catholic widow Maria Fitzherbert in the 1780s – a marriage invalid in British law due to the Royal Marriages Act. However in 1795 he was faced by an ultimatum from his father, the King, that he must make a suitable marriage to provide an heir in order for the King and Parliament to clear his debts. The Prince faced the selection of his bride from the suitable European protestant princesses, and remarkably he delegated the selection to his current mistress, the Countess of Jersey. She in turn selected probably the least appropriate person ever to be married to a man like George, his own first cousin, Caroline of Brunswick. 

Caroline’s mother was George III’s favourite sister. The younger George was not the least bit attracted to Caroline, probably, one would think, because she resembled him physically, being relatively short, overweight with a propensity to obesity, and possessed of the Hanoverian slightly bulging eyes. Reputedly he asked for a medicinal brandy immediately upon seeing her for the first time in the flesh. The plausible story is that he slept with her on their wedding night, and never again. Whether that is true or not, Caroline very quickly became pregnant with their only child, Princess Charlotte.

Very soon after the marriage and the birth of Princess Charlotte it was clear to all that they were leading separate lives, a fact which soon became official. George went so far as to accuse Caroline of giving birth to an illegitimate child. The subsequent enquiry seemed to disprove this, but it did establish that Caroline’s behaviour had become as wild and sexually indiscreet as her husband’s. King George III took over the care of Princess Charlotte. With access to her daughter severely restricted, the Prince of Wales also saw to it that Caroline was socially excluded. People who attended her parties could expect to never again be invited to the Prince’s far more lavish and prestigious entertainments.  Eventually the Foreign Secretary of the time, Lord Castlereagh offered Caroline an annual settlement in return for her leaving the country. Caroline moved to Italy, and never saw Charlotte, who died in childbirth in 1817, again. She only  learned of Charlotte’s death from a visiting courtier, since Prince George was determined not to tell her the news.

There was no question of getting a divorce while King George III was still alive, even though the Prince, who was Regent from 1811 until 1820, had effectively assumed all the duties of the King. When George III died though, George IV immediately set out to obtain a divorce from Caroline. Even for the King this was an exceptionally difficult thing to achieve, requiring an Act of Parliament. Caroline, pushing her luck, had returned to the UK on George III’s death, intent on being treated as the rightful queen. By the law and ancient custom of the land, Caroline had become Queen on George’s accession, and she was determined to assert her rights to the title’s privileges. Caroline proved immensely popular with the London masses, primarily one suspects because they thought that anyone so hated by the hated George IV was worth supporting, rather than through her own intrinsic qualities. Jane Austen herself said as much. This convinced George that he would fail to obtain his divorce through Parliament. 

George had his revenge, though. He declared that Caroline would be barred from his coronation, on 19^th July 1821. Caroline actually made several attempts to enter Westminster Abbey on the day, but each time she was turned away by guards and officials who had been specially posted on the King’s orders. Eventually she was forced to admit defeat. Almost as if she was acting according to a prearranged script, Caroline took ill that very night, and died within three weeks. As per her instructions she was buried in Brunswick, in a coffin with a simple inscription referring to her as “The Injured Queen of England”.

When you read about historical figures such as George and Caroline, it can be difficult to remember that these were real people, real human beings with real human feelings. It’s very easy to feel very sorry for Caroline, and she does deserve some sympathy, to an extent. Only to an extent, though. Caroline, once it became clear that her husband was no longer going to be a husband to her, didn’t shrink into the background and meekly accept her lot. She decided that what was sauce for the gander could be sauce for the goose as well, and this at a time when different moral standards were applied to the sexes. Yes, both a husband and wife if they were rich and privileged enough could choose to take a lover, but woe betide the lady who sought to flaunt this like a man could.

While on one hand I admire Caroline for going her own way and not just accepting the raw deal that this arranged marriage had offered her, I really rather think she made her own bed with her actions after George became King. We can’t really know Caroline’s feelings about her daughter Charlotte, and how badly she was affected by their separation and Charlotte’s tragic death. But after Charlotte died, in many ways the life Caroline had between 1817 and 1820 was rather enviable. She had been given a generous annuity. £35,000 a year is enough to live on now. Back in the 1800s it amounted to a fortune, and not a small one at that. In return all she was expected to do was stay out of the country, stay out of George’s life, and try not to embarrass herself or him too much. While one can understand that the realisation that she had now become Queen might have certainly made her think again about her situation, the idea that George would ever even accept her as Queen, let alone allow her to be crowned such is a display of hubris, or at the very least an inability to see things as they really were. She’d accepted Castlereagh’s deal in the first place, and breaking its terms in this way was never going to bring success. So I find it difficult to be sympathetic towards her in this last year of her life.

As for George, I find him a fascinating and very contradictory character. He was a wilful man for all of his life a man for whom his own ego and wants were his own little god. He was a persistent debtor, to whom the concept of living within one’s means was unknown. For example, he squandered huge amounts on his white elephant Royal Pavilion at Brighton, while people starved to death in different parts of the country. He was very vain, and sexually incontinent. Normal behaviour for the Prince would be at the very least described as sexual harassment in the present day and age. As the young Prince of Wales his behaviour during his father’s first bout of dementia in the 1780s was disgraceful. As a friend he could be extremely disloyal. Prior to becoming Regent his closest political friend was the radical MP Charles James Fox. Immediately on becoming Regent, George dropped Fox like a hot potato, and revealed his true, reactionary colours. As King his attitude to the relaxation of laws against Roman Catholics was particularly reprehensible. His attitude towards his wife, whom he viewed, at best, as a baby making machine, and whom he discarded as soon as she had fulfilled this function, is rightly condemned. 

And yet.

This is in no way an excuse for George’s faults, but the fact is that he did contribute to the lasting cultural heritage of the United Kingdom. For example, he had a large hand in the genesis of the institutions that became the British Museum, the British Library and the National Gallery. For such an infuriatingly self-centred and wilful person, he had great taste. Certainly in terms of art and literature, if not in architecture. Despite her personal antipathy towards him, Jane Austen still dedicated “Emma” to him, while Sir Walter Scott stage managed his triumphant visit to Scotland as King. Even in terms of architecture, while the Brighton Pavilion might not be everyone’s cup of tea (I personally love it) his patronage of John Nash resulted in the building of Regent Street, one of the most elegant streets in the whole of the capital.

One Sketch #115) John Wayne (Wednesday 18th July)

He had staying power
That's a fact
A constant superstar
(Who needs to act?)

You might be wondering why I painted John Wayne for Wednesday’s sketch. After all, he’s another movie icon, but I painted the first two – Laurel and Hardy, and Marilyn Monroe whole England were playing in the World Cup, but the World Cup is now well and truly over. Well, the fact is that I had cast around for suggestions whom I should paint should England reach the finals , and the Duke was a suggestion I really rather liked.

Which is odd. For I have never been anything that could even remotely be described as a fan. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that I hated John Wayne – I didn’t – but it’s a little complicated. 

It all stems from my father. A lot of blokes born in the 30s and 40s – my Dad was born in 1940 – loved Westerns as a genre, and John Wayne in particular. With my generation, it was different. For a lot of blokes who were born in the 1960s, I’d guess it was space stuff and science fiction. After all, I was 5 years old when Neil Armstrong stepped onto the surface of the Moon for the first time, and that made a huge impression on me. I was 12 or 13 when Star Wars hit the UK, and that also made a great impression. So I can understand the affection my Dad’s generation had for the Western genre, I just never felt it myself. As for John Wayne, well, I don’t want to upset anyone, but I don’t think he was the world’s greatest actor, for all that he won the Best Actor Oscar for “True Grit”. For the record I rather enjoyed that one. 

Whenever I was in the same room as the old man when he was watching one of Wayne’s films, it always struck me that he was playing the same character in all of them, which was probably what he was like in real life. But looking back, I guess that this is the point. A huge number of people liked that character, and didn’t tire of seeing it in film after film after film. I did read that John Wayne stayed in the top 10 box office stars for the best part of three decades, which puts pretty much anyone else you can think of to shame.

One Sketch #114) Geoffrey Chaucer

Father of English
That's what they call you.
It must have been expensive
When your child's birthday
Came round.

Over the last few weeks I've read a number of works on some famous pilgrimages, and of course, the most famous pilgrimage in Britain is that to the shrine of Thomas Becket at Canterbury. And one of the greatest works of English literature is Geoffrey Chaucer's Middle English masterpiece, The Canterbury Tales, which uses a pilgrimage from Southwark to Canterbury as its framework. In the course of reading  I came upon a reference to a book called "Who Murdered Chaucer?", authored amongst others by Terry Jones. Decades ago I read and enjoyed his "Chaucer's Knight". The book arrived in the post today, and I've literally just started reading. Hence the choice of Geoff for today's sketch.

One Sketch #113) World Cup Trophy (Monday 16th July)

Croatia, Belgium, England
Must keep dreaming.
- France is where the World Cup Trophy's
Gleaming.

Yesterday France won the World Cup, in one of the best final games of one of the best World Cup tournaments I can remember.

One Sketch #112) McArthur Glen Designer Outlet Bridgend

Sunday's routine doesn't take much topping
Worshipping the retail gods of shopping.

Like many families we do have our own little family routines. My kids are all grown up, and my wife and I tend to do our own thing on Saturday - she often helps out my daughter who is the manager of a local charity shop . . . and I don't. But on Sunday, barring unusual circumstances we go out to a car boot sale - most of the time accompanied by at least one of our five children and at least one of our grandchildren. We leave early in the morning, and once we've done the boot sale, then we have a cooked breakfast in the Toby carvery. Often, that's it. However it's not unknown for us to go to the Designer Outlet on the way home. Today we went because of the offer from the Build A Bear Workshop - long story. Now, I'll be honest, I don't like McArthur Glen. I don't like shopping generally. Still, at least I was able to sit on a bench and make this composite sketch as my wife and the kids were doing whatever it is that they do in the shops.

Sketching Tips 7) Sketching foliage

Foliage

It’s been a while since I last gave a ‘lesson’ and so please let me start with a reminder of my usual caveat. I’m totally self taught, and all I can tell you is about my way of doing things. I’m not recommending it as the right way or the best way, just explaining that this is how I do it, in the hope that this might help. 

Now, most of the time foliage – by which I mean trees, bushes and grasses – is definitely not the ‘star’ of my sketch. I’m not deiberately dissing foliage here, but I’m a city boy originally, and what I find excites me is achitecture, machinery and people. So I tend to keep to limit the foliage to outlines with a few light shading marks. This usually provides a nice contrast with the actual object of the sketch. For example, in the sketch of a bridge in Aberavon below, the lightly sketched grass and the sky together frame the bridge, which is the real ‘star’ of the picture. A few vertical or almost vertical strokes do a good job of conveying the suggestion of grass to the eye.

In a similar way, in the sketch below which shows Pontrhydyfen Aqueduct, the darkness of the stone contrasts with the outlines of the forestry, which have not been shaded at all. To keep it light, I sketched in a few areas of shadow, but merely left them as outlines, which is a technique that I find can work particularly well when you’re trying to sketch in trees and bushes.

A couple more examples of me using this technique are these two sketches:-

The British Lion Pub Cwmavon. In this sketch I’ve even included outlines of some of the larger leaves, but again, none of the foliage is actually shaded, because the building is the focus, not the trees.

I like this sketch below, of Dyffryn Rhondda Post Office in the Afan Valley, because there is a contrast between the trees on the right, and the grassy hill side on the top left of the sketch.

Now, this minimalist technique for sketching foliage is fine when you are making a building, or something else the focal point of the sketch. However there may be times when you want to sketch the foliage itself in more detail.

This is a sketch of the disused Cynonville Railway Station. The track was ripped up decades ago, and the station now is on the route of a cycle path from Afan Argoed Country Park. Its leafy, overgrown appearance is very much the point of what I wanted to show about it.

As with the bridge picture, I’ve used vertical, or near vertical lines to show grass. However, as you can see I’ve applied far more shading to the bushes. If I was really focusing on the hut, then I’d just have only drawn the outlines of the shaded patches, and not all of them either for that matter. With this amount of shading you just can help but be struck by how overgrown the place is, and the hut itself seems to be merging into the foliage, which is very much the idea that I wanted to convey – that the trees and grasses are slowly reclaiming the land.  

Then there’s this sketch I made of my own back yard:-

If you look at it closely, you can see that it’s actually an inversion of the way that I usually depict foliage in a sketch. The buildings are lightly shaded, where shaded at all, while there’s heavy shading on the bush, and many of the individual leaves are sketched and even some of their marking details are sketched in. And the reason is that when I made the sketch, I felt that the bush was as much the ‘star’ of the picture as any other element.

A few random points

If foliage is not the most important element of the sketch:-

·       The more shading of the foliage that you do, the more you will draw attention towards the foliage and away from the main elements of the sketch, which isn’t what you want to do.

·       You can get good effects by simply sketching in the outlines of blocks of foliage, and also the outlines of areas of shading.

·       A few vertical, or near vertical lines sketched close together can give the appearance of grassy areas.

If foliage is one of the most important elements of the sketch:-

·       Sketch in areas of shading. As with many things, the more different gradations of shading you use to suggest lighter and darker areas, the more detailed your foliage will appear.

·       Heavy shading tends to make foliage appear denser, bushier and more overgrown if this is the effect that you want to achieve.

·       You can achieve some very appealing effects by using areas of dark shading around negative space in the shape of individual leaves, especially if the background to the tree or bush itself is lightly sketched in.

One Sketch #111) Afan Argoed and River Afan

On Afan Argoed's paths
I'm never lonely,
There's plenty pass on bikes
Or Shanks's pony.

The drought has seen the River Afan wane
Shrinking underneath the steelworks' cranes.

This morning I was on a bit of a time budget, scheduled as I was to look after my 3 year old granddaughter from 12. So I started off making a quick ink sketch of the River Afan. Actually I did wonder if it would be quite a bit lower, bearing in mind that it's weeks since we saw a significant amount of rain. After that though I drove up the Afan Valley to the Afan Argoed Country Park. It's a bit of a mecca for mountain bikers. I'm not, but I don't mind a nice hike, and the walk along where the old railway line up to Cymmer used to be is particularly nice.

I still made it back in time for Mimi, and we had a lovely time painting together, thanks for asking.