Conversations from the Field
Part One
Drawing in the landscape is a very special activity. To sit outside with nothing more than a pencil and pad, struck by the aspect of a place, and to make from private scribbles an image in which others will recognise that moment, is to preserve something of oneself in the passage of time. But it is an activity that is vulnerable to interruption by whomever happens to walk past, and that may include everybody from the meek and the curious to the bores and ignoramuses. The following scenarios are true; the conversations occurred while I was working in the field, in the inner suburbs of Sydney.
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In the backblocks of Glebe, where the ground drops away towards Ultimo, there are some fabulous views over the inner suburbs to the city of Sydney. This area, partly industrial and not yet remade in the name of development, is one of my favourite places for urban drawing. The best vantage point of all is the Ernest Pedersen Steps, which afford an unbroken view over trees and rooftops to the city skyline. The Steps rise between terrace houses and sheer sandstone walls, and whilst only narrow, their landings are long enough for me to sit and draw, or even paint, without blocking the way of the joggers, school kids and one-bag grocery shoppers who come and go.
From my spot halfway up the Steps, the dog-leg turn at the bottom allows me to hear oncoming walkers before I see them, and one afternoon, working on a long, panoramic drawing, I heard what sounded like a violent argument. A man was cursing somebody, his shouts coming closer until finally he appeared, accompanied by a woman. The man was probably in his thirties, but his face was worn and looked older, and his voice and movements spilt beyond normal human dimensions so that in the confined space of the Steps, he was a huge presence. I realised that it was not an argument I had heard, but a routine communication at full volume, to which the woman seemed inured. Here they now came, only twenty steps away, the man taking great strides with his arms flailing about, the woman following with her head bowed. It was quite possible that this man would have something to say to me, and I braced myself as five steps became three, then one.
“Ah,” he began, perching above me with his hands on his hips. “Doing a bit of sketching, mate? You a student or somethin’, are ya?”
“Yes” I answered, dishonestly. A student was a good thing to be in this situation: explicable, justifiable, and placing less pressure on me to argue my lines and smears as art. Although the drawing appeared legible to me, I know from years of plein air work that there are many people who will be confused by anything except highly polished realism. Describing to this man the impassioned lines of Tintoretto or the imaginative structures of Van Gogh, and explaining that the expressionistic impulse survives today in a culture that is in some senses inhospitable to it, seemed an insurmountable challenge.
“Yeah, you’re no genius,” he said as he squinted at my drawing. “But you’re having a go.” The upward inflection of his pronouncement sounded his encouragement, and from there our brotherhood as blokes having a go was established. “Yeah, me fucking car’s broken down,” he continued. ‘It’s at the garage on Bridge Road and I’ve got to get up this fucking hill to Glebe Point Road. Is this the way to Glebe Point Road?”
“Yes,” I nodded. “Up the steps and keep going straight up the street.” I hoped he would take the advice immediately.
“Oh yeah, good. Yeah, and I’m fucking puffed too, mate. Smoked too much of the green over the years. Ah, it stuffs you up doesn’t it? And I’ve got her to take care of.” He motioned to the woman, who now stood a few steps above us, ready to move on.
“Got to keep goin’” he said as he recommenced the climb. “You keep trying, mate.”
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I did indeed keep trying. Three weeks later I was back at the Ernest Pedersen Steps, this time to paint. Painting is a less compact activity than drawing, and I have to walk twice from my car to the chosen spot, to bring all the equipment. The set-up of a drop-sheet, canvas, brushes, water receptacles and other paraphernalia must be carefully arranged at a site like the Steps, for it is a personal claim on public space. The way that I lay my blanket, and place my stuff within its bounds, says unambiguously to the passing pedestrian: I am working here, and I have left this portion of the path for you to use.
I had been painting for almost two hours, and was very involved in my work when an altogether different couple rounded the bend on their way up the Steps. It was a pair of police officers. She was blonde, he had brown hair, and they were both young, perhaps in their twenties. I felt anxious, for while I know of no law against painting out of doors, not everybody is sympathetic to the activity, and my partial takeover of the footpath might have been a problem. There was also the matter of the large spillage of grey paint that had fallen beyond my drop-sheet, which I was doing my best to cover with my foot as the pair made their inquisitive approach.
“What are you looking at from here?” the female officer asked with an innocent curiosity that should have put my fears to rest.
“I’m painting the city.” Determined to meet goodwill with goodwill, I was polite and smiling, but not at ease in their presence. Unable to put on a cool face and just talk to them, I blurted it out: “I feel guilty.”
“What do you feel guilty for?” the female officer fired back. “I’m the one who’s having trouble coming up this hill. I’ve let my fitness slip!” This declaration put us on an equal footing, and I realised I was off the hook for any imagined crimes. I explained that I was painting the view, and that I was less happy with the first painting, which sat drying on the footpath, than the one I was presently working on. The first was built up from areas of detail, and I preferred the second for its more convincing sense of the sweep of the space.
“Nah,” disagreed the female officer as she pointed at painting number one. “I like this one.”
I wondered whether she could determine quality better than me, with her uninvolved eyes and no-nonsense outlook. Perhaps that painting, with its embarrassing mistakes of proportion, did hold something. On the other hand, people will often latch onto details and cling to them for dear life when presented with an image that is unfamiliar, without a thought for pictorial unity and resolution. Now peering closely at my painting as it dried on the footpath, the female officer had noticed a worrying development. “There are ants crawling all over it” she said, alarmed. She had probably also noticed the flakes of bark and leaf lodged in the paint film, blown there by the wind. I explained that the paint was dry enough to withstand the ants, and they were not a threat to the final form of the image.
At that, the male officer, who had been entirely silent throughout the episode, standing with his hands in his pockets like a boy dragged along to a wedding, spoke: “It’s all part of the dramatical effect”.