Gateway

Penrhos-Feilw K Howell Pastel on Paper 14cm x 21cm

One of the greatest barriers to my obtaining a drivers' licence was a tendency to be distracted by landscape details. Trees. Standing stones. Birds. People. Just about anything outside the car, actually.

But in order to stop for standing stones, you need to be in control of the car, so in the end, it was necessary to keep distraction under restraint to better apply focus.

I love the way standing stones create frames within the landscape. Like ancient figures, marking a gateway. The stature and weight distribution appears anthropomorphic from a distance - their solidity a proper contrast to the whispering grasses.

Standing stones offer a new framework. And a stone circle? Don't get me started...

It was a wet day when I visited these stones; water clung to everything and after wading through the grasses and getting thoroughly wet, the next logical step was swimming in the ice cold Irish sea. With the man-eating jellyfish (They won, in the end. It was a short swim).