Talking the talk

 As best that I could I included details in The Wainwrights in Colour Book as to how I conceived the whole idea, worked out a system and then took ten years to complete the project from start to finish. Most importantly though the book was produced to feature all of the 1500 sketches so there just wasn’t enough room in the 360 pages to go into full detail about the trials and tribulations of the task. This side of the story could probably fill another book but that still wouldn’t convey the pride, passion and emotion that I have for this unique challenge, this is where public speaking comes into it’s own. Anyone who knows me will understand that I can talk on this subject for ages, maybe for too long.

 Consequently I have now put together a fully illustrated presentation on The Wainwrights in Colour. I have given these talks in the past either locally or at events such as Festival of the Fells in Ambleside but now with the project complete and the book published I have completely re-written the presentation content and updated the details. Recently I have not only given the talk here locally in Bowes Village but also I am booked to give these talks at various prestigious event in the coming months. My good friend Andy Kyle has just sent me some of the photographs that he took at Bowes Village Hall.

This talk was to raise funds for Bowes Carnival and the hall was ideal for such an event. Prior to the event the ticket sales had been very good and it was wonderful, to see the gathered audience before the talk began.  I am quite happy to speak publicly, perhaps due to the training that I had in the forces. The presentation allows me to explain the intricacies of the work, from plotting the references, finding each one on the ground and then producing the sketches. The frustrations of weather and seasonal complications are explained which helps to fill in the details behind this challenge.

At Bowes I gave a 45 minute presentation, there was then a 15 minute break, we then showed the film which comes with the book and this was followed by a short Q&A session which is always rather enjoyable because I never know what questions are going to be asked so the challenge is to come up with a quick but interesting reply.

It seemed that the whole evening went down rather well and even those in the audience who know little about me or my work or even Wainwright for that matter left with a good insight to The Wainwrights in Colour. 

As I said earlier, I will be giving this talk (which I will adapt for each location) at events in the next few months beginning next week on Saturday 10th June at 4pm  at the Keswick Mountain Festival. I understand that tickets are still available for this talk. Other venues include The Witham on 27th June in Barnard Castle, and the Adventure Book Festival in Sheffield in July and once again at The Festival of the Fells event in Ambleside in September. Several other presentations are being planned, many in the Lake District area. To keep up to date do follow the Events Programme. If you would like to book me for a talk for your local club or event then just email me : [email protected] 

Many thanks to Andy Kyle for the use of his photographs in this blog post.