
Watercolour wonders
A passion for painting and architecture has led to exciting new ventures in retirement for local artist Andrew Fisher. Interview by Kate Chapman.
A collection of beautiful watercolours by artist Andrew Fisher, capturing local scenes around the county, is proving popular with both villagers and visitors to the Wolds.
Andrew, who divides his time between Tealby, near Louth, and Norwich, pulled out his watercolour sketchbook and produced a series of views from around the village for his own pleasure and amusement.
No-one was more surprised than him when greeting card versions, which he had produced and donated to the village’s community shop to sell, proved a huge hit.
Now his work – featuring paintings of the Old Butcher’s shopfront, Vintage Tea Rooms and Jesmond Cottage, as well as scenes in Lincoln, Caistor’s High Street and Anderby Creek – is in demand and available in several outlets across Lincolnshire, much to his delight.
“In an age of quick communications and rising postal costs, no one was more surprised than I when the cards began to sell well,” says Andrew, a former lighting consultant who retired around six years ago.
“These were soon followed by Christmas cards and now a few years down the line the community shop buys around 100 cards at a time, together with postcards, and the images have been creatively used on a mug too.
“Art has always been a favourite hobby. When I went on holiday, I always took a sketchpad, and would sit in market squares, but it was never something I felt I had any great future with until I began going on a few courses.”
Embracing art
Andrew’s favoured medium is watercolour, although he enjoys working in pen and wash, which is similar but has a more definitive line around it.
He describes his style as “traditional”, and mainly paints buildings and landscapes, although he always tries to inject a bit of life into his work with the addition of a few people, or animals, to give it more depth.
“I was never blessed with a great deal of artistic talent at school. So, in later life when I retired, I decided to embrace art and enjoy it a bit more. I needed to occupy myself and now I had the time to do so,” explains Andrew, whose other hobbies include growing his own vegetables, reading, gardening, walking and DIY.
“I went to Ireland on a painting course led by Grahame Booth in 2014. He taught us about everything he did in his work – about perspective, tonal factors and colours. This was something, if I’d had him as an art teacher when I was younger, I might have been far more prone to pursue art more seriously.”
Keen to build on his skills and improve further, Andrew has been on several other courses with artists including Steve Hall, Tim Fisher, William Newton and recently Shari Blaukopf, where he has learnt to develop his own style rather than follow that of his tutors.
Earlier this year, he also exhibited his work at Grainthorpe Arts Festival, alongside his wife Eleanor, who showed a series of linocuts she had created.
“Through my work as a lighting consultant, I was working with light and shade and the relationships between light and surface in buildings such as the Greyfriars Tower in King’s Lynn and inside various churches, which had many striking architectural features,” adds Andrew.
“I always enjoyed black and white photography too and had a little darkroom to develop my own photographs. I used to experiment, keep them in longer. This process meant the colours were a bit darker. Even then I was working in tone.
“Watercolour is a bit like photography – as you never quite know what’s going to happen. It can do its own thing!
“It is quite different to oil which has longer drying times and involves more equipment. With watercolour you just need a small box of paint, a couple of brushes and a sketchpad. If you’re painting near a stream, you don’t even need to take any water with you. But art has always been a hobby, it was just something that I found relaxing.”
Andrew also enjoys watching others paint and cites television programmes such as King & Country and Watercolour Challenge, which were on when he was younger, as fascinating and an inspiration to him too.
Local scenes
As well as selling his cards in Tealby’s community shop, other local scenes painted by Andrew are available at Post & Pantry in Donington on Bain, shops in Louth, including Cards For All Occasions, and more recently he was asked to create a series of cards of local images for Caistor Post Office to celebrate the town, called Aspects of Caistor.
Another happy collaboration has seen one of his paintings of Louth’s Mansion House restaurant interior added to flyers which its owner is using to publicise the former Georgian assembly building.
“The Wolds is a beautiful area, and it has been a pleasure to paint here and to help these dedicated shopkeepers stock something original,” says Andrew, who was born in Norfolk, but fell in love with the area during the time his wife completed a course at Riseholme Agricultural College.
“Tealby has a wonderful community shop and all the money raised goes back in to the community to support its institutions.
“It’s a beautiful village with lots of lovely views, pretty houses and architecture and flowing water – there’s plenty to provide inspiration for my work.
“Creating and providing the cards had been great fun, it’s a real pleasure to do. I always enjoy painting new scenes and often take the train or drive down to Lincoln to sit and draw there – there are some lovely areas around Bailgate and down near Brayford Pool.
“It’s been a real joy developing my art in retirement – I’m looking forward to seeing where it will take me next.”
For more information about Andrew’s work, email andrewfisher170@btinternet.com
Photographs: courtesy of Andrew Fisher
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