Series 7 of Landscape Artist of the Year started last week with a special episode - Celebrity Landscape Artist of the Year "does Climate Change". Actually it was the first ever Celebrity Episode they'd had - and it saw a renewal of competitive paintbrushes for Jim Moir and Tomasz Schafernaker who have both previously appeared in Celebrity Portrait Artist of the Year.
So a bit of a fun programme - except for Jim and Tomasz - with the stakes raised when the contestants were told that they weren't just painting what they could see but rather they were painting on a theme of Climate Change.
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| Artists lined up with pods behind at the harbour at Whitstable |
Artists
- Jim Moir - a comedian, actor, musician and artist known best for his TV work under the name Vic Reeves. He's a previous winner of the Celebrity Portrait Artist of the Year episode in 2018. He's also a resident of Kent. (This is about Vic Reeeves the artist on his website
- Tomasz Shafernacker - a meteorologist for BBC Weather. I've yelled "get your hair cut" at him many times in recent months. He owns a very arty apron which has a layer of paint spatters - so very obviously a keen amateur painter. (This is his art website)
- Caryn Franklin - a British Fashion journalist and Educator who has a BA (Hons) in Graphic Design from Kingston and did a postgrad year at Central St Martins and can obviously draw plus a MSc in Applied Psychology in Fashion at London College of Fashion. She was sewing for this episode - and brought her sewing machine bought with her 18th birthday money with her to the seaside.
- Jessie Cave - an English actress, comedian and cartoonist, known for her role as Lavender Brown in the Harry Potter film series. Her cartoons are observational and somewhat child-like.
- Rose Matafeo - a New Zealand comedian, actress, and TV presenter. - who has produced dioramas in the past - and produced another one for the programme.
- Jordan Stephens - half of the English hip hop duo Rizzle_Kicks - who was perhaps the least experienced of the six artists.
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| The artists with their artwork after the four hours were up |
Location: Whitstable
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| A grey day in Whitstable |
The location for this episode was Whitstable - a small seaside town on the North East Kent Coast. The only time I've visited Whitstable it was exactly the same as the weather in the episode - cloudy grey skies and rather windy.
The town is famous for its Oysters which have been grown just offshore since Roman times.
The pods were all lined up along the West Quay of Whitstable Harbour, next to a boat park. It was obvious the filming became a little bit of a local attraction over the course of the day with a few people stopping to take a look at what was going on.
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| Artists in pods on a wet day in Whitstable |
Ifv you fancy visiting and having a go for yourself, the location was on the concrete strip on the rectangular bit jutting out of Whitstable Harbour (i.e. the East Quay - just past the Harbour Car Park and RNLI Station)
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| A bird's eye view of Whitstable Harbour |
