Hispano Suiza

In the 50s this vintage Hispano was bought by a fellow student for the princely sum of £400. Yes, only two noughts ! It had once been owned by Count Zabrowski the racing driver. It had two cockpits with two windscreens and duplicated instruments. Supposedly it was to take four persons but we were able to stuff in many more to pay for the petrol,it would take about a gallon just to clear the garage forecourt. I think it was later sold for about the same amount. Another student friend bought an old Rolls-Royce for £40 and took it right round Spain and back then sold it for £45........ Sigh.

Essex marshes

A drawing by my brother Colin Grimes of one of our boats pulled up onto the grass island on the Pyefleet marshes near West Mersea in the late 40s. The boat was called Sudden Death due to us fitting a sail on what was supposed to be a rowing boat. Happy to say it didnt live up to its name but did result in a lot of involuntary swimming. Strood Villa can be seen in the background.

JITTERBUG

Am green with envy for some of this stuff

Bella and the dog

While we have been on the subject of Mersea Island here is a rerun of that brilliant little film "Bella and the dog"from the stable of Musing on a muddy island " This will strike a chord for anyone who has walked the Essex marshes or owned a water loving and sometimes smelly black Labrador dog. See it to the end for the sting in the tail.

Strood Villa Mersea Island 1945

This is a Birdseye picture of Strood Villa bought by my family around 1945. it was on the edge of the marshes and was used as fortifications to guard the Strood causeway leading to Mersea Island during WW2. We had to de-fortify it which meant moving many hundreds of sandbags and several gun emplacements. It became a brilliant family home,a real life Swallows and Amazons to us children................drawn from memory by Colin Grimes.

landscape

oil on canvas

worth a read

http://www.michaelcrichton.net/speech-alienscauseglobalwarming.html

boats

Oil on canvas painted 1949 at art school

Charlie G

Making his mark

Bhudda with thousand hands

Amazingly these Chinese dancers are all deaf

Oh Yes ?

Sayings of today......

JO

IT

Autumn in Wiltshire

Stourhead gardens

Hull

Oil on board...painted around 1963 36x27 inches

Strictly come dancing meets Top of the pops

love it.

Studio photograph

Taken with an Olympus OM4 35mm film camera and further imaged on a Wacom tablet using Corel classic paint.

A new "Vincent"motorcycle

I would say the best looking motorcycle on the road,£35.000 and its yours, Psst
can anybody lend me some money ? http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/motorbikes/3458370/Quality-and-nostalgia.html

Crunch time

woods

Oil on canvas painted sometime early sixties

My friend Mei

Trys her first Kimono for visit to shrine for Shichigosan

London

Early pen and ink

Charleston

Who said the youngsters cant dance these days ?

oils

2008 oil on board

2001 oil on board

art

Grandson up for the Turner Prize

early bikers

Douglas Motorcycles...................British Gels

Outside

Ivie Anderson

An unsung singer on my own hit parade

Gloomy Sunday

Home I.T.

DECORATIVE

Bikers Moll ?

Not quite todays image