Port Talbot Sketches Possible Exhibition

Okay, so the last time that I posted towards the end of September, I'd just made some sketches of Port Talbot, my local town, for my daughter's Oxfam Shop. Here's the sketches: -

A4: -

Dock Hotel Port Talbot c. 1985

Dyffryn Road and Steelworks

Aberavon Beach Funfair c. 1960

Station Road Level Crossing c. 1950

Margam Castle

Plaza Cinema c. 1990

Tata Steelworks

A5 pictures and smaller

Aberavon Beach with Dock Cranes

Tata Steelworks

Station Road c. 1940

I have to say that I'm rather surprised that they've all sold, bar one of the smaller pictures. It's vulgar to talk money, but then I'm a pretty vulgar guy I guess, and so I don't mind saying that these sketches have raised a total of several hundred pounds for the Oxfam shop, and an outlay of just £5 for a new sketchpad.

Now, in my day job, I teach English in an 11-16 school. About the same time I was working on the sketches, the school asked if anyone would like to have a stall in our Christmas craft fair in the 3rd week of November. I had the brainwave to produce calendars based on these and other sketches of Port Talbot.

I've put feelers out with just a couple of these, and they've sold, which covers the cost of me printing more to sell in the Craft Fair. I also made some prints of the cinema, Margam Castle, Station Road Level Crossing and the Steelworks, bearing in mind how quickly the original sold. I had 100 postcards printed using the same images as well. 10 of these postcards I've stuck some small calendar pages from a local art supplier. I've also taken my cinema sketch, and simplified it, and my daughter Jess has embroidered the design onto some bags from the Art supplier, and we're going to sell these too. The fair is on Thursday.

I would love to say that making a profit isn't that important to me, but that would be a bit of a lie. I was delighted to be able to make the contribution that I did for Oxfam, but all that cost e was time. I'm just hoping to get some pay back for the time I've put into the stock for the far.

However, I won't lie, as much as the money, the proof that people like my stuff enough to be prepared to spend money on it would be an important validation for me.

None of which explains the Exhibition in the title of this post.

While the sketches were on display in the window of the Oxfam Shop, they were noticed by a couple of members of the Friends of Margam Park. Margam Park is Port Talbot's own stately home - owned now by the Borough of Neath and Port Talbot. The Chairman emailed me, and eventually we met. It's a little complicated, but basically, the second floor of the Castle is being opened to the public for the first time since it came into council ownership. The Friends of Margam Park have asked if they can display my sketches, and sell them, and prints of them, and calendars, on my behalf.

What can I say? Throw in a fat guy in a red suit, and it would've been Christmas there and then. However, there was a problem. Basically, there are bats living in the roof of the castle. Now, bats are very much a very protected species - or group of species - in the UK. There is currently a concern about whether the bats will be disturbed by opening the second floor. So, this whole issue needs to be sorted out. In principle, then, I do have a forthcoming exhibition in Margam Castle - in practice I just don't know when (or if) it will come off. Fingers Crossed.

I've produced a series of more sketches for the exhibition. All of the sketches which follow have been mounted and framed since these scans were taken.