QN SUMMER 22

SOUTH EAST REGION MEETING
FAST Museum
Saturday May 28th
now faded. The aircraft certainly casts
Having decided to call off our visit to
Farnborough last autumn due to the
‘crisis at the pumps’, it was good to
make another visit to the FAST museum
in May this year. It was our second
meeting of 2022, with most of the aircraft
exhibits displayed outside, a late May
date was chosen and fingers crossed
for a dry day.
Many of the established exhibits on
show have Farnborough ‘Royal Aircraft
Establishment’ connections with several
other interesting aircraft being added
over the last few years. More recent
additions since our last visit being two
new helicopters; a Westland Lynx and a
Westland Scout.
The fine weather brought out thirteen
members for a welcome day’s sketching
and painting. It was good to see Chris
Draper from the West Region and
Paul Couper from the SE Region, both
highly respected Full Members and no
strangers to working at Guild sketching
and painting events.
As on previous visits the spectacular twoseater
Jaguar was a popular choice of
subject, resplendent in its red, white
and blue RAE ‘Raspberry Ripple’ colour
scheme, (now somewhat faded and a
little more soiled since we last visited).
The Jaguar was the chosen subject of
choice for David Livesley, Chris Draper,
and Nick Harder.
Next door sat the Folland Gnat which
was the choice of Brian Miller. Brian
went for a head-on view with his seat
and easel placed alongside the De
Havilland Trident nose section. In so
doing he managed to be included
in Paul Couper’s ‘twin nose’ rendition
featuring the Trident and the Canberra.
Further on and Katie John sketched a
rear three-quarter view of the Westland
Scout; quite a challenge with all the
mechanics on show. Moving on down
the row and we found Damon Poole
working in his unique ‘mixed media’ style,
his subject the Puma helicopter which
was fairly well encased in scaffolding
and scaffold boarding while the aircraft
received some much needed attention.
Nestled in amongst the exhibits at that
end, Chris Tyler found an interesting
viewpoint to work on a selection of
aircraft tails which if all went to plan
would form an interesting montage.
a different shape. I remember seeing
these on static display in the SBAC
Farnborough Air Shows in the 1960’s; all
ground breaking technology back then.
The rest of us headed to the other end
of the Trenchard House site. John Rosam
and myself worked by the new Westland
Lynx addition. I chose a head on view
and went for the speed of pastel and
prismacolor pencils. John went for a side
‘nose view’ in watercolour with the two
seat Harrier behind. The Harrier was the
sketching choice for Scott Lester and
John Jones with Shirley moving around
for a second sketch, once the Jindvik
was done.
Others who managed a second sketch
were Scott Lester who tackled the two
seat Hawker Hunter and our resident
Concorde specialist Katie John couldn’t
resist a pastel drawing of a section of
Concorde fuselage that had been used
for testing purposes in period.
All too quickly it was time for our 3.30pm
review meeting to close the days
proceedings and Paul Couper very
kindly conducted the revues. Taking
advantage of the fine weather, we held
our meeting on the picnic benches,
overlooking the Farnborough Airport site
with the occasional interruption when
an executive jet passed over. As always
an eclectic mix of styles and subjects,
there were some impressive studies and
plenty to both admire and discuss. I’ll
leave it to you to admire the work done
on what was a very enjoyable day.
Thanks to all who came along and
especially the staff of the FAST museum
who I’m sure enjoyed seeing the work
progress throughout the day and
making us so welcome once again.
Nick Harder
Damon Poole
Chris Draper
Chris hard at work on the
Raspberry Ripple Jaguar.
The muted colour palette
for the foreground and
background brings out
the red and blue on the
aircraft. Also note the
reflections. The brilliant
white highlights and
cockpit reflections finish
it all off. Superb!
Katie John
Richard Wheatland
John Rosam
Tucked around the corner we found
our Guild Treasurer, Shirley Batten-Smith
sketching the unique Jindivik target
drone, with its florescent orange paint
Richard Wheatland GAvA
South East Region Organiser
Shirley Batten-Smith
David Livesley
Katie John
Chris Tyler
18 GUILD OF AVIATION ARTISTS QUARTERLY NEWS SUMMER 2022 GUILD OF AVIATION ARTISTS QUARTERLY NEWS SUMMER 2022 19