The North Sea coastline of East Lothian has the most interesting layers of coloured rocks: sandstones, limestones and red conglomerate rocks with lines of quartz and basalt lava from the volcanic activity of many million years ago.
John had a fascination with rock pools since childhood. He has written about it several times in his books Land Marks and Sea Wings and Lines from Nature. And at Tyninghame, near Dunbar, where the basalt slabs have fractured allowing waves to create spaces for living organisms, he had a favourite rockpool which he visited regularly, delighting in the differences found each time.
“water-formed miniature landscapes of the sea-shore exposed between the tides: times of stillness, waiting for the changes each incoming sea will bring.”
John had been painting these miniature landscapes for decades. Variations on variations as with his artistic eye he pulls you into the calm stillness of a rock pool and the seaweeds and shells finding refuge there until the next tide.
“The patterns of rocks and seaweeds are beautiful. They rival anything an abstract artist could possibly invent…”
A selection of our rock pool pictures, both in oils and watercolours
