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Stephen Gregory

@sgregory.art

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I make paintings and drawings from observation imagination and memory.
Miscellaneous photos @developingsituation
Inspiration @archievisualintelligence

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A memory-sketch of Manchester Central Library, made after tea (dinner was at lunchtime when I was growing up😀), early evening.
Ink and lead crayon on A4 paper, 14/10/2026.

The only factors I have probably remembered correctly are that the building is round and it has windows and a door.

My first library membership was at the Thomas-the-Tank-Engine Simpson Memorial in Moston, North Manchester. That will be for another picture.
After we moved to Stockport in 1957, me aged six, the comprehensive explanation of the world was available at the local Great Moor Library. It is, wonderfully, still there.

A little later, there were visits to the local history room on the top floor of Stockport Central Library. On the way up the stairs was the open door to the newspaper reading room, silent, save for the sound of pages being turned; capped and gabardined men solemnly stood, keeping warm, perusing the locked and chained broadsheets.

All that was forsaken, in the last couple of years of school life, when I found the bonanza of art and art history books on the top floor at Manchester Central Library, here vaguely remembered. Besides, it was obviously a much more trendy, pretending-to-be-a-student, location for doing exam revision.😉😄

It was a huge privilege to have access to all those four libraries and, of course, to the various other ones I have frequented since.

@manclib_archives @stockr__m #libraries #memoryart #drawingfromimagination #stpeterssquare #manchester taken in Manchester Central Library by @sgregory.art

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3 days ago

‘New Arrival in Newcastle’

soft and oil pastel, charcoal, watercolour, gouache, lead crayon and conté crayon on paper, 76 x 56cm, 10/10/2026

#memoryart #nightbefore #interview #fineart #1971 taken in Newcastle Central Station by @sgregory.art

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8 days ago

The north side of Stockport Parish Church

pen, pencils and crayon on A3 paper, 08/10/2026

#fastdrawing #beforetherain #theotherside #drawingoutside #generalidea taken in Stockport by @sgregory.art

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9 days ago

‘Flotillary’

watercolour and gouache on paper, 25.5 x 36.3cm, 30/09/2026

Enhanced with imagination, a memory of childhood experiences that left a lasting impression.
Excursion boat trips from Plymouth round into the River Tamar to view the naval vessels alongside the wharves and in the dry docks of Devonport Dockyard, others, semi-retired at anchor in the river.
This first happened in August 1960, when I was 9 years old, with a repeat three years later. While my brother’s childhood transport obsessions were trains and planes, nirvana for me was maritime.
Consequently, the schedules for our annual family holidays necessitated our parents incorporating diversions, away from their hard-earned relaxation on the beach, to inspect strategic railway junctions, peer through chain-link fences at runways and take note of which vessels were taking a break from the Cold War.
Mum and Dad’s planning and goodwill in these matters was exemplary.

#memoryart #maritimeart #seascape #devonandcornwall #boattrips taken in Plymouth by @sgregory.art

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18 days ago

‘Monkee Business in Great Moor’

soft and oil pastel and lead crayon on paper, 76 x 56cm, 26/09/2026.

#memoryart #gplan #paintingbynumbers #pastelpainting #1967 taken in Stockport by @sgregory.art

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22 days ago

The River Tyne Piers

pencil, ink, crayon and graphite on A3 paper, 29/09/2026

#onshorewind #lowtide #northsea #rivermouth #drawingoutside taken in North Shields by @sgregory.art

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19 days ago

‘Over Mirrlees’

soft and oil pastel, lead crayon, charcoal, conté crayon and ink on paper, 76 x 56cm, 17/09/2026.

#memorial #differenttimes #lookingback #woodsmoor #hazelgrove taken in Stockport by @sgregory.art

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a month ago

(swipe for 3 more slides….)

The annual ‘Northumberland Open Exhibition’ is due to open on February 13th 2027.
It takes place at The Woodhorn Museum, managed by North East Museums, in Ashington, England and is billed as ‘the largest exhibition of its type in the region.’

Yesterday, I looked to see the submission procedure and learnt that it is ‘sold out’….’fully booked.’ 🤔

The, now redundant, information states a closing date of December 3rd but also, in contradiction, that there was only space for ‘500 artwork submissions.’ Further, ‘up to two artworks’ could be submitted so, theoretically, submission could be limited to only 250 entrants.

It was also stated that, ‘we expect to be able to exhibit between 420 and 500 artworks’ so there’s a high probability that everything submitted will be exhibited. 🤔

I’m not sure what that says about bothering with the arrangement for ‘Works’ being ‘selected for exhibition by a professional panel of artists and curators.’😀

‘Booking’ a submission had to be done through Ticketsource, so more like trying to obtain limited concert tickets.

I had work included in the show a couple of years ago but the procedure then was genuinely open.
I was obviously lacking in street-wisdom this time. 🤣🤣🤣🤣

#opencallforartists #openexhibition #northumberland #woodhornmuseum taken in Ashington, Northumberland by @sgregory.art

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5 days ago

‘Seaton Sluice Harbour, Northumberland’

ink on A3 paper, 20/09/2026.

#observationaldrawing #sundaymorning #risingtide #seasideart #upthecreek taken in Seaton Sluice by @sgregory.art

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a month ago

This is about a painting that I completed in Milton Keynes, England, early in 1980. It was included in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition later that year and was sold from the show.
It was made using stained and sprayed acrylic paint on unprimed cotton duck.
The subject is a detail of the metalwork of a floating crane that was operated by the Mersey Docks and Harbour Board. Named ‘Mammoth,’ it had been built in Schiedam, Netherlands in 1921 and could lift 200 tons.
I worked from a black and white photograph that I had taken during one of my several visits in those years to the Liverpool and Birkenhead docks.
I deliberately used b&w, rather than colour, film so that the colours I chose for the painting were free from those of the actual structure.
Looking back, I’m interested to see the extent to which I zeroed in on, abstracted, relatively small sections of the constructions that inspired the paintings I was then making. More to follow.

1/ ‘Heavy Metal,’ acrylic on canvas, 60” x 48”, 1980.
private collection, London, England.

2/ 3/ Two of the photographs I took of the floating crane ‘Mammoth’ in the Liverpool north docks.

4/ A photograph of ‘Mammoth’ in Gladstone Dock, Liverpool, taken in December 1944.
©️Imperial War Museum, catalogue no. A26755

5/ Pages from the catalogue of the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 1980, showing the listing of this painting.

6/ Frontispiece of permit for photography/sketching issued by the Mersey Docks and Harbour Board.

#heavymetal #acrylicpainting #acryliconcanvas #miltonkeynesart #royalacademysummerexhibition #liverpooldocks #floatingcrane #metalfabrication #spraypaint #schiedam #hardedgepainting #beanhill #marineart by @sgregory.art

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2 years ago

‘Ore Inspiring’

pencils and pen on A3 paper, 31/08/2026.

#drawingoutside #alumina #blyth #northumberland #observationaldrawing taken in Blyth, Northumberland by @sgregory.art

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2 months ago

‘Fast Lines’
acrylic on canvas, 48” x 60,” 1982
collection: Milton Keynes University Hospital.

PLUS ….swipe for 14 of my reference photos.

Sometime in the winter of 1981/82 I took b&w photographs of the construction of Milton Keynes Central Railway Station when it was nearing completion.
I wanted to include a sense of speed and so, rather than just working from one photographic image, here I used a montage of elements from different photographs to create the painting’s linear structure.
The colour scheme choices depended, more freely, on a mix of memory and imagination.

Looking at the image of the painting now I’m thinking, yes, that’s impressive. Technique-wise, I’d translated Charles Sheeler’s method of overlapping oil glazes into ones created with sprayed acrylic, diluted with varying amounts of medium.
I had acquired the first of the books I own about Charles Sheeler soon after it had been published in 1975 and, in January 1981 I saw various of his works for real in the USA.
Most inspiring was the painting ‘Ore into Iron’ of 1953, now in the collection of the Museum of Fine Art in Boston but, at the time, it was still part of the Lane Collection and I saw it at the house of Bill and Saundra Lane in Leominster Massachusetts. (hanging on the back of the kitchen door!)

‘Fast Lines’ was on display at the official opening of the railway station in May 1982. Sir Peter Parker, then chair of British Rail, expressed approval (of the painting…I think he liked the station as well😉).
In 2017/18 Arts for Health Milton Keynes, who curate the art collection at the hospital, had the painting repaired and cleaned by brilliant conservator Harriet Pearson.
Only in writing this post have I realised that, due to personal crisis at that time, ‘Fast Lines’ was the last of the paintings I made in Milton Keynes. Any poignancy about that is tempered, in retrospect, in knowing that a chapter had finished on a high and that I would soon be on ‘fast lines’ to new adventures!

@arts_for_health_mk_collection @mfaboston @sgregory.art @culturemiltonkeynes #miltonkeynes #miltonkeynescentral #cmk #britishrail #beforeprivatisation #artinhospitals #railwaypainting #westcoastmainline taken in Milton Keynes by @sgregory.art

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2 years ago