“OUR CREATIVE INCLINATIONS”an introduction to Image Gallery by Cally Miller

I think that one of the most of creative inclinations is to birth a member of the next generation – we’ve birthed several, all daughters who, with little or no help from us, continue the process. Our other creative inclinations have been building, painting and drawing and this exhibition features some these aspects.

Harley had been running his own architecture practice through the 1960s and the aspect he really enjoyed was the presentation work; perspective drawings and models of proposed developments to help confused clients understand his thinking and visualise the plan pictorially. One such client was the National Trust - South West. They said ‘we see you like drawing – would you like to illustrate a book for us?” Thus began his second career, starting with pen and ink drawings of the interiors of Trust properties including Saltram House, Arlington Court, Killerton, Compton Castle and Lhanhydrock. This gave him far more personal fulfilment than the day-to-day trials and tribulations of his practise but unfortunately the drawing contract was a one-off.

At that time we were living in the delightful Devon town of Sidmouth with our four daughters, dog, cat, hamster and guinea pig. Sidmouth is renowned for its Cottage Orné style of architecture:  'rustic' stylised cottages of the late 18th and early 19th century. They made ideal subjects for a representational artists. So Harley started to wind up his practise and began knocking on Cottage Orné doors. “I love the look of your delightful property, please can I draw it for you?” In most cases he received an enthusiastic response from the occupier, particularly when it was explained to them that the drawing could be reproduced by a local friendly-printer as postcards, invitation and greetings cards and as letter-headings. Often he would be immediately ushered into the garden and would spend the next hour or two sitting in the sun with his drawing pad (no photographs for him) and served with tea and bikkies. Each day he would return home with a wallet stuffed with real money - so different from his architectural practice where we were often kept waiting a year or two before his fee was paid.

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That first summer he spent many days drawing people’s houses, however, warm summer turned to cool autumn and outings became more dependent on the weather conditions. When winter set in and the drawing ink began freezing in his pen, it was obvious that something had to change. We sought the advice of a friend who worked in the gift-trade and he was able to direct us to gift shops who were open to stocking prints, folded cards and postcards. Already having a local firm of Printers involved in our work and having gained some understanding of the processes of print reproduction we decided to start-up a print publishing business.

During the winter months we began to produce a collection of Devon and Cornwall scenes for the spring Gift Trade Fairs and for direct sale. Harley was our artist/salesman and my part of the business was to deal with the Printer and get the orders ready for despatch. The printing process was letterpress and drawings photo-etched onto zinc plates mounted on wood blocks - this was long before the development of instant photo, ink jet and laser printing. Producing the printing blocks and setting up the printing press required a long run of prints if it were to be cost effective and produce a profit. Generally a run of a thousand cards would make the run viable, unfortunately we seldom landed a single order for such a quantity. Across a portfolio of 50 subjects we might sell 50 prints of each subject to one shop and 10 prints of each to another and 5 of each to the third and so on. We had previously converted our dining room into a stock room filled with boxes of unsold prints and cards. We had to rapidly learn the art of balancing print re-stocking against orders in-hand and predicted orders if we were to remain in profit.

Through his face-to-face meetings with buyers, Harley identified some niche openings for new items including local guides and calendars. In third year published a series of local Devon and Cornwall calendars based on our existing portfolio of drawings, now number 250 subjects. These would be sold into retailers in July and August for the following year. In the first year we printed 3,000 for each area and were delighted to find that these were sold out in the first months of delivery so the next year the Retailers increased their orders. May and June was assemble time for the calendars. Friends and

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relatives who had assumed they would be staying with us in Sidmouth for a relaxing summer holiday would instead find themselves roped in to help cut, wrap and pack calendars. By 1972 we had expanded our publication portfolio to cover eight individual areas to include Wales, Dorset, Hereford and Wiltshire.

We have always had a fascination with the sea and ships and our portfolio included the ‘Kathleen and May’- a three-masted sailing schooner recently acquired by the Maritime Trust. It occurred to us that a Maritime Trust would be an interesting project. Harley met with their curator, Captain Greenlees who thought the idea had merit. The Trust owned a collection of vessels across the UK and in various state of repair and we eventually received a commission for drawings of twelve of these vessels to form the Maritime Trust Calendar for 1972. The project involved a huge amount of research into the vessels histories and several trips to the Maritime Museum at Greenwich. We visited the 12 chosen subjects to inspect and sketch their structures and conditions - our family spent a lovely extended holiday in a camper van touring these sites. Amongst other places we visited Bristol to see the site where the SS Great Britain, which had just been unearthed in the Falkland Islands, was to be restored; Milford Haven and the HMS Warrior, the first ironclad Royal Navy ship, which was now just a hulk used by Shell Petroleum as a landing stage; the Clyde Puffer ‘Auld Reekie’ in the Inverness Canal Basin skippered by James Dinwoodie; the steam pleasure craft ‘Dolly’ on Lake Windermere; the herring drifter ‘Lydia Eva’ in Great Yarmouth; the ‘Cutty Sark’ at Greenwich; the oyster dredgers at Falmouth, and so on. During this period we also produced and published drawings for the opening of Major Goddard’s Maritime Museum in the Exeter

The Maritime Trust calendar was printed by Harvey Barton Ltd. of Bristol. Being publishers they became interested in our business and proposed a ‘take over’. It seemed an attractive offer and we agreed to a three year trial with Harvey Barton Ltd. having first right on Harley’s artwork plus paying him an annual retaining fee plus royalties on sales. Actually it was a huge relief for us to be shot of the business admin., sales and distribution and this left time for

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the development of our other projects: the sculpture and manufacture of high relief medallions and diamond stipple glass engraving of windows and goblets. One particular commission was for the stipple engraving of 50 Dartington Glass goblets - when Harley was glass engraving – a delicate art - our four young daughters had learned creep around the house so as not to upset the ‘master’ at work. But unfortunately Harvey Barton did not fulfil our expectations and we decided not to renew the three-year agreement.

In 1974 we moved onto ‘The Iolanthe’ a houseboat on the River Bure in Horning, Norfolk. Now, in addition to pen and ink drawing, Harley was developing as a painter. He adjusted well to the life of a ‘glamorous artist’ with exhibitions in Norwich and now had a circle of arty friends. By now I had learnt how to cut mounts and frame pictures. By the early 70s instant-printing was becoming available and we were able to order smaller print-runs than before.

On the Horning front just down the river from our houseboat we rented an out-of-use tennis pavilion and ran an art gallery during the summer months. In addition to the painting, drawing, prints and calendars we offered a range of miniature drawings of Norfolk scenes including windmills and herons, which we sold at a price that children could afford and that was fun. We exhibited some of Harley’s diamond glass engraving and this lead to commissions for window engraving including one from the Seventh Day Adventist Church in Norwich – a depiction of the “Angels of the Revelation” on their large entrance screen. Our Horning Gallery also gave him the opportunity to develop his painting style. In the run-up to Christmas in 1976 he rented a space in a Norwich department store and did ‘while-u-sit’ portraits of people and dogs. It was mostly an enjoyable experience, except when having to deal with reluctant four-year old boys!

During this period I struck out on my own, working in a local boat yard painting the interiors of pleasure cruisers; possibly the only woman on the Norfolk Broads doing this because it was a very male dominated occupation at that time.

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In the Spring 1977 Harley and I, with our youngest daughter, moved to Findhorn in Scotland and a year or two later founded the Newbold House project in Forres where we presented adult courses using painting and drawing as a medium of personal and group expression. One such course was “Paint Your Dragon” - a tool for conflict resolution between groups. Between 1982 to 87 Harley travelled, designing and presenting holistic art workshops, seminars and courses in both in East and West Europe and America. I continued my work until the late 1990s as a Personal Counsellor and ran personal growth workshops and conferences.

In 1989 we moved to Roseisle in Moray where we took ten years to design and build a house on a hill! During this period he re-found his pen and brush and began painting and producing pen and ink drawings of local views published as hand-coloured and mounted prints; initially to retailers in the North East Scotland and then spreading outwards. I found the hand-colouring of prints provided a soothing balance to my intense counselling work.

Through the 1990’s Harley accomplished his Images of Enterprise project depicting fifty different aspects of Scottish business, commerce and industry presenting what he calls the ‘soul-quality’ of each enterprise, a portrait as against an advertisement. Each enterprise commissioned their painting and kept him extremely busy travelling all over Scotland, including the Islands, visiting clients and their scenes of operation. Most clients also wanted reproductions of their finished painting as artist-signed prints, which was a valuable addition to the commission. These prints were processed by A.M. Graphics, Glenrothes. An add-on to Images of Enterprise was a collection of small painting depicting the skyline behind each of the company premises and published as subscribed edition-prints. The commissions produced a good income which helped towards the costs of our house-building.

Alongside the Images of Enteprise project, he designed and published reconstructions of vintage railway stations and completed several commissions for his ‘Ancestral Landscape Painting’ for overseas clients descended from Scottish family estates.

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Having now spent three decades working as an Professional Artist he had become used to hearing comments such as ‘You can’t possibly be making a proper living from painting!’ or ‘You’ll be worth more when you are dead - ha! ha!’. Even fellow artists would say ‘An artist always needs a part-time job to support their painting’ In 1998 Harley devised and presented a six-session evening class in Elgin for local professional artists and for those with that ambition, sponsored by the Workers Education Association. It was very well attended and received and it was obvious that a book on this subject would be useful, so he set to and wrote ‘Painting for Your Living’ which lead to the development of two-day seminars of that title.

In 2001 we sold our self-build house, bought a 28ft American luxury RV and began a UK-wide venture, presenting “A proper Living From Your Art” seminars which were mostly sponsored by Business Link and Local Enterprise Agencies. For four years we travelled the length and breadth of the country, from Kirkwall in Orkney to Lands End in Cornwall and lots of places in between. It was adventure, fun and hard work but always rewarding; meeting fellow artists and discovering parts of Britain we may otherwise never have seen. Now ten years on we continue hear from some of our course participants and receive updates on their enterprises. The unedited version of our chronicle of this time can be downloaded at: http://www.harleymiller.com/freewheelingtravel.htm

Soon after we began our travels in 2001 we realised that our first book was short on substance and there was a demand for a more comprehensive self-help book, so we set to and wrote and published ‘A Proper Living from Your Art’ which can now be downloaded free at: www.harleymiller.com/booklivingfromart.htmThe Society for All Artist commissioned us to write ‘The Professional Artists Manuel’ and they continue to present this to their professional members. Alongside this Harley also offers a free on-line mentoring service.

In 2006 we called a halt to our seminar presentations, said goodbye to our luxury American RV and settled into Sluie Lodge close to the River Findhorn.

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Soon after moving here Harley was commissioned to produce the River Findhorn Salmon Pool map and several paintings. And he has now re-identified himself as a digital graphic artist and has had to quickly learn the magic of digital graphic art, photo-resolution, website construction and ongoing management which has opened him to a new world of creative fun. Together we have drawn upon our individual life experiences to create websites which appreciates building heritage of the High Street – see www.elginstreetparade.org and www.regentstreetparade.org for which I provide the historical research and some of the photographic work – whilst sliding into the garden whenever I can.

We have grown close to our neighbouring River Findhorn after meandered its length from its source in the Monadhliath Mountains to its estuary on the Moray Firth and have produced an on-line audio/visual of its sight and sounds see: www.youtube.com/watch?v=H68ZvwjUwEw

So now we offer you the Images Gallery as an on-line walk-in experience and hope you might find it to your liking and might even wish to acquire something from our portfolio. Pleased do contact us with any questions or sound us out with ideas.

Harley and Cally MillerSluie Lodge, Dunphail, Moray IV36 2QGTel: 01309 611708harley@harley miller.comcallymiller@gmx.co.uk

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