Views from Rievaulx Terrace

View of the ruins of Rievaulx Abbey

11" x 11", pencil and coloured pencil in Daler Rowney A4 sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

"Everywhere peace, everywhere serenity, and a marvellous freedom from the tumult of the world."
St Aelred (1111-1167), the third abbot of Rievaulx Abbey

Rievaulx in Yorkshire has two major heritage sites - Rievaulx Terrace (looked after by the National Trust) and the ruins of Rievaulx Abbey (maintained by English Heritage) - the first Cistercian Abbey in the north of England, founded in 1132.

Rievaulx Terrace is really rather odd. It's an eighteenth century landscape garden in a serpentine curve. It comprises a very large flat area of well maintained fresh green grass - at the top of a very steep slope - with temples at either end. The Ionic Temple is designed for banquets and contains a dining table. What I'm not too sure about is why any of it is there as there is no large house just behind it. It's just there - facilities for banqueting in an Ionic Temple at one end of a big grass terrace - which looks down on the ruins of Rievaulx Abbey.

Anyway, it was a sunny afternoon and I sat at the very top of the slope (maybe more accurately described as a precipice!), just in front of the Ionic Temple and sketched the abbey ruins a very long, long way below. It was one of those sketches where you're continually trying to work out what is the colour of trees which are just about to come into leaf but not right now.

Rievaulx Terrace
11" x 16", pencil and coloured pencils in Daler Rowney A4 sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

I then sat on the terrace of the Ionic Temple and sketched the view across Rievaulx Terrace. It reminded me very much of why the 'grass green' colour has that wonderful fresh colour associated with new grass in Spring and trees bursting into leaf.

The terrace is so big that the people look tiny but I decided to include them to get a bit of scale. I then did a very quick sketch of a lady and her dog when she sat where I'd been sitting earlier to do the sketch of the abbey ruins. Her protective arm reminds me of just how steep that slope really was - I totally understand why she wasn't taking any chances of her dog getting interested in exploring down the slope!

(My apologies for the short delay before this post finally appeared. For some reason, the last sketch gave PS Elements the heebie jeebies on three separate occasions! The stitched version has now been finally wrung out of the ghost in my computer - with some difficulty!)

Links:

• Address: Rievaulx Terrace and Temples, Rievaulx, Helmsley, YO62 5LJ North Yorkshire, England
• Location: Rievaulx Terrace is 2.5 miles northwest of Helmsley.
  
• National Trust - Rievaulx Terrace and Temples
• Gardens Guide - Rievaulx Terrace and Temples
  
• Wikipedia - Rievaulx Terrace
  
• English Heritage - Rievaulx Abbey

Technorati tags: colored pencils, coloured pencils, drawing,plein air, sketch, sketchbook

"The finest view in Yorkshire" from Sutton Bank

The view from Sutton Bank

11.5" x 17", pencil and coloured pencil, double page spread in Daler Rowney A4 sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

"The finest view in Yorkshire" ('James Heriott')

This is the view from Sutton Bank which is a very steep escarpment separating the North York Moors from the Vale of York and the Vale of Mowbray which you can see in this sketch. The Pennines can be seen some 40 miles away in the very far distance. I had a lovely sunny day to do the sketch but the seat on which I sat to draw Hood Hill (or "one tree hill") and the vales was so exposed and 'breezy' that I was really glad I'd taken a layered approach to dressing for plein air sketching - all five of them! This sketch was a bit of challenge in terms of how many greens in the landscape and aerial perspective blues I could get with the coloured pencils I had with me.

A 'killer hill' with a narrow road leads up to this view. There are lots of signs threatening awful things to caravans (which are strictly prohibited from attempting the climb) and warning HGVs about many broke down last year when they didn't follow the advice to select their crawler gear! I did it for the first time after my warning light came on to say the antilock braking system has been disconnected - for no obvious reason - so it was a bit intimidating to say the least!

If you go the other side of the road and walk along there's a wonderful view of Gormire Lake - which, I understand fills a bowl left by glacial action and is one of the only two lakes in Yorkshire. Personally I thought its name made it sound like it was auditioning to be in a new novel by an author with a prediliction for 'interesting' names. It certainly had a somewhat eerie quality to it given the way in which the dense woodland surrounded it and I didn't feel an overwhelming need to visit.

James Herriot
Near the foot of the escarpment is the town of Thirsk where the real James Herriot (Alf Wight) had his vetinerary practice at 23 Kirkgate with his partner 'Siegfried Farnon'. Thirsk (along with a few other towns) provided the basis for 'Darrowby' in the books. Walking his dog on the top of Sutton Bank was apparently a favourite occupation whenever time permitted.

The quotation comes from a book called "James Herriot's Yorkshire" which was given to my father complete with autographs from the three real people behind the 'characters' in the very popular vet series after he rescued my friend 'A' (daughter of 'Tristan' and midwife to the birth of my first cat) and me from another car calamity on our way up north on an extremely hot day some 25 years ago.

For those interested in Yorkshire, the book has some great photos by Derry Brabbs (who also did the photos for some of Wainwright's Books of the Lakes). Fans of the James Herriot series can now also visit the house at 23 Kirkgate which was home to the real vetinerary practice and was 'reproduced' in the BBC series as it's now home to a museum about the world of James Herriot and vetinerary science.

Sutton Bank and the North York Moors National Park
Sutton Bank is part of the Hambleton Hills at the very western edge of the North York Moors and National Park. It's also known as Roulston Scar. It's bisected by the road between Thirsk and Scarborough which follows the southern edge of the Moors . It's also home to the Yorkshire Gliding Club and the White Horse of Kilburn which lacks some of the artistic merit of the White Horse of Uffington but none of the impact.

The North Yorks National Park - and their very helpful staff - have a home in the trees just as you get to the top of the hill with car parking for the Park's very many visitors. There are five walks into the area around Sutton Bank which start from the car park. The Moors Bus Service (April-October) also picks up people from and deposits them back at the car park.

Sutton Bank is also home to a massive Iron Age Hill Fort erected around 400 BC which has been a recent subject of archeological investigation on behalf of English Heritage

Links:

• North York Moors National Park
• National Park - Sutton Bank
• English Heritage - Sutton Bank Iron Age Hill Fort
• Yorkshire Tourist Board - North York Moors
• Hambleton DC - map of area to the west of Sutton Bank
  
• James Alfred Wight OBE (James Herriot)
• The World of James Herriot
• "James Herriot's Yorkshire" James Herriot with Derry Brabbs (Michael Joseph Ltd 1979, Mermaid 1996) ISBN 0-718117530 (Hardcover); 0-718140931 (Paperback)
• Yorkshire Tourist Board - James Herriot Country

Technorati tags: colored pencils, coloured pencils, drawing,plein air, sketch, sketchbook

The Rill Garden at Wollerton Old Hall

The Rill Garden, Wollerton Old Hall

11.5" x 17", pencil and coloured pencils
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

I'm going to start "Travels with a Sketchbook......in the north of England" with the one garden and one post which relates to Shropshire. All the rest of my sketchbook on my recent journey up north was devoted to Yorkshire and it seems better to keep those posts together in sequence.

This sketch of the Rill Garden is a double page spread in my Daler Rowney black hardback A4 sketchbook - which means it's a big sketch. Getting the perspective right - including all those round box 'puddings' - was a bit of a challenge! The box hedging and mounds were interesting to do. The trick seemed to be to keep mixing greens across the range from dark blue green to light yellow green. I'm not sure I made such a good job of the pleached limes though!

Wollerton Old Hall Garden is a real find. For me it's the nearest equivalent to Sissinghurst that I've ever come across in the north of England - and my mother and I are veteran garden visitors. Lots of small garden rooms - each with its own very distinctive personality. You can take a virtual tour of the garden here.

The really interesting thing is that the garden is not that old and it's still developing and changing. It's also an RHS Partner Garden. This is the way the website summarises what the garden is about.

Wollerton Old Hall Garden is a four acre plantsman's garden developed around a 16th Century house (not open) in rural Shropshire, England. Strong formal design has created many separate gardens each with its own character. It features intensive cultivation of perennials using planting combinations with an emphasis on colour and form, as well as many rare and unusual plants.

The Wollerton Old Hall Garden website starts thus - and I repeat it here as the garden certainly lived up to its plaudits!

A formal garden with exuberantly planted borders set in the Shropshire countryside, in the heart of England.

"Artistry, vision and discipline combine here to make a garden of exceptional quality." - The Good Garden Guide

"This is truely a delightful garden to explore and learn from." - Noel Kingsbury, House & Garden

"This is a garden to be enjoyed - and to be plundered for inspiration"- Patrick Taylor, Daily Telegraph Gardeners' Guide

The food's good too! We had lunch and tea there and both were most enjoyable.

Links:

• Wollerton Old Hall Garden
• Wollerton Old Hall Garden - virtual tour
  
• Garden location - just west of Market Drayton in Shropshire
  
• RHS - Wollerton Old Hall Garden

Technorati tags: art, coloured pencils, colored pencils, drawing, plein air, sketch, sketchbook

Travels with a sketchbook.....in the north of England

The refectory windows at Fountains Abbey
pen and sepia ink and coloured pencils in daler Rowney A4 sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

I'm interrupting the posts about Kent for a new section of sketches recently done on my trip to the north of England. Over the next week or so I'll be posting sketches of:

• The Rill Garden at Wollerton Old Hall Garden, near Market Drayton in Shropshire
• The view from Sutton Bank - the finest view in Yorkshire according to 'James Herriot'
• Fountains Abbey - part of a world heritage site in North Yorkshire
  
• Views from Rievaulx Terrace, North Yorkshire
  
• The centre of Helmsley in Ryedale, North Yorkshire
  
• The ruins of the cistercian Abbey of Rievaulx, North Yorkshire
  

[10th June 2007: Revised/Updated ] This summary post will be updated as blog posts are posted to this blog.

Sketches have been transferred from Making A Mark. These include:

• Staffordshire: Drawing people and delaying the cream tea (13th April 2006) - a visit to Biddulph Grange Gardens - and its tea room.
  
• Cheshire: Sketches from Tatton Park (18th April 2006) - two double page sketches of scenes from this 50 acre garden set in a 1,000 acre deer park.

Both of the above posts on this blog now include links to the places mentioned in the blog post.

[2nd November 2007: Revised/Updated] More sketches from the North of England:

• Cheshire: Early Morning Light in Cheshire (1st November 2007) - sketching the views and the early morning light - including a sunrise - from windows in my cousin's home.
• Manchester: Eating in the Gallery Cafe at Manchester Art Gallery (2nd November 2007)

A link to this summary post is inserted into the "Travels with my sketchbook in...." section in the right hand column (which groups together all summary posts).

Through the fence

What do I do when I get home from sketching my way round the south western states of the USA? I sketch!

"He who must not be bored while I sketch" was in very chatty mode while we drove down to his favourite view at Emmetts Garden in Kent. I sketched the view to the rear of us while we sat on a bench looking at the Weald and idly speculating about which country has the best weather in the world. Well it was a walm and balmy summer's day in Kent - and we decided that Kent was really pretty good!

Isn't it weird that even with a sketch which features an "in your face" fence, barbed wire, a chain mesh fence and nettles that it still looks really peaceful!

This sketch is in my new small Moleskine which I'm going to try and use a bit more. That means that this image is only 7" x 5.5" across a double page spread. It was done 'en plein air' in pen and ink and then I used coloured pencils when I got home.

Just to clarify: Odd - as in "intermittent" - sketches will continue to be posted on this site. Only sketches associated with trips and travelling will go on my new new blog - and they have now started - first sketches were posted today!

[Originally posted in Making a Mark on 7th August 2007. What gets posted where has changed again. All sketches associated with travels outside my home now get posted on this blog with a narrative. The same main image with a much shorter narrative may also be posted on Making a Mark - unless previously posted there and/or the sketch is associated with a major trip.]

Links:

• Emmetts Garden, Ide Hill, Sevenoaks,Kent, TN14 6AQ Tel 01732 751509
• Making a Mark - Through the Fence
  
• National Trust - Emmetts Garden, Kent
• Emmetts Garden - how to get there
• Gardens to Go - Kent Gardens - Emmetts Garden (has a number of photos of the garden and links to other gardens in Kent)

Technorati tags: colored pencils, coloured pencils, drawing, moleskine, pen and ink, plein air, sketch, sketchbook

Sketching bluebells at Emmetts Garden, Kent

Bluebells sketch

coloured pencils on Canson Mi Teintes paper in Charmian Edgerton sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

Yesterday we made our annual trip to visit the bluebell slopes at Emmetts Garden in Kent. They weren't as far advanced as I had hoped - but they were on their way. "He who must not get bored while I sketch" brought his book (Roy Hattersley's "The Edwardians") and even took some photos of me sketching!

We sat, looking out at the slopes of bluebells, on a log seat that they've made out of the trunk of one of the trees which came down in the Great Storm of 1987 which caused a lot of very mature trees to be felled. You can see a picture of the devastating damage to the garden on this website - photos were taken from Bob Ogley's book "In the wake of the Hurricane". I've included a couple of photos of me sketching. One of me with short stubby coloured pencils gripped tightly in left hand and one of the view I was looking at.



The sketch had some little tweaks when I got home as I stopped when the "plein air" started to get very chilly plus I also forgot to pack my sharpener and couldn't find a couple of important colours! It was a cloudy day with sunny intervals - not the easiest light to work in as it means you have to plump for sunlight or shade from the outset and then carry the image of what's it like in your head as the weather delivers the other one. I went for sunlight but was increasingly working with cloud. This one is likely to be converted into a pastel so I was mainly focused on achieving a sense of the colours and how they might be pushed.

I produced my sketch using a variety of coloured pencils in my very old pastel Charmian Edgerton hardback sketchbook from L. Cornelissen and Son. It's filled with neutral shades of Canson Mi Teintes interleaved with glassine. I also forgot my bulldog clips and had a fine time trying to stop the glassine flapping around in the breeze! As my pencils become short and stubby they always get sent to the sketching pencil cases as it means I can then carry more colours around with me.

I have a funny feeling that having written the name Cornelissen I'm now going to have to go and pay them a visit - they must surely have one of the nicest art shops in the world! However, I do try to stay away as visits can get quite expensive! But please note they do worldwide mail order if you want to browse!

But before I do any more art shop visiting I'm off to repack my sketching kit to make sure I don't have things missing next time I'm out sketching.

[Originally posted in 'Making a Mark' on 30th April 2006. New links added with this post. The work developed from this trip is displayed below and in the gallery devoted to drawings of trees on my website. It's also discussed in Making a Mark - Bluebell beginnings.]

Bluebell Beginnings £195
coloured pencil on Arches Hot Press paper
image 8" x 12"; frame 17" x 19"
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

Links:

• Emmetts Garden, Ide Hill, Sevenoaks,Kent, TN14 6AQ Tel 01732 751509
• Making a Mark - Bluebell beginnings
• National Trust - Emmetts Garden, Kent
• Emmetts Garden - how to get there
• Gardens to Go - Kent Gardens - Emmetts Garden (has a number of photos of the garden and links to other gardens in Kent)
  

Technorati tags: art, bluebells, coloured pencils, colored pencils, drawing, plein air, sketching, sketchbooks

The kitchen garden at Chartwell, Churchill's former home

Chartwell Kitchen Garden
pencil and coloured pencil in Moleskine sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

"A day away from Chartwell is a day wasted" (Winston Churchill)

Yesterday the sun shone - and we went to Chartwell in Kent, former home of Winston Churchill and now a National Trust property. I went armed with camera and sketchbook and my partner went with the intention of doing one of the things he enjoys doing best - sitting in the sunshine with a marvellous view of the Weald of Kent.

After a quick visit to the house (again - we go every year at least once, partner is a big history buff) and some negotiation as to which bench in the garden meant he got the best dose of sunshine on his face and gave me the best view(!), I settled down to sketch the kitchen garden from a terrace just above it. Churchill himself built the brick walls in the background of this kitchen garden. There's more information about the recent restoration of the kitchen garden here.

The sketch was completed using a mechanical pencil in a double page spread of my Moleskine sketchbook and I used coloured pencil on top to give a sense of the main colours. I think I'd like to have a go at doing a landscape painting from the terrace we sat on as the bit you can't see is the stunning view of the Weald of Kent which is just above the top margin of my sketchbook.

I've included some photos - the first is of the view I had (except the photo was taken standing up).

One of Churchill's recreations was oil painting. The next is a shot looking down to the studio where Churchill painted and the Weald beyond. The studio is the brick building to the left of centre. The kitchen garden wall is top right.

Finally, one taken from the studio area looking back up at the house. This last view is one which I'm doing in pastel for my partner. He's very patient, as it was started on a sunny day a long time ago and has stayed 'nearly' finished for simply ages! It's quite a busy traffic area and I didn't find it easy to paint from there so I'll probably try and finish using this photo as a reference. There's not a lot to do to it.

You can see more photos on the National Trust website.

[First posted 6th April 2006 on 'Making a Mark'. New links and quotation added with this post.]

Links:

• Chartwell Mapleton Road, Westerham, Kent TN16 1PS
  Telephone: 01732 868381
• National Trust - Chartwell
• BBC - Historic Figures - Winston Churchill (1874-1965)
• The Churchill Centre, Washington DC - Life at Chartwell
  
• Wikipedia - Churchill
• Wikipedia - Chartwell
  

Technorati tags: art, Chartwell, Churchill, coloured pencils, colored pencils, drawing, landscape painting, painting, plein air painting, sketch, sketchbook

Travels with a Sketchbook...in Kent

Bluebell Beginnings

8" x 12", coloured pencil on Arches Hot Press paper
Antique White mat, American Oak Frame £195
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

The next section of this blog will feature sketchbook blog posts (from Making a Mark) which are about places in Kent. These all include sketches which are drawn in pencil or pen and ink and then completed using coloured pencils.

The summary list of posts relating to Kent - in the order they were published is as follows:

• The kitchen garden at Chartwell, Churchill's former home
• Sketching bluebells at Emmett's Garden, Kent
  
• Through the fence (Emmett's Garden)
• International Sketchcrawl - Great Comp Garden, Kent
• More sketching at Sissinghurst and a salutary tale
• The White Garden, Sissinghurst Castle Garden, Kent
• Summer at Sissinghurst
• Autumn at Sissinghurst
• Knole House in Kent
• Spring at Sissinghurst
• Spring fields from Sissinghurst
• The view from the Downs
• A hot summer's afternoon in a Kentish garden (Penshurst Place)
  

These posts will be posted after this summary and the hyperlink to each post will be added to this summary as each is published.

I'll also include a date at the end of each post of when it was first published on 'Making A Mark' but otherwise won't comment further.

In future, this summary will be:

• included in the "trip summaries" section (near the top of the right hand column)
  
• updated on a monthly basis if I've posted a sketch of Kent in the previous month.

The image at the top of this post is a drawing I completed based on the sketch I did and the photos taken during my visit to Emmetts Garden in Kent last April (see 'Sketching bluebells').

Knole House in Kent

Knole House, Sevenoaks, Kent

8" x 10", pen and sepia ink and coloured pencils in Moleskine sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

On Easter Sunday we visited Knole House near Sevenoaks in Kent. We went for a stroll in the ancient parkland which is one of the few deer parks to survive over the last 500 years and the only one in Kent. Then we both sat on a fallen tree trunk in the parkland on the hill overlooking the house while "He who must not be bored while I sketch" read the Sunday Times and I sketched Knole House - in pen and ink finished with coloured pencil.

When I finished the sketch I decided that my failure to ever actually pay a visit to Knole House needed to be remedied and so I made a very quick acquaintance with the interior at the end of the day - a time I especially like for visits as it tends to be quiet.

Knole House is now a National Trust property. It's a sprawling ragstone property and has the most fascinating mix of historical, ecclesiastical, Royal, and literary associations. Believed to have been created in the thirteenth century and long associated with the hunting of deer, it was originally home to the Archbishops of Canterbury before it was 'given' to King Henry VIII and made a Royal Palace. Elizabeth I then presented it to Thomas Sackville, the first Earl of Dorset in 1566 and is has been home to the Sackville family ever since.

A curious legend attached to Knole House is that it had seven courtyards, representing the days of the week, fifty-two staircases - one for each week of the year - and 365 rooms, corresponding to the days in a year. (The Heritage Trail)

Knole was the childhood home of Vita Sackville West who restored Sissinghurst Castle and created the very famous garden there. Her close friend Virginia Woolfe writes about Knole in Orlando and a facsimile manuscript of Orlando in Woolfe's own handwriting - showing the development of the description of Knole in the book - is displayed in the Great Hall. The novel ends with Orlando taking possession of the house although Vita was denied ownership of Knole because the house was 'entailed' and passed through the male line.

The house is also full of paintings, including portraits by Joshua Reynolds and Elizabeth Vigee Le Brun and copies of the Raphael cartoons which are in the Victoria and Albert Museum.

For more information about the house try reading either the National Trust website about the history of Knole, this very informative New York Times article or Vita Sackville West's book "Knole and the Sackvilles'.

Knole Park is relatively unique amongst English country houses in that it was never 'landscaped' and consequently looks much as it did in the seventeenth century. It was however devastated in the Great Storm of 1987 - which felled 6 of the seven oaks in the town of Sevenoaks. The ancient parkland lost 70% of its trees which reputedly cost a £1m to replant across 1,000 acres in a way which had to be careful to reflect the lack of a 'designed look' for the overall parkland.

We finished up on Sunday by having half a cream tea each in the Brewhouse Tearoom. I reckon the scones had been out of the oven for about half an hour as they were still warm and moist. Excellent blackcurrent jam and cornish clotted cream was served as well - very definitely a place to go for a Cream Tea treat! I have been planning my book which rates National Trust properties by the quality of their cream teas for some years now........

The garden looks and sounds really interesting and I'm now planning to go back this summer and visit it on a Wedesday when it's open.

If you visit Knole, note that:

• the house is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays
• the garden is private to Lord Sackville and is only open on Wednesdays
• the parkland is open daily for pedestrians only. Cars are only allowed in when the house is open.
• details of how to get there are available here.
  

Links:

• National Trust - Knole
  
• The Heritage Trail: English Stately Homes - Knole House
  
• New York Times: Knole House - Quintessential English Style
• The Bloomsbury Group and Vita Sackville West
• The Literature Network: Biography of Virginia Woolf

Technorati tags: national trust, sketchbook,

Google fails to stop theft and abuse by spam blogs

Google's search engine lists spam blogs which steal copyright material from legitimate blogs and then generate income by hosting Google Ad-Sense adverts.

The content of my blogs - which is all copyrighted specifically to address this issue - is being repeatedly scraped (stolen) and used on spam blogs. The content of your blog might be suffering the same fate. I'm currently faced with an explosion in the amount of material being stolen. Read on to find out if you've got a problem like mine and what you can do about it.

What's a spam blog (splog)?

Spam blogs, sometimes referred to by the neologism splogs, are artificially created weblog sites which the author uses to promote affiliated websites or to increase the search engine rankings of associated sites. The purpose of a splog can be to increase the PageRank or backlink portfolio of affiliate websites, to artificially inflate paid ad impressions from visitors, and/or use the blog as a link outlet to get new sites indexed. Spam blogs are usually a type of scraper site, where content is often either Inauthentic Text or merely stolen from other websites. These blogs usually contain an high number of links to sites associated with the splog creator which are often disreputable or otherwise useless websites. (Wikipedia)

What sort of fraud or theft is it?
Content from my website/blogs is stolen (scraped) and reposted on a splog which hosts Google Ad-Sense adverts.

• It's fraud because income generated for the host spam blog is generated by content devised by and stolen from other legitimate blogs (likes yours and mine).
  
• It's fraud because all clicks on an advert on a spam blog are charged to the advertiser. The advertiser's name is also being linked to fraudulent activity.
• it's theft because Google is involved in publishing stolen copyright material by continuing to index the website in its search engine after it has been notified about it.

How did I find out?
I have various phrases associated with my website/blogs set up on Google Alerts [http://www.google.com/alerts] - not to be confused with www.googlealert.com which is nothing to do with Google. Guess who got stitched up on that domain name!

Every time the phrase is used in something indexed by Google I get an e-mail alert. The number of alerts I've had in the last 24 hours which are actually associated with spam blogs is getting quite ridiculous - hence this post.

I very much recommend that you also set up Google alerts for your blog's name and any similar 'phrases' to see if your content is also being scraped.

How did I report the theft and the abuse?
What I did was I found the website for reporting abuse of abuse of Google Ad-Sense, located the e-mail address and reported the abuse. The e-mail address is " adsense-abuse@google.com ". (They call it a 'policy violation'. I call if theft.)

You should report:

• the names/URLs/posts of websites/blog sites from which content is being scraped
• if your content is copyright protected and whether there is a notice to this effect on site
• your concern that income is being generated for thieves committing fraud through the use of Google Ad-Sense adverts on the offending site
  

You will get an automated response. This is it.

We've received your email alerting us to a potential policy violation on a site displaying Google ads. Although we're unable to respond to individual reports, we have forwarded your email to our team of specialists for further investigation.

We appreciate your help in maintaining the quality of the AdSense program.

Sincerely,
The Google AdSense Team

Dissatisfied with this initial response to a statement of their involvement in a theft of copyrighted material, I wrote again and indicated I was about to start blogging about it and got this (automated?) response

Hello Katherine,

Thanks for writing in. I understand your concern about your content being re-posted on other sites. Upon investigation of the sites you've listed, it appears that the blogs in question have been since been suspended.

Please know that publishers participating in AdSense may not display Google ads on web pages with content protected by copyright law unless they have the necessary legal rights to display that content. Should you find that your content is being replicated on other sites, rest assured that we will take action as necessary to address the issue.

We appreciate your patience and understanding.

Sincerely,

Diane
The Google AdSense Team

I've reported a number of further breaches in the last 12 hours and am back to the original automated response.

Why is it a problem?
The problem exists because Google has created opportunities for it the problem exist and is not doing enough to close down those who operate in this way. This is not a new problem. I did a little bit of investigation and found more than a few articles about it. Here are links to a couple.

• Rich Miller at Netcraft (a reputable security oriented internet company):
• Google draws fire over Blogspot spam blogs
• New Google Ads could influence hosting affiliate programs
• Yahoo News: Study exposes Spam Blogs - reporting on a joint Microsoft/University of California study
  

Often, legitimate companies have their advertisements served on questionable sites through redirections designed to "obfuscate the connection between the advertisers and the spammers," the researchers wrote.........If those links are clicked, the doorway pages then redirect to other pages, potentially bringing revenue back to its controller via pay-per-click advertising offered by companies such as Google Inc. through its AdSense program.

and

A responsibility also lies with advertisers to assert greater control over where and how their ads are placed.

"Ultimately, it is advertisers' money that is funding the search spam industry, which is increasingly cluttering the Web with low-quality content and reducing Web users' productivity," they wrote.

How to get Google to do something?
So long as Google's search engine continues to index spam blogs and Google Ad-Sense continues to serve up adverts to spam blogs then:

• blogs like mine - and yours - will continue to be scraped of content
  
• copyright breaches will continue
• income generated as a result will mean that content authors are being defrauded
  
• people advertising using Google Ad-Sense will be defrauded.

I sat and pondered on why Google hasn't done anything. And decided that one of the reasons may be that advertisers are not aware of how bad the problem is. If advertisers started pulling their adverts and/or pressurising Google then maybe Google would get it sorted.

So I've decided to start listing all the advertisers appearing on the same page of the spam blogs hosting my stolen content. This at least would alert advertisers to where their adverts were being placed.

Some of the advertisers are small operations - some are individual artists - and some are major companies - including Microsoft! All are potentially being defrauded by the sites hosting my stolen copyrighted content. None appear to be exerting sufficient control over where their adverts appear and all need to check what sort of site their adverts are appearing on.

1. www.nostalgicpen.com - an artist's pen and ink artwork
   
2. www.turnercreative.co.uk - an architectural illustrator
3. uk.shopping.com - buying pencils
4. www.drawnbymike.com - on the spot caricature
5. www.mrpen.co.uk - quality pens
6. www.NailDesignEuroDiscount.com - nail art pen
7. microsoft.com.sharepoint - free trials of Microsoft sharepoint 2007 software
8. elite-supplements.co.uk - anabolic steroids book
9. www.bug.co.uk - training
10. www.investmentu.com - stock reports
11. www.newmexicoindianmarket.com - Indian blankets
12. www.clubmed.co.uk - holidays
13. www.langdale.co.uk/easter - holidays
14. www.monaco2007.com - Holiday apartments
15. www.directrelief.org - Gulf hurricane relief (charity?)
    

I wonder how long it will take for a representative from Google Ad-Sense will turn up to comment on this post to identify what they are doing to halt this sort of abuse. Or maybe they don't pay attention to what people are saying about them on the Internet?

If you are an artist paying for Ad-Sense to advertise your art - you might want to pause and think about the wisdom of your investment. Your adverts might be turning up on spam blogs and getting listed on blog posts like this.....................

Links:

• Google Ad-Sense - don't sign up before you have checked out the search engines for reviews of abuses of Ad-Sense
  
• Google Ad-Sense Abuse - write to adsense-abuse@google.com
• Google Alerts (beta)

Technorati tags: ad-sense abuse, google ad-sense

Travels with a sketchbook in London: a summary

This is a summary of all the sketches on this blog which relate to London. I'll update it at the end of every month if I've posted sketches relating to London in that month. A link to this summary is included in the 'trip summary section' in the right hand column.

Recent sketches in London can see seen either in the list of posts relating to the current month in the archive or by clicking on the category 'London'.

[Amended August 2007] The sketches are grouped first according to the area of London and as stated in the description beneath each area (rather than the date they were first posted as I'm still transferring sketches to this blog from my main blog).

Central London

This section contains sketches of places in the City of London and central London and of areas along and immediately north and south of the River Thames east of Tate Britain and west of Tower Bridge - including Bankside in Southwark. The order below is east to west rather than date order. [Section summary added September 2007]

• Northern Rock - Drawings from the Front Line sketches done during the first 'run' on a bank in the UK since the nineteenth century. This post introduced the new 'tag' of 'life events'.
• 10th International Sketchcrawl - the results a fish stall in Borough Market, London Bridge looking east towards the Tower of London and and Tower Bridge, outside Southwark Cathedral, Wright Brothers, an Oyster and Ale House, Southwark Bridge and St Paul's Cathedral 
• A 'trip' to Borough Market, Southwark and views of the marketplace
• Walbrook Wharf and Southwark Bridge - This is almost a nocturne. At the end of November I sketched barges on the River Thames at Walbrook Wharf, with Southwark Bridge and the sun setting behind them.  
• The Barbican Terrace - a sketch of the Terrace in February
• Sketching at the Brokers Wine Bar - inside the Brokers Wine Bar in Leadenhall 
• Leadenhall Market - an initial sketch of Leadenhall Market  
• Sitting on the steps of St Paul's Cathedral in the sun - a contre jour sketch of Ludgate Hill
• From Bankside to the City of London: the view from Tate Modern - a view of St Paul's Cathedral, the 'old' Nat West Tower and 'the Gherkin' from rooms in Tate Modern - the national gallery of international modern art.
• St Paul's Cathedral from Tate Modern - this includes a view of the Millenium foot Bridge over the River Thames
• Room with a view - a view of St Pauls Cathedral from the Friends Room at Tate Modern
  
• Sketching at night by the Thames - St Paul's Cathedral at night and the Thames Bridges at night 
• Sketching Tate Modern people - people on the grass outside Tate Modern  
• The Millenium Bridge - The view that nobody draws - This is the view the other way round. I'm sat looking down the remainder of Peter's Hill to the Millenium Bridge and the Tate Modern.
• Barts and The Bankside Gallery - a view of the interior of the Bankside Gallery and the Great Hall at Barts Hospital
  
• The shoreline at Bankside - a plein air sketch of the shoreline on the south side of the River Thames at Bankside. The bridges you can see are the Blackfriars Railway Bridge and then Blackfriars Bridge carrying the road just beyond it.
• More sketching at Bankside - Another sketch of Blackfriars Bridge and more history of the area. 
• Sketching with watercolour pencils at the Bankside - sketching on a Sunday and an experiment with watercolour pencils

 

• The Courtauld, Old Bank of England and West Smithfield - a visit to areas around and about Fleet Street and Smithfield and sketches of lunch in the interior of an ex bank and West Smithfield in the spring
• The Temple and Temple Church - a visit to The Temple and a sketch of the Temple Church plus some historical facts about the Inns of Court, the Temple Church and Knights Templar.
• St Pancras International - home of the Eurostar and Lunch at Carluccios at St Pancras International - an interior view of both the restaurant and the home of the Eurostar. Plus John Betjeman and St Pancras - a sketch of Betjeman's status at St Pancras.  
• Sketching at Seven Dials -  a sketch of people sat around the great big Sundial Pillar (it has six sundials) at the centre of a junction of seven roads (between Soho and Covent Garden)
• Sketching in Neal's Yard - two views of Neal's Yard, a small courtyard which is a slightly hippy home to healthy food near Covent Garden
• RWS Friends: Sketching at the Royal Festival Hall - this has a view of Parliament and Embankment Place (above Charing Cross Station) from the RFH and a view down into the Skylon Restaurant and out to the Riverside Terrace and the Thames  
• A view of Charing Cross Station and Embankment Gardens - the same location but a different sketching group and this time a panoramic vista

• Embankment Pier and Thames at Charing Cross - sketching the view looking west while sat at the base of Cleopatra's needle 
• Storm clouds over Westminster - a preliminary sketch study for a drawing from Committee Room 4 in 3 Robert Street, looking down the Rover Thames towards Westminster  
• The Christmas Tree in Trafalgar Square - a sketch produced with very little light on the evening they switched on the lights of the Christmas Tree
• Lunch at the National Cafe - a series of lectures about drawing in October 2007 meant I visited the National Gallery every Wednesday lunchtime - and this is the pen and ink drawing of the interior of the National Cafe which I drew after the lecture on drawing. 
• Lunch in the National Cafe #2 - another in my series of sketches drawn while havling lunch.
• Drawings from the National Gallery - more drawings after another lecture on drawing at the National Gallery.
  
• Lunch at the National Dining Rooms and sketching at the National Gallery - views of my pudding (Eton mess), the front of the National Gallery and Trafalgar Square - plus a sketch from inside the National Cafe looking out and of one of the paintings in the National Gallery.
  
• High Spots in Westminster and Trafalgar Square - the view from the Portrait Restaurant at the top of the National Portrait Gallery
• Drawing, tea and DVDs at the National Portrait Gallery - the same sketch from the Portrait Restaurant while having a "Portrait Tea" at dusk on a rainy day in January.
• Westminster at Night - another sketch of the view from the Portrait Restaurant at night.
• Lunch at the Portrait Cafe - a sketch of the cafe in the basement of the National Portrait Gallery 
• Sketching at the Wallace Collection - three sketches of the interior of the Gallery in Manchester Square
• Sketching Soho with Julie Oakley - sketching in Gerrard Street in Chinatown starts a day in central London of sketching, talking about art and viewing art with Julie Oakley
• Sketching and quotations from the NEAC Exhibition - sketching in the Mall Galleries during a talk by Ken Howard at the Annual Exhibition of the New English Art Club 
• RI Exhibition at the Mall Galleries - another sketch over a cup of tea
• Drawing trees in St James Park - a 32 inch sketch of the panorama of the lake and trees in St James Park  
• Horseguards Parade and the Lake in St James Park - an early evening sketch
• Lunch at Fortnum and Masons - an epic sketching session. Three large sketches over lunch before I saw the Summer Exhibition across the road at the Royal Academy of Arts.
• Tea at Fortnum and Masons after the Summer Exhibition - a sketch done a pot of Darjeeling and a cream tea in the old tea rooms at Fortnum & Masons. Fond memories!
• A day out in Piccadilly - I spent the day with fellow blogger Robyn of 'Have Dogs, Will Travel' seeing exhibitions, eating and buying books and this is the result.
  
• Sketching at The RA - The Friends Room #1 - one of my first ever blog posts and a theme which has continued
  
• Sketching at The RA - The Friends Room #2 - a sketch done while having tea in the Friends Room after visiting the exhibition 'Impressionists by the Sea'
  
• Sketching at The RA - The Friends Room #3 - plus tips on how to sketch a room like the Friends Room 
• Sketching at the RA - The Friends Room #4 and #5 - more drawings from the Friends Room at the Royal Academy of Arts   
• Sketching at the RA - Friends Room #6 - after the Van Gogh exhibition
•  Sketching at the RA - Friends Room #7
• Just time for a cup of tea - and a sketch - sketching at The Wolseley, a very popular a cafe-restuarant at 160 Piccadilly.
• RWS Sketching Day in South Kensington and sketches of the Roual Albert hall and the Royal College of Music 
• Panoramic sketchbooks and Kensington Gardens - trialling a new panoramic sketchbook on the views in Kensington Gardens
• Dining and sketching at the Tate Britain restaurant - lunch in the Rex Whistler restaurant at Tate Britain with Shirley.  
• Hampstead - Flask Walk, Burgh House and John Constable - sketching in Flask Walk and Well Walk
• Hampstead Heath and the Boating Pond - a couple of sketches on an sunny August day which started off with a downpour!

Pool of London / East London / Greenwich

This section follows the Thames upstream from the Olympic site around the Bow Back Rivers to Tower Bridge and the Pool of London.  It covers areas either side - Spitalfields, the East End, Isle of Dogs and Canary Wharf (the new financial centre) to the North and Rotherhithe to the south. Again the order is from East to West. [Section summary added September 2007]

• Sketching the Olympic Park - and where you can sketch it too
• Old Ford Lock - and some ancient tales of the pre-Romans and where Queen Matilda fell in the river back in the 12th century
• Formans and Fish island  - opposite the Olympic site
• Sketching Victoria Park and the Hertford Union - scenes from the first recreational park in the East End and an adjacent canal
• Developing a view of the East Lake - this is the quieter East Lake in Victoria Park
• Sunday in the Park - a sketch of the main promenade in Victoria Park on August Bank Holiday Sunday

• Victoria Park: the Tea Pavilion - a sketch from a hot June morning in Victoria Park
• Victoria Park Lakes and a few birds - a sketch on a cold day in January 
• Lake Trees and a veggie breakfast - the view from my veggie breakdast across the lake in Victoria Park
• An introduction to the Ecology Park Pond series - about my project to record a pond and surroundings over the course of one year plus The Ecology Park pond in December - an update
  
• The Green Bridge - the Millenium bridge (a bridge with a park and trees on top) built over one of the main road into London from Essex 
• It's a watercolour......... - of Willow Pond 
• Herons, coots and goslings - grooming, housekeeping and babysitting - I start getting into sketching East End birds!  
• 8,000 steps 3.8 miles 456 calories! and more sketches from the Ecology Park ponds
• 13th International Sketchcrawl: Sketches of the Pool of London
• Rotherhithe: the Mayflower and Brunel - historic locations in a short stretch of riverside in south London
  
• Wapping: the Pier Head and Old Custom House - the old entrance to the old London Docks
  
• Shad Thames, Tower Bridge and the Pool of London - a view from Wapping of what was once the busiest area on the River Thames.
• The religious extremes of Fournier Street in Spitalfields - highlights the mosque and Hawksmoor's great church at either end of Fournier Street 
• Columbia Road Market on a Sunday morning - two sketches of the famous East London flower market 

Greenwich

This section is views of Greenwich or from Greenwich. Posts are not in date order.

• Canary Wharf Sky 31st January 2007 - the view from next to the Old Royal Observatory in Greenwich Park - looking down to the Old Royal Naval College and the National maritime Museum and beyond over to the Isle of Dogs and the skyscrapers at Canary Wharf on the other side of the River Thames.
• Greenwich - very nearly sitting on zero - a view of the Royal Observatory at the top of the hill in Greenwich Park - which is where the Prime Meridian lies. Plus some observations on the Palace of Placentia.
  
• 16th Worldwide Sketchcrawl - the result - good intentions of sketching along the Prime Meridian are scuppered by a slow puncture only discovered when I get to Greenwich Park. But I did a sketch anyway - of the view towards the Millenium Dome/O2 Arena.
  
• A Canaletto View - a sketch of the view of the Old Royal Navel College in Greenwich from Island Gardens on the Isle of Dogs plus old sailing ships
• Trafalgar Tavern and low tide on the Thames- a sketch of the view to the left of the Naval College - at very low tide
  
• Boxing Day ice skating at Greenwich - Ice skating at the Old Royal Naval College.

West London and Kew Gardens

West London is defined as anything which comes with the area known as Greater London which is west of Tate Britain and Vauxhall Bridge. [Section summary added September 2007]

• Good Friday at Kew Gardens - sketches of the Palm House and Syon Reach
• The Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew in June - a sketch of the terrace outside the Orangery and photos of some of the flowers in bloom at Kew on 1st June
• Henry Moore in Kew Gardens - a visit in October 2007 to view monumental sculpture in a world heritage setting
• Sketching the Japanese Landscape at Kew Gardens. This post contains a few basic reminders about useful practices when sketching - plus a few other items of interest to those visiting Kew in Spring and Summer 2008
  
• Taking tea at Kew Gardens - a sketch of people taking tea at the Kew Plaza cafe in May   
• Autumn at the Sackler Crossing, Kew Gardens - a sketch of the vivid colours of the gardens in autumn
• Tea at The Kew Greenhouse - a sketch of the interior of the cafe near Kew Station on the way back to the tube
• Peacocks, palms and magnolias - Kew Gardens in April - sketches inside the Temperate House and outside the Orangery

Reference Books - Book Reviews

• Byfield and Binney: London Sketchbook