Linocut sketch: Navarrenx salmon poster/postcard

© Peter Gander

My brother David lives with his wife Lindy and daughter Nancy in a fortified medieval town called Navarrenx in the Béarn region of south-west France, close to the foothills of the Pyrenees. Navarrenx was the first fortified town to be built in France (in 1316) and reminds me of Canterbury near my home in Kent, as it has a wall and ramparts surrounding it and, like Canterbury, you cannot walk around the town without being aware that the place is steeped in history. A minute’s walk from my brother's front door is the ‘Gave d’Oloron’, a picturesque salmon river that I have fished myself - not for salmon as yet, but I have caught rainbow trout here, cooked on a riverside barbecue minutes after being caught! David and Lindy run Galerie Le Petit Chien and I have threatened to produce some Navarrenx-themed artwork many times before, so this morning I finally got down to sketching out this poster/postcard design en route to London on the train. By the way, any similarity to the golden age of travel poster design is purely intentional - I do love the retro feel that it has ;) The bridge is drawn from memory and I have since checked my pics of the bridge and it doesn’t have as many arches, so I will need to address that, but generally I am very content with the design. Fiona suggests I make the happy angler look in the direction of his quarry too, which is a fair point, as the two elements are a little disconnected. This will be a two-colour linocut, in black and a blue-grey and will be a tad smaller than A3 size. I will make handmade limited edition prints of this and I will also scan and produce postcards from these prints for their gallery too. Permanent pen and graphite pencil (grey areas) on parchment sketchbook. © Peter Gander