by Graeme Webb

Neither quite blue nor truly black, Payne’s Grey has haunted artists’ palettes for over two centuries. Invented by 18th-century watercolorist William Payne as a moody alternative to flat black, this stormy, atmospheric hue became a quiet revolution in the art of shadow. FromTurner’s clouded skies to George Shaw’s suburban gloom, it’s a color that whispers rather than shouts—always elegant, always just off-center. This is the story of a pigment that darkened the world in the most poetic way possible.

David Bowie didn’t just write lyrics — he assembled them like puzzles, borrowing a trick from the literary avant-garde. Inspired by the cut-up technique of William S. Burroughs and Brion Gysin, Bowie used randomness to shake loose fresh images and unexpected meanings. Whether with scissors and glue or a computer program called the Verbasizer, he fractured sentences to let the subconscious speak. This approach became a powerful tool in his artistic reinvention, fueling some of his most surreal and iconic work.

I'm shortly going to revisit my 'Evolution of the Pod' series using natural inks from plants and vegetables instead of the acrylic and spirit based ones that I currently use. This introduction to the process is a little reminder to myself that ill have to get cracking as woodland fruits will soon becoming avaiable. 

This 45×45 cm mixed-media painting is a piece from my 'Urban Glyphs' series.  Its diifferent to the previous canvases as its a layered 3D construction on heavyweight archival card. Set within a deep shadow box frame, the piece transcends the flatness of traditional painting by incorporating sculptural elements—cut-out geometric forms, especially circular discs, which are raised above the main surface. These elements cast real shadows, altering the viewer’s perception as they move around the piece. I also used some techniques related to my post on chance aesthetics, using randomly placed stencils and masking tape on the lower layers which then inform the later levels up to 7 in total.

Spend five minutes with The Oliver Shaw Experience and you’ll wonder where this strange, beautiful noise has been hiding. Frontman Oliver Shaw isn’t just another brooding singer-songwriter from Camden. He’s something of a modern-day poetic prophet — equal parts Beckett, Cobain, and Milligan (Spike that is) with a soupçon of Syd Barrett and backed by a band that sounds like they’ve dragged their amps straight through the dark side of the moon.

Brian Eno and artist Peter Schmidt dreamt up a deck of cards called Oblique Strategies in 1975 . Each card has a cryptic prompt or constraint meant to “break creative blocks” by pushing you into sideways thinking.

Visited Tate Briain at the end of May 2025 to catch the Ed Atkins exhibition, photos below are general views from that visit. Tate Britain has a completely different character to its bigger brother the Tate Modern, less brash and noisy and it is quite relaxing to wonder though the galleries.

As the cover artist for several Beatnpress titles, I have witnessed firsthand the unique quality and creativity that define this independent press and its authors and poets.  I started providing cover art for titles like Danny Gray’s Beat Dimensions a year or two ago.

Chance aesthetics breaks away from traditional notions of artistic mastery by embracing uncertainty as a creative force. By incorporating randomness, artists can tap into deeper subconscious ideas, unexpected beauty, and innovative techniques that challenge conventional artistic boundaries. Whether you’re a painter, writer, musician, or performer, using chance can open up exciting new directions in your work (Above my attempts at Surrealist Automatism, Uncontrolled drawing with random colours of ink over collaged text, see below).

I’ve had the privilege of knowing Danny Gray for a while now, and I was quite honored when he asked me to provide paintings for the covers of Beat Dimensions and his more recent volume, Up Beat Down.

In the Evolution of the Pod series, my primary focus was to explore the dynamic interplay between ink and watercolour, utilising their contrasting qualities to reflect the organic and transformative nature of the pod motif. Working on handmade paper, I used the lightly textured, absorbent surface as an integral part of the visual experience, allowing the medium’s natural behaviours to influence the final outcome.