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Band Practice 30th July 2026
Our band has changed its name from “Edgeworth Band” to “The Camden Market Free Art Man”. I haven’t told Emma yet but gave her a copy of our latest album under the new name, so she’ll notice at some point. I can hardly believe a search through my YouTube videos suggests that last night was the first time we’ve played together…
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Oil on stretched canvas. Approx 7 x 5 in/ 18 x 13 cm. In my Ebay and Etsy shops £25 each. Free postage to UK and Europe. Ready to hang so don’t need a frame or any attachments. Signed and titled on the back in pencil. Buying work from my shop help my FREE ART FREES ART campaign to make art freely available to members of the public who do interviews for my CAMDEN MARKET FREE ART MAN display.
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HHJ Home | Etsy | Ebay | Release Heckel’s Horse | Donate
Now my home studio has been cleared out to make room for our weekly Thursday afternoon band practices, I have enough floor space to do some bulk paintings. Three at a time, each set of three taking roughly an hour, two sets per day. All are oil paintings for my Heckel’s Horse Jr series on stretched canvas. Today I got an extra painting done in the first session, so ended up with a total of seven paintings. Here’s me standing with the second set of today’s paintings:
Under each painting is a page from the Heckel’s Horse Jr catalogue I did for an exhibition at Highgate Literary and Scientific Institution in 2024. It was at this exhibition that I first met Ron Throop @ronthroop and Rose Throop in person for the first time. The pages are nailed to the wall to act as a guide, but I’ve painted so many versions of these paintings I rarely look at them. Both of today’s painting sessions were filmed on my webcam and published on YouTube. Here are the paintings from today’s first session:
After a long period favouring acrylic over oil, mainly due to its faster drying time, I’m now back on oil. The problem I’ve been having with acrylic recently is that it dries too fast on the palette when I’m painting in my expressionist style. Acrylic’s fine for flat colour painting, as I know which colours I’ll be using and can paint them one at a time. But for the expressionist paintings, I need to have all colours instantly available. Having to stop and squeeze tubes every couple of minutes, and judge how much to squeeze doesn’t work. When it comes to painting three or more expressionist paintings concurrently, it has to be oil.
To keep this rate going, assuming it’s to be a weekly half-day painting event, I’ll need to sell a few to pay for the stretched canvas. Even aside from the money, I’ll need to sell them as stretched canvas takes storage space my house doesn’t have. A friend recently gave me a load of blank canvases and oil paints, so I’ll be fine for the next few weeks even if none sell. For my oil on canvas work, I’ve stopped putting Advertism on the front. Adverism needs glue, and I’m not gluing these oil paintings. I like the matt oil look Pierre Bonnard and Gauguin paintings have when it comes to this looser work. The flat colour acrylic pop art’s different.
As well as the seven Heckel’s Horse Jr paintings, I reworked a couple of old paintings I did under my real name, Edgeworth Johnstone. They both had borders around the edge, which I don’t like any more. I used to like putting borders into paintings after seeing some German Expressionists doing it, and in particular, Billy Childish when I started working in his studio around 2013. All these paintings will take a few weeks to dry enough to put in my online stores, so I’ll still have to do some acrylic work in the meantime to keep the regular flow of work into my online shops going. My goal is to have two hundred oil on canvas artworks in each of my online shops by 2027. I’ll be the Ryan Air of art and revolutionise its business model through FREE ART FREES ART. If I’m going back to Thailand this winter, I’ll need to get painting.
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HHJ Home | Etsy | Ebay | Release Heckel’s Horse | Donate
Original oil paintings on paper that I glued onto the cardboard backing. I put two hole in the top corners so it can be hung on the wall. No need to buy a frame or any attachments. I signed it on the back in pencil.
These paintings are part of a series called “Heckel’s Horse Jr Self-Portrait”. Each are numbered on the back. Approx 36cm x 36cm.
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Original oil paintings I did on plywood. I attached the frame around it and put a hole in the back so it can be hung on the wall. No need to buy a frame or any attachments. I hand printed the lettering, stamping each letter individually in good quality oil based printing inks, and signed it on the back in pencil. A limited edition of 8, each numbered on the back. Approx 10 x 8 inches / 25 x 20 cm.
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Today was the new look Camden Market Free Art Man.
New colour co-ordinated signage, new LP style paintings for people to flick through as if looking for an album in a record store, and my new album Class on CD. The only copies of my album anyone took today were people I gave them to without them asking. For anyone to take one voluntarily I’ll have to attach them to an artwork. Camden’s more known for music than art, and a similar type of music to what I make. Guitar based alternative, punk, it’s taken me two years to get my albums to Camden, way too long. The table makes art that was otherwise on the ground a lot more popular:
A problem with the new signage is that it’s no longer clear enough that you’re supposed to do an interview for a painting, and that they’re not just free to take and then walk off. Quite a few people took a painting today without doing the interview, but as long as it’s just a Blond Card it doesn’t matter. I’ll get some new signage done for next weekend to stop this happening so much.
The LP style painting table today was a trial run, and did pretty well. Next weekend I’ll have at least three tables up with signage on the front of each box. Hopefully it will make the Blond Cards less popular and get some bigger and more powerful Advertism up on people’s walls. I like the idea of people all standing next to each other on the pavement flicking through paintings. Those queuing up for an ice cream on the other side of the road will think I’m giving away records and come over. It was Alan, the town crier’s idea to do the lettering on a yellow background.
The overall display still isn’t getting many people photographing it, far less than stop and photograph Zombie and Alan, but that’ll change when more tables are out and there’s more bright signage asking them all to do the interview. The legs of the tables need something painted on them, but not sure what yet. I’ll need to find somewhere in Camden to store these tables, as it’s all getting too much to carry on the bus as it is. Shelley let me store today’s table at Maddarings, her silver jewellery stall where I get my rings from. Some of my art promotes Maddarings. If she can take the other tables, it just needs to be figured out how to get them to me in the mornings. Another reason to get Aon over here from Thailand to help out.
Aon was going to come this summer, but then the peace talks failed, oil jumped to over $100 again and return tickets from Bangkok to London went from £700 to £1500. 2026 is all preparation anyway. 2025 I did all the wrong work. 2026, I’m learning what art works at Camden and how to mass produce it. 2027, if all goes to plan, will have all the right work done in advance, have both Aon and I in operation in London, and therefore be the first year I expect to make some real progress getting FREE ART FREES ART off the ground.
Once it’s publicly demonstrated that giving your art away on the street is, not only an alternative business model to the traditional gallery one, but a superior one. Other artists will try it and the model can spread. So to get the money rolling in, my online shops have been filling up with more work. Especially scheduling online auctions. If all this can get sorted out this year, 2027 will be all set and ready to go.
Edgeworth Johnstone 