About Us -
There are Three of us and two Rats.
We are all Artists in our own right as well as writers and poets although the rats have yet to produce anything worth reading.
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Island Artists - the line up
The gang below - on the left top Ratman: centre: Bill and right: Bobbin.
Bottom row left to right: Ratty, Sophie the Cat and Posh Rat
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Bob Collins Island Artist & Poet
Bob has a unique take on poems and painting. He is a well known artist on Sheppey and has painted some fine watercolors. His favortite theme is what he calls 'Dreamscapes' which are landscapes of local areas with a dream-like twist that disturbs the normality of his work. He does this with his poems that are meant to be read aloud and not just read from the page.
Bob was born on the Isle of Sheppey and has lived there most of his life. As far as I know he hasn’t got webbed feet, which according to popular myth, sets apart a native Sheppey resident from any other. (He likes water?) But Bob being different will always do his thing his way. His paintings are different and mostly about boats but in his own words:
“James has asked me for a profile,
so I’se put up my crayon,
picked up pen and do as I do,
I started to write as a teenager
and just as in my twenties,
I had great ambition
but failed in my day job,
as a potter (Wee o wee)
Still I persevere
I’ve written and painted
(exhibiting mostly boat paintings).
Since these early years
I do have some success
in my published works (Poetry Now)
I find I write with a Christian vogue
and enjoy over forty poems published.
Here with James are the sometimes published sometimes new for you to review, I hope you enjoy.
Crayon Ahoy.” (Bob)
And like me (James Apps - I write my name to remember who I am) he too writes in crayon. For his water color painting he uses coloring in books and painting by numbers without the numbers for oils. (He is really very good.)
Bob is a little ambiguous about Rats.
Bill Anthony - writer and poet
Bill is a lively, venerable and curious Indian gentleman who began life as a young student in an Indian school run on strict English Raj lines. His formal education fitted him to muck it with the best and in the 1960's he arrived in England looking for the pot of gold. Unable to find it he decided to create one for himself and from humble beginnings he rose from the breadline and became an Engineer. Bill is from Sittingbourne. Retired engineer who originated from India and can add a dimension to our performances that he describes as being delivered in a Bombay Welsh accent.
Bill is a witty individual with a sense of fun and a great awareness of his role in life as a Grumpy Old Man. Planted, raised and grazed in Jewel in the Crown - formation and schooling. Exported to England for further training and tertiary education. Hard graft exposure in England, Ethiopia, Zambia, Saudi Arabia and Botswana in the mechanical engineering and construction fields. Widely travelled - 29 countries. Worked and mingled with 27 nationalities. Married with three daughters and four grandchildren. Now retired. Hobbies and activities: reading, writing,drawing and sketching, DIY jobs, gardening, socialising, current and international affairs, Western classical music and Indian instrumental music. Ex-member Lions International, ex-member CAB and Swale Minorities Panel, member of the Swale Seniors Forum and Sheppey and Sittingbourne Writers' Group.
Currently studying all sorts of things at Open Uni he also tells good stories of his native land and explores the rich area of imagination between his Indian roots and his English lifestyle. Bill is a witty, intelligent man who has a way with the ladies and can charm them into listening to the most outrageous tales.
The Ship's Rat 'Ratty' Ratty was discovered at the Sea Sheppey event in Blue Town - Ratman who was drunk and starving nearly ate him but was persuaded by a large helping of pork and onions and a huge bread roll to delay the feast and give Ratty his freedom. The creature has remained with Island Artists ever since and has become a part of the crew.
James Apps was born in Chatham in Kent in 1942 and in spite of the Charlie Chaplin look alike who was doing his best to take over the world seemed to enjoy his childhood. An avid reader of the Beano and the Dandy and other such erudite publications he learned to write his own stories and poems in crayon and has continued to do so ever since.
Struck by the dreadful logic of Alice in Wonderland, Through the looking Glass and the Owl and the Pussycat he never forgot where the truth that made the world operate lie and so, many years later and not yet in his dotage he wrote The Turval and the Grobble. The book is a combination of his thoughts and ideas gathered throughout his many years as a Fitter and Turner in the UK, New Zealand and Australia. Although the poem has little to do with work, his keen enthusiasm for motorcycling, his almost worshipful devotion to his cats, earning a Masters Degree in English Literature at Auckland University or in fact anything to do with normal living, it does spring from a versatile and strange mind.
Using his crayons he paints pictures on canvas although so far he has never yet had to paint a tent. His ambition is to is to have a stranger approach him in the street and say “You're that fat hairy poet bloke, ain’t you? You know, whatisisname.” And to be able to answer with all modesty “Yes”.
The Turval and the Grobble is available @ £3.00 a copy plus pp from the author - e-mail: cat-person@live.co.uk
Addition to the crew kindly donated by Ruth Partis who seems to think we need a bit of class on the site. Introducing Posh Ratty - full name Reginald V Rattington-Smythe (the V stands for vermin but we don't mention that in his hearing)
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