This web site is a focus for sketching, art and travel. It's not meant to be a 'showcase' of my work, it's more about sharing the joy of sketching and providing opportunities to do it as part of an adventure. I find sketching invaluable, enjoyable and challenging, and like most good things in life, (like exercising), I find it difficult to do on a regular basis. I mean the floor needs polishing, I'm running out of milk and there are internet forums to visit!

This web site is inspired by and dedicated to my grandfather James. He left school at 14 and started work at the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast as an apprentice cabinet maker. He worked there all of his life until his retirement aged around 70. (Before the days of mandatory retirement at 65).

This photograph is typical of the time when James would have been an apprentice, it shows the men heading home after their day's work. In this photograph you can also see part of he famous Titanic under construction in the background.

I stayed with James and his wife Mary in their typical tiny, red bricked terraced house in the back streets of Belfast just off the Ormeau road, for over 6 months as a young boy when I was only nine years old. I had just arrived back from New Zealand with my parents, What a contrast to the sun filled beaches. I remember vividly standing on the deck of the ocean liner as we docked in a freezing cold grey winters day in Belfast.

I remember the heavy winter snow, the thick smoke filled fog, the glow of the gas lamps in the streets at night, the man in the horse and cart selling coal and many more childhood memories of that time and place.

James got up very early every morning, had breakfast of an Ulster fry, made up his lunch box and headed out the door in all weathers to walk the two and a half miles or so to the shipyard. He worked 49 hours per week back then for around £2 in wages.

James was a tall, well built, plain and hard working man who always wore a black suit with open white shirt and a flat cap. Typical working man's clothes in Belfast in those days. He hardly missed a day off work in his life through ill health. His house was furnished top to bottom with his beautiful craftmanship.

He was always very kind, patient and considerate to me.

If I can turn up to my art every day and have a work ethic like my Grandfather I'll better honour his name.

Through my work and his inspiration I've managed to visit, sketch, draw, paint and photograph places he would never have imagined possible, given his circumstances and background. I'm very thankful I continue to have the opportunities to do this.

Barry McCullough