Our Jack is Back | Jack Holmes
by Northern Life
It was just a year ago that we first introduced you to our Jack. Here Jack Holmes shares his latest work, offering us an insight into his home town of Keighley.
Self-taught artist Jack Holmes left his beloved town of Keighley over 50 years ago and moved to the suburbs of Birmingham, and at the age of 76 he refreshes those memories every time he heads back to Yorkshire to visit his family. Formerly an engineer, Jack served his National Service in Nairobi and painting posters and signs at his RAF base. Returning to Civvy Street, Jack worked as a long-distance lorry driver and a bus driver in Birmingham, and later turned his artistic talent into a small business as a signwriter, painting shop signs and vehicles.
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- Lodecker by Jack Holmes. Bristol Lodekker bus turning into into Keighley bus station in the 1970s with the Cavendish Hotel is in the background on the corner of Lawkholme Lane.
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- An oil painting of a northern scene in the snow. Can you see the ghost at the window? The pub is run down and closed due to declining sales, but it brings out the atmosphere of harder times to come.
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- Silsden Consevative Club 1900s by Jack Holmes. This Oil painting depecits the Conservative Club in Silsden at the turn of the last century at the bottom of Addingham Road.
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- No 22 by Jack Holmes. Oil painting of a number 22 double decker bus turning into Cavendish Street on the Journey from Riddlesden to Brackeden Bank, Ingrow.
Jack and his wife Ann, who have two daughters, two grand-daughters and a great-grandson, have been happily settled ‘down south’ for many years, but Jack can’t resist returning to Keighley when he can. He enjoys nothing more than painting the streets, shops and characters he remembers so fondly from his youth.
Jack has also provided the comic strip on the Letters page, is there no end to this chap’s talents?
For more details or to purchase one of Jack’s paintings go to picturesandpaintings.org.uk
