Locos in Profile | Artist

I now live in Medway, Kent, UK, but my formative years were spent to the south of London, between Morden and Sutton. I would often cycle to one of the footbridges at the south-west end of Wimbledon Station and enjoy the steam hauled main line trains thundering underneath me. I also visited the Talyllyn and Ffestiniog railways while on holiday with my parents in the early sixties.

My real interest in railways dates from a visit to the Bluebell Railway, Sussex, in 1974 and decided that I wanted to learn a lot more. This led me to visit Camden library, which was near my work place, and read my way through their stock of books on railway history and steam locomotives. At the same time I became a member of the Bluebell Railway Preservation Society and visited other steam railways around the country.

An early illustration – GWR 4054 Princess Charlotte.

Being (what was then called) a commercial artist working in advertising I started producing drawings of steam locomotives during the late seventies. To start with they were ink line drawings with flat colour added, but later more detail was added and an airbrush employed to make them three-dimensional. After a break I came back to illustrating locomotives – this time using the technology I was now using in my everyday work. This has enabled the production of the highly detailed artworks you see today.

One of my earlier illustration of the Bluebell Railway's locomotive Stepney was printed and sold to benefit the railway. I've also supplied various graphics for the society.


34059 Sir Archibald Sinclair's nameplate crest.		Plaque used when 21C123 is renamed O.V.S. Bulleid.

My involvement with the Bluebell led to me being asked to produce the artwork for Battle of Britain Class, No. 34059 Sir Archibald Sinclair's enamelled plaques. Although I had one of the originals as a guide this was damaged so I needed to do some research to produced the new artwork. Later I produced the artwork for the shields which are fitted to No. 21C123 Blackmoor Vale when renamed OVS Bulleid to honour the locomotive's designer. I'm also the webmaster for the Bulleid Society's web site.

Book

My connection with the Bulleid Society led to John Harvey asking me to produce the black and white line drawings for his book on the Bulleid Merchant Navy Pacifics, published by Ian Allan.

Southern Locomotives Ltd asked me to design their web site which is now overseen by their own webmaster. I was also asked to produce prints of their locomotives; No. 34010 Sidmouth, No. 34028 Eddystone, No. 34053 Sir Keith Park, No. 34058 Sir Frederick Pile, No. 34070 Manston, No. 34072 257 Squadron, No. 35025 Brocklebank Line plus BR 4MT No. 80104. The prints of No. 34010 Sidmouth, No. 34058 Sir Frederick Pile, No. 35025 Brocklebank Line and BR 4MT No. 80104 are for Southern Locomotives Ltd's exclusive use at present, but will become available to purchase in the future.

Over the past couple of years I've been volunteering at Southern Locomotive's Kent base at Sellindge. Here we are working on; Sidmouth, Sir Frederick Pile, and Brocklebank Line.

Myself painting Sir Frederick Pile's new drag box after removing the rust which had built up.

No. 34072 257 Squadron's new plaques were also made from artwork I produced.

257 Squadron's new plaque.

Another plaque artwork I have done was for the Battle of Britain Locomotive Society's locomotive No. 34081 92 Squadron. The production of the vitreous enamelled plaques were done by Burnham Signs (now part of the Stocksigns group) which was the company who original produced the Merchant Navy centre plaques and the Light Pacific shields and plaques for the Southern Railway.

No.34081 92 Squadron's nameplate crest. The original is on the right with the new one on the left.

I have also worked with a well known model railway manufacture supplying livery sheets which are mainly in 7mm scale for 0 gauge with the occasional ones in 4mm scale for 00 gauge.

I was also the adviser for the Masterpiece Models Bulleid pacific models.

ARTIST RICHARD GREEN

ARTIST
RICHARD GREEN