Filling Up - by Malcolm Root1000 Piece Puzzles - 685mm x 490mm Box Dimensions - 305mm x 305mm x 50mm As leaders in the nostalgia jigsaw puzzle market Gibsons have offered a very specific view of a petrol filling station from the 1960's. This 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle entitled Filling Up is located in Cavendish, West Suffolk and displays all the details we have come to expect from the Gibsons catalogue. From the Austin Healey sports car to the Lambretta scooter, to the buildings, authenticity blended with clever perspective makes the scene entirely believable. Even the old fashioned building on the left with the herring bone brickwork as well as the Automobile Association decal on the building on the right would make any jigsaw puzzle enthusiast, not to mention model enthusiast, eager to assemble this puzzle. The six cylinder Austin Healey may have at one time represented all that was excellent in British car manufacturing. Sadly the day of the reasonably priced British sports car is a thing of the past. The only way to obtain such a vehicle would be through auction or private purchase. The casual petrol station is almost quaint given today's enormous gas stations that look more like shopping malls and are completely uniform in appearance. One could almost picture this jigsaw puzzle setting replicated in miniature to fit into a model railway diorama. Malcolm Root was born in Colchester and has lived in North Essex ever since. He left school at sixteen and trained as a printing apprentice, with a view to a career in design and typography. In 1982, Malcolm left the printing trade and set up in business as a full-time artist. His works were featured at a number of small exhibitions and it wasn't long before commissions started coming in on a regular basis. In 1983, Malcolm was elected to full membership of the guild of Railway Artists and some of his paintings were published in books and magazines. Following this, three books devoted to the paintings of Malcolm Root were published; one on twentieth century transport and two on railways, the most recent being Malcolm Root's Railway Paintings. Malcolm has always been interested in the period when public transport was at its peak, when trains and buses were used by the majority and only a few fortunate could affort to own a car. In those days, every decent-sized town and many villages were connected by branch lines that covered the British Isles, making travel a real adventure. Malcolm's hobbies are football, cycling and local history. At present, he is busy painting for calendars, collector's plates and of course, jigsaw puzzles. Malcolm has six pictures ranging in period interst from Victorian times to the 1950's represented in the Gibsons jigsaw catalogue. His puzzle sizes include 636 piece puzzles as well as the more popular 1000 piece jigsaw puzzles.
