A FRESHWATER East artist is sharing her sketchbook with the world.

Eighty-two-year-old Gillian Adie launched her art book, ‘From Coast to Countryside – A sketchbook by Gillian Adie’, at Jameston Village Hall on Wednesday, July 23.

The book includes a selection of colour and black and white sketches from more than 35-years work and 57 sketchbooks.

Brought up in Cheshire, Gillian Adie (nee Aston) spent four years at the Manchester College of Art, latterly specialising in Illustration.

Gillian’s work reflects her interest in people's unguarded moments, the light and colour of the coast and countryside, and characters observed in different situations.

The book includes numerous sketches from coastal scenes in Pembrokeshire, Cornwall and Scotland to countryside images of farms, buildings, animals and people.

With the publication of her book, designed by Art Works Design Consultants in Cheltenham, Gillian said: "One day I was sitting thinking about all the sketchbooks I had in the cupboard and it seemed a shame that they were hidden away.

“I thought to myself, how good it would be if I could share them with other people and thought, ‘Why don't I do a book?’. After that it was a case of putting things into place.

"Artworks Design have done a fantastic job of balancing the different sketches, colours and even little jokes, to bring the character of my work to life.

“With help from all my family - John, Susan, Keith and Alison, James and Marcus - in choosing and co-ordinating the different stages, it has been a wonderful project to be involved in."

North Pembrokeshire artist Rod Williams, who also trained at the Manchester College of Art in the 1950s - meeting Gill and her husband, John, as Friends of the Graham Sutherland Gallery many years later - wrote the foreword to the book.

"Over the years in Pembrokeshire I have come to appreciate and admire the gifted artst's eye and hand that speaks to us through Gill's creative work, whether it be sketches or finished paintings,” he wrote.