IT WAS the 19th century French artist Jean-Auguste Ingres who maintained that "Drawing is the true test of art", writes Frank Ruhrmund.

It's safe bet that he would not only have approved of but also applauded the charcoal drawings in the exhibition being held in the Tolcarne Inn, Newlyn, by Newlyn-based Nick Henshall. He passes the test with flying colours.

A man of the sea who, despite growing up a long way from the briny in land-locked Cheshire, had his appetite for a life on the ocean wave whetted, not to say "firmly cemented", when young, during holidays spent fishing for lobsters in Anglesey.

In the late 1980s he came to Newlyn, where his hunger for a life at sea was more than satisfied when he worked on a variety of fishing vessels – crabbers, netters, trawlers and inshore boats

In the mid-1990s he gained his Class II, deck officer qualification and seemed set for a future in fishing; but unfortunately a serious injury sustained in a motorcycle accident brought about a change of course and, instead of working on fishing boats, he found himself on traditional square riggers, including "acting as first mate on a replica 19th century schooner."

Eventually, he came back to his home port of Newlyn where, no longer able to pursue a career as an offshore fisherman, as well as starting and raising a family, he worked at a variety of jobs, from boat-builder to welder, from being mate and relief skipper on a commercial dive vessel to fishing with his own lobster boat. Only last year he began to learn the dying art of withy lobster and crab pot-making and this has been one of the inspirations for his return to his own artistic background.

Although he continued to develop his art work alongside his different marine experiences, studying life drawing and, as he says: "Showing and selling pictures, throughout the 1990s, mainly through Tony Sanders' gallery in Penzance", his current exhibition is his first solo show.

Pictures that, from A Dying Art to Last of the Withy Fishermen, not to mention a splendid portrait of his daughter Jess, are carried out with care, strength and precision, almost painterly in approach, filled with light and shade, detail and drama, they are simply superb.

The impressive, Nick Henshall's Newlyn Charcoals can be seen in the Tolcarne Inn, Newlyn, during normal opening hours until the end of the month.

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