Just before Christmas each year I receive a phone call from an old pal of mine. Stephen and me were at art college together in the sixties, and he makes the annual visit 'home' from Dublin to see his mum on Tyneside. The phone call summons me almost instantly to a gathering of old student friends in our haunt of bygone days The Crown Posada, on Side in Newcastle. This is probably one of the last remaining 'real' pubs in the city and it's great to meet the guys and catch up with what they are doing. There's always some good crack and a bit of a laugh, as well as the compulsory walk down memory lane!
Newcastle College of Art was the forerunner of Newcastle Polytechnic, now better known as Northumbria University. The college departments were spread over the city and our graphics section was in Chillingham Road, above a primary school. 'Liberal Studies' lectures meant attending the fine art building in Ellison Place, where I was initiated into the worlds of Velasquez, Gaugin and Monet. It also meant the opportunity to watch some amazing movies that so far had been nowhere near my radar, never mind on it, such as The Seven Samurai, Battleship Potemkin and Jules et Jim.
