An enthusiastic Geoff took great pride in introducing our guest speaker and his friend Captain Michael Joseph and his wife Jane. Captain Michael Joseph born 1951 in Dorking UK, is an identical twin, married to Jane (an Ecologist), and father of two sons.
His talk was a personal journey turning failure at school into success as an airline pilot. The entertaining presentation was about all the funny anecdotes that happened along the way which definitely had our club in stitches. His stories included; how he came to be walking through the terminal building in his Speedo swimming trunks; why the Surrey police were throwing stones at his bedroom window and what happens when a cow confronts a Jumbo jet, among others.
Michael Joseph has always been spatially aware. From an early age he was competent at drawing and using his hands to make things from all sorts of materials. At school in the 1960’s, (leaving in 1968) he was runner-up in a national car design competition with Vauxhall. His entry was a hatchback before they had been invented. He became an engineering apprentice at Rolls-Royce Aero Engines in Derby where his original and creative thinking led to him winning a competition, the prize for which was a Private Pilot’s Licence. Learning to fly was a skill he found easy to master with his ability to judge the three- dimensional concepts of speed, height and vectors.
In 1971 he joined British Airways as a trainee airline pilot at Hamble. It was as a distraction from the intensive training that he first took up oil painting. This soon led to exhibitions in London with the Guild of Aviation Artists, where he won several awards including the Aviation Painting of the Year Award in 1987.
In 1975 he became a First Officer with British Caledonian Airways flying a BAC 1-11 jet. Then Boeing 707, 747 back to the 1-11 as a Captain. With British Airways he flew 757, 747-400, 777 until he retired in 2006.
During 1999 - 2014 he went back to engineering inspiring young school students designing, building and racing full size electric racing cars.
Today he enjoys the creative process by switching between drawing, painting and sculpture, responding and editing from one work to the next. In 2017 he held a successful one man show at the Oxmarket Gallery in Chichester and later in the year won the Stride Open Drawing Award.
Michael will jump from one medium to another responding to the previous piece of work, reforming and editing as he goes. Works include charcoal, inks, paint, metal, carbon fibre, mirrors or shadows. Equally the tools he uses range from a simple brush to a computer controlled milling machine. There are no limits when working creatively and the outcome is diverse and eclectic.
Although Michael Joseph spent most of his working life as a BA pilot, flying Jumbo Jets he was also responsible for leading the Weald School Team to first place in the National Electric Racing Car competition.
Michael is now a full time artist/tutor (drawings, paintings,sculpture) www.mjartist.com Instagram michael.joseph.artist
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Graeme’s Something to Smile About
Director’s Roundup 
Silly Joke / Meme 
