A CUMBRIAN artist who specialises in life-like depictions is putting one of his pictures up for auction to help NHS charities.

Amazingly Trevor Fleming, from Morton, Carlisle, has spent a number of years teaching himself in the one of the most exacting of artforms, Realism.

The dad-of-three used to work in the print department at Cumbrian Newspapers for 14 years, until about two years ago.

He's now a forklift driver at Crown Bevcan, a drinks package and can maker in the city's Borland Avenue.

One day he hopes to maybe become a professional artist and is already selling his work for hundreds of pounds per picture.

Trevor said: " My first real memory of art was when I was about 8 or 9-years-old.

"The teachers were saying that it was at a higher grade to my other school friends.

"I'm a self taught artist and I started to focus about two years ago when I was leaving the Cumbrian News.

"I work heavily in charcoal and graphite and use mechanical pencils which are really fine so you don't have to sharpen them.

"I will basically start the outline of a piece using a lighter shade and over time will start to deepen that to a 9b pencil shade.

"It is all done in a number of layers."

A recent picture of an eye took 180 hours to do.

It was started on April 23 and finished on May 20.

The 38-year-old added: "The lockdown has actually been quite handy in that way.

"I have had a lot more time on my hands and I have been able to go back to things that I have been meaning to do."

He said that the picture of the eye has a message about mental health and the struggles that certain people face.

The depiction comes from another image by famous South African artist Jono Dry - who specialises in surreal pencil drawings.

Trevor added: "I was researching images and I saw the picture by Jono and I was blown away by it to be honest.

"We exchanged one or two emails and I asked him if I could attempt his work, he said 'go for it'.

"I sent him updates every now and again.

"The main reason for auctioning this is to raise money for the NHS so we are going to have a live auction at the Royal Scot pub in Morton."

Another work he has completed is one based on an American Indian from an old photograph.

He completed it about two and a half years ago and using the same methods to painstakingly get a true to life look.

Trevor said: "I believe he was one of the last remaining Indian chiefs before the cowboys came."

He regularly displays his work on Facebook sites like I am an Artist which has 37,000 members.

His work has been noticed far and wide and he gets regular offers to buy from places as far afield as South Africa and India for use in things like company logos.

The works can sell for hundreds of pounds but a lot of the price depends on the size and the amount of work that is put into it.

Trevor added: "Overall I think it depends on the amount of time.

"The eye picture for example is A1 size.

"I suppose I can sell things for three to four hundred because there is lots of work in there.

"I always do drawing for myself but they always end up selling so I can't keep them unfortunately.

"Being a professional artist is something that I have looked into but there are lots of talented artists out there."

The auction of Trevor's eye picture will be held at the Royal Scot, in Landrigg Road, when the lockdown has ended.

To find out when it takes place follow Trevor on Facebook at the following address: www.facebook.com/trevorf369