IF you go to the Bolton Museum now you'll see lots of colourful paintings by an artist called Jerry Gordon.You might think they're just a collection of canvasses - depicting famous sites such as Stongehenge, the pyramids in Egypt and St Basil's in Moscow.

You might even like them.

What you might not know is that they are in fact the fruits of the artist's 13 year quest to paint the world's most sacred sites before the Millennium, just to spread around a little harmony.

In the process, he visited 45 countries and produced 32 paintings - rapidly gaining him the reputation of one of Britain's greatest project painters.

The works of art are Jerry Gordon's lifetime's ambition for which he gave up his house, his car and all his worldly possessions.

"It's about doing what you're supposed to be doing," said Jerry.

Being single - Jerry's marriage to the girl-next-door had long been over - there was nothing stopping him to up sticks when he made the big decision to abandon his nine-to-five existence.

Destination

America was the first destination the trained social worker headed for. And it was there that the idea for it all first took hold.

Hitting the road in a VW camper van, Jerry travelled across the states - "fantastic, it was a bit like being a hippy" until he realised he should concentrate on his artistic career.

A back pack and lots of energy is all he has needed from then on.

"Since then I've had a strategy of finding work to fund the next leg of the journey."

He was in Berlin at the time of Perestroika and Glasnost, a month before the Wall came down. Later in Leningrad Jerry and his orange VW Beetle attracted KGB attention and resulted in "an evening out" with officials who gave him the third degree - "it was a bit worrying".

In 1990 Richard found himself a studio in a fishing village near Barcelona to study the famous Sagrad Familia.

Three years later, he made his way to Pitcairn, the island in the Pacific Ocean where ringleader Fletcher Christian took refuge after the mutiny on the Bounty. Jerry stayed with descendants of Christian when he was there.

Dangerous

More dangerous was his stay in Istanbul, when he only narrowly escaped being blown apart by a terrorist bomb. The blast killed several people and injured scores of others, but Jerry was saved by someone whom he since regards as a guardian angel: A shoeshine boy.

If this boy hadn't persuaded Jerry to stop to have his shoes done he would have walked straight into the explosion.

In India he had another uplifting experience, when he met the Dalai Lama, who blessed Jerry's project.

And before finally returning to Britain, Jerry set up studio in Trinidad - "I couldn't afford to live in this country at that time".

Back here, Jerry is keen not be seen as a crackpot and would like to settle down now.

"My feet are firmly on the ground - it's that Lancashire-ness, you can't loose it!"

Modesty also leads him to compare his painting skills to Bolton Wanderers - "waiting for promotion to the Premiership" - adding: "I realise I'm not the best painter in the world, but I think I have got good ideas."

His exhibition at the Bolton Museum is part of his placement for a University of London course in Arts Management.

And he praised the "A-team" of curators at the museum, consisting Lucy, Adrian and Caroline.

On his travels, too, it was the people he met who "made" the experience.

"It's a life affirming point - wherever you go people have more in common than they do differences.

"You will always find you are going to make connections with people."

And that's the whole point of the Millennium project.

Jerry Gordon's exhibition The Harmony and Diversity of Sacred Sites will be on display until March 13. All works in the exhibition are for sale.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.