Llyn Llydaw - The Miners' Track - Snowdonia

Allotmenting yesterday, but pulled my finger out and painted today...(after painting the raised bed I built yesterday...but that wasn't my best work, so I won't bother blogging it :)) ... This is Llyn Llydaw, one of the lakes on the Miners track on the way up Snowdon. Initially I'd drawn the mountains in the background, but I decided to extend them up a bit and do away with the sky altogether...I think this maybe the first time I've painted a landscape without a sky...anyway I liked the way the light hit the hills and wanted a darker background...so up went the mountains :)...I've actually painted them in a slightly different way...laying on lots of colour and then lifting off the markings on the cliff. I'm quite pleased with the way thats worked out, the slight blur gives a sense of depth and adds a nice contrast to the sharp lines of the masking fluid...all in all, not too bad :)

A quick update on the oil experiment...oil is still wet...I may have to rethink this ;)

Two Farmhouses in Wales

I've been somewhat distracted with summer holidays, allotment building and general sloth like behaviour over the last couple of months...time to get on with things! I've got my oil experiments and the acrylic pictures to continue with but I need my main focus to be these swirling watercolours...I want to have 20 good ones to take to galleries next year and that means I need to crack on...17 weeks until the end of the year, so I need to aim for a couple of paintings a week, which is perfectly doable...if I focus ;)

Anyway I think I'm going to add this one to the good pile as I'm really pleased with the way it's turned out. I used some new tubes of watercolour for this one. I'm increasingly finding I prefer tubes to pans as I can get more pigment on quicker, hence the colours on this are a bit more intense and there is a bit more time to play with the paint while its wet on the paper.

So one done this week...need to do better next week :)

Oil Swirls Experiment

I'm trying a little experiment at the moment to see if i can use oils with the swirling landscapes...I've got a canvas and a board I've coated with Gesso. Both are divided into two and I've used masking fluid on one half, moulding latex on the other, I've made a variety of marks with both and then painting on some oil. Thin to thick across the surface. I need to wait for it to dry now, then I'll add another coat... then I'll need to wait a LONG time for it to dry fully....and finally, we'll see if the masking fluid/latex comes off or not :)

Also did a painting yesterday which I'll blog later...need to head off now and am late already :)

Just for a change...Ink...

I've been meaning to try one of these swirling landscapes in ink rather than watercolour...So today I did :) I'd taken a few photos on the path down from Snowdon to Rhyd Ddu (Where there is a fantastic tea rooms that does wonderful Dutch coffee...) and this was composed from several of those. I've wanted to try ink as i thought i might be able to get an engraving/print(ish) effect...and to some extent, there is an element of that...though this is still very much a painting...One day, I must get myself a printing press...and somewhere to put it... :)

Holiday painting 2 - Gesail Gyfarch

Here's the second painting, a view from the hill above the farmhouse where we were staying. I'm particularly pleased with this one, there's a nice rhythm to it I think...

I'm getting more confident painting these and that's allowing me to paint them more freely, which is exactly what the style demands...all in all, a reasonably productive holiday :)

Holiday painting 01 - Harlech

This is the first of two larger paintings i did while away, a view of some tumbled down walls over Harlech in North Wales (for anyone that knows the area, the castle would be directly ahead behind the trees and lower down :) the hills in the background are Criccieth and Porthmadog...:)

Broadly speaking, I've been trying to use three variations of mark making in these watercolours...it's a habit that's been forming as I've been doing them...in the case of the masking fluid, there are the outlines (done with a knife or masking fluid bottle), the brushstrokes (done with...yes you've guessed it...a brush...;) ) and a bit of splatter (with an old toothbrush)...I've really enjoyed having this mix of effects and trying to balance them...it's certainly something i plan on continuing to explore :)

Girl with Butterfly

Here's a little sketch I did while away...I want to try and find a slightly different way to depict the female form in the acrylic paintings i'm doing at the moment...so I'm playing with a few more flowing lines here...nothing even close to a finished idea, just a first step :)

Postcards from the edge...Part 3

...Like buses, you wait for ages and then these posts come along in threes...jump back a couple of posts and all should become clear :)

Postcards from the edge...Part 2

previous post continued...:)

...However, having created these little pictures I wasn't wildly keen on I started thinking about what might work on such a small scale. Inspired by the weather I started doing these bolder pictures of views through the rain covered windows. For these I used normal brushes and masking fluid, as with the larger paintings, but they were still very quick to do...lots of splashing water around and making a mess everywhere...I know Sue will be very pleased to hear that ;) The first ones were actual views through the window, but I ended up just sloshing the paint on to do the later ones, I enjoyed the effect I was getting, so I just kept going :)

Postcards from the edge...Part 1

Well, it's been a long time since the last post as I've been away on my holidays...lovely weather...;) Anyway, while I was away I had a play with some watercolour postcards. Quick sketches done with a little brush that you fill with water, so all very easy to pop in your pocket and capture something quickly (thanks to Lorna for the idea :)).

I'd have to say I didn't really enjoy doing these first ones, I hadn't done any watercolours for a couple of months and the combination of brush and scale really didn't get things flowing. But they were a good way of getting things started, I did a couple of full size paintings (which i'll post soon) and they turned out ok.

...Blogger doesn't seem to want to let me post millions of pics at once, so I'll split this post up...:)

Started on the box this evening...

The title says it all today :)

More work in progress

Birthday parties, allotment digging and visits to Art In Action all out of the way today, so I did some painting :) Tiger and 'man in box' shapes in. Need to do a bit on the box and the background and then I can start building up the paint.

and then there was a rhino...

Got some paint onto the rhino figure this afternoon. Re-drew him quite a bit while I was at it...the hybrid human/animal look is working well I think and I'm starting to see some of those interesting lines I get so excited about, so all in all a positive session :)

Finally got some paint on...

Have been working on this over the last week, just drawing the design out, changing a few bits here and there as it develops... Pencil on black canvas doesn’t really show up very well in a photo, so I haven’t bothered posting anything until now…today I’ve started adding some paint as you can see :). This is the ‘Ape’ character sat atop the box… the big cat has now become a tiger…I like the idea of using the stripes to echo some of the spiky shapes in the foreground. I’ve marked out the main line of the tigers spine in the background, but I’ll leave drawing him fully until there’s a bit more paint on and the shapes become clearer…The way the figure in the box is drawn is now totally different and I’m really pleased with the way he’s developing (though you can’t see him very clearly yet…:))

Black and Red Ideas

Thought I’d post a few scribbles I’ve done while thinking about the next picture I’m going to do…currently called ‘Black and Red’. I’ll leave you to see if you can interpret anything from these…they are quite messy, but that’s the way I do things…I don’t think I’m going to explain what it’s all about, a painting should be able to stand on its own two feet, rather than need a written dissertation…

I had the idea about a year ago and I’ve been looking at ‘Study after Velazquez’s Portrait of Pope Innocent X’ by Francis Bacon and ‘Guernica’ by Pablo Picasso for…emotional inspiration…So it’s going to be pretty dark :)