North Yorkshire Moor

I was walking the moors in August on a day that started clear but with the mist rolling in fast, which made the landscape look quite autumnal. 

At first, we spotted just the occasional grouse, but the further we walked, the more birds scuttled out of bushes and ran away from us. They are quite well camouflaged. I wonder if you can spot the one in this painting?

Thoughts on achieving a likeness

This is the portrait of a chocolate labrador I painted towards the end of the summer and I am pleased with how it turned out. 

People who know the dog have commented that it is a good likeness and particularly referred to the eyes as a true reflection of the dog's character. 

On a practical level, when trying to achieve a likeness, it is not enough to focus on just painting the eyes correctly. Instead, the same attention must be paid to the attitude of the dog and all the apparently less important parts of the head, as they all contribute to an eventual likeness. This is why I finish the eyes last in my painting process (be it in humans or animals). 

Portraits need reference photos with good lighting to be successful and I find natural light without strong shadows the most pleasing.

Inspired by Sorolla

Before visiting the National Gallery Exhibition of paintings by the Spanish impressionist painter Sorolla, I knew nothing about this artist. I gather he is particularly popular in the United States and his home country. I loved his light-filled oil paintings of beach scenes and gardens and his painting style reminded me of John Singer Sargent, his contemporary.

The lesson I took away from his garden paintings is not to worry too much about a finished look to a painting, as his quite often had areas that were not fully developed. In the same way, my own painting of a fountain in Bridge End Gardens (Saffron Walden) has a background that is just floated in wet-in-wet and left fairly vague, so as not to compete with the foreground.

Two paintings from Devon

Sidmouth

This is Jacob's Ladder in Sidmouth, England, painted on Hahnemühle paper in watercolour.

Ladram Bay

Just a few miles along from Sidmouth is Ladram Bay with these sculptural rocks, which makes a great nesting place for seagulls. Ladram Bay can be easily reached on foot along the coastal path from Sidmouth.

Painting with a Chinese watercolour brush

My first introduction to Asian brushes was through reading an instruction book by Ron Ranson, who painted with a hake. I found it very difficult to control, as it held a lot of water and I was relatively inexperienced back then, so I soon put it aside, never to be taken out again until maybe a year ago.

Since then, I have bought some round brushes made from goat hair, which give lovely random effects.
This has encouraged me to explore a wider range of Chinese brushes so I bought a set of three weasel brushes  from Jacksons. They come in a beautiful box and are really reasonably priced.

Unlike Western style brushes, these Chinese brushes need to be prepared for painting first, as they are coated in some protective substance which glues the hairs together. From the Jackson's blog I found out that they need to be soaked in warm to rinse the coating off.

I have tried this on my smallest brush and found it took a good five minutes (it definitely needs to be warm water, as the cold water hardly lifted any of the substance). Once I could ply the brush head, I knew the brush was ready.

I then tried it out on khadi paper (see photo below).

The brush on the top is the one I used for these marks. 

For the blended green and purple washes, I used the belly of the brush on its side, which makes more random marks.

For the scribbles on the top right, I used the tip of the brush, lifting and pressing the body down to get different widths. The brush comes to a good point and can make really thin lines.

For the circles further down, I splayed the brushes' hairs first before putting it to paper. This way I could achieve fine multiple lines, which could be used to paint hair or fur, or to add texture to a wash.

So far, I am very happy with this brush and expect the others to be as good. 

Montacute House

Montacute House is an Elizabethan Manor in Somerset; you can learn more about it here. It has an impressive long gallery, which affords lovely views over the grounds. I understand that there are changing exhibitions of paintings in the rooms leading off the gallery.

The weather during my visit was overcast, which meant that I wanted to push the colours more in this painting.

Water always provides an opportunity to paint loosely and wet-in-wet to give an effect of movement. In fact, I think watercolour is one of the best mediums to portray water.

At the Cafe

I have painted this old lime tree before. You can find it in the old town of Zofingen, Switzerland and the Restaurant Linde is named after it.

Wouldn't we all love to sit in the shade of this beautiful tree and enjoy a relaxed afternoon in the sunshine?

View of Corfe Castle

An early summer painting in England, which is always particularly green at that time of year. This has caused a problem of recession, and maybe I should have used a bluer colour to make the castle sit more in the background.

I am sure I am not the only one to think that beautiful subjects don't automatically make for beautiful paintings...

Whitby Harbour

This was quite a complicated subject and needed a lot of simplification to get to grips with it. It always helps to make a tonal plan. I usually break it down into just three values (light, middle, dark) and do a little thumbnail sketch in pencil.

Roseberry Topping

This mountain is also called the Matterhorn of North Yorkshire but to me, it looks more like the Sphynx. It only acquired this shape after part of the mountain collapsed in the early 20th century. I visited on a clear day in February, when a super moon showed itself in daylight to add to the beauty of this scene (in my painting, I moved it a bit closer to the mountain to make a better composition).

Led by my much more energetic son, I climbed up the short, strenuous route and had to stop several times to catch my breath. It was well worth the climb, though, as the view across the North Yorkshire landscape was fantastic. On the way back down, we took a more leisurely path and encountered this strange building:

The plaque on one of the wall explained that it was a shooting lodge used by hunting parties for shelter in bad weather. By the time we reached it, the sun was already setting.

Roseberry Topping is a popular destination for walkers and I'm sure I will want to go back and enjoy it at a different time of year.

Still life of grapes on a plate

I am quite happy with this still life. I kept the background simple with dark and light tones and painted the grapes and plate in a fairly realistic way.

I used just five colours for this painting, two blues (cobalt and ultramarine), one red (Turner Quinacridone Magenta, a reasonably priced red similar to Alizarin Crimson), one yellow (raw sienna) and one green (phthalocyanine green). Except for the Turner, all paints are made by Jacksons. They are good quality artist grade watercolours and come in large 21ml tubes.

Not getting the ellipsis of the plate right makes it look unrealistic. I think I managed it and added a shadow underneath to make it 'sit' on a surface. I painted first the tones and then the pattern of the plate and they have blended together quite  well.

Greenhouse

Watercolour of a greenhouse

With the first few days of sunny weather, I have spent more time in the back garden, seeing it slowly come back to life. The snowdrops are already blooming and the first few daffodils are also coming through.

I thought the shadows on the greenhouse made a great subject for a painting, even though a challenging one. The key was not getting too distracted by the detail and simplifying where possible.

Light and Shade

This is based on a photo I took in Bridge End Gardens, Saffron Walden, and is linked to my previous post 'Watercolours from Saffron Walden'. The painting below is of St. Mary's church, Saffron Walden, also seen from Bridge End Gardens.  Every so often, I like to go through my references to get inspiration for a painting. 


I have been using Chinese brushes for most of these paintings. They make beautiful random marks. Unlike sable brushes, they don't spring back to a point, so need to be used lightly to get the best out of them.