By the River

Lockdown has given me a deeper appreciation of wildlife close to home. While we could not meet family and friends, there has always been nature to engage with. Over the last year, I had the chance to follow the life cycle of coots and observe the changing bird population on the river and lakes and this has given me a sense of normality that has been missing in everyday life. 

Two weeks ago, I happened to come across a heron by the river and managed to take photos for reference. I hadn't noticed before the striking pattern of its plumage, and it seems both male and female herons look similar.

I first made a little study, before developing it into a painting.

heron study in watercolour

heron and duck on river, watercolour

Big Sky

 In between 'proper' paintings, have started to paint on the back of failed efforts to try out techniques or ideas. 

This is a recreation of a dramatic cloudy sky I observed on one of my walks. I knew I wanted to paint it as simply as possible and used just three colours, the darkest being Teal by Ken Bromley instead of my usual French Ultramarine. It seems to me that it makes more transparent greys than the latter colour.

For the tree reflections, I just bled the trees into the bottom part of the paper and the reflections appeared as if by magic.

This painting took all of five minutes, but I am very pleased with the result.

River and lake

 Two local scenes from of the river and gravel lakes. These particularly provide a haven for wildlife with changing bird species over the course of the year. I noticed that more cormorants have moved into the area, which seems to be their migrating pattern for the winter.

I loved the bright blue colour of the canal service boat and used white oil pastel for its white railings and the conservatory of the house behind it.

For the first painting, it was the flash of bright yellow that inspired me to paint the scene. 

Tous Saints chapel, Sion

 

This little stone chapel is part of a castle in Sion, the capital of the canton of Valais, Switzerland. Sion is in the French speaking area of Valais and looks very picturesque with is castles and fortresses overlooking the town.

I painted this on Hahnemühle Aquarell Anniversary Edition. This turned out to be an ideal paper for painting the stone church,  as the structure of the paper helped with granulation, which suggested the stone texture in an effortless way.