Welcome to my Blog

I am pleased to welcome you to my blog and though I am a complete novice when it comes to blogging I am excited by the possibilities it presents and look forward to showing you my work, the work that some of my students produce and to answering any questions you may have about aspects of the work, techniques used or just discussing painting and drawing.

Wednesday 29 June 2016

Bishop's Bay, Loch Leven

Bishop's |BayLoch Leven

I have Bishop's Bay on Loch Leven here to the stage where I need to paint in the yachts and then their reflections and then all of the movement lines of the water. Then I will complete the sky and sky reflections. Keep an eye open for my next post...

Saturday 25 June 2016

Predominantly Blue

Totland Pier
Here's another predominantly blue painting (Prussian Blue) The unity of this painting is created by the use of the colours in the sky echoed in the foreground and a simple composition. I am going to paint a similar scene to this again as a square format canvas, increasing the space between the left hand edge and the canvas and the end of the pier putting the light about a third of the way in from the right and up from the bottom more closely observing 'the rule of thirds'.

Latest Isle of Wight Landscape

Newtown, February

The attraction of this scene for me was definitely the reflected sky. The extraordinarily high tide cut off the footpath from the bridge to the Town hall (on the right) and created the little island tufts of grass. The thing to note here from a painters point of view is the fact that light colours reflect darker and dark colours/objects reflect lighter, a valuable tip for painting water and making it look wet! I like the unusual amount of blue in this landscape.

Monday 13 June 2016

Painting in The Western Highlands

Bishop's Bay, Loch Leven

I very recently returned from leading a landscape painting holiday in water-mixable oils with some lovely guests at Alltschellach, on the edge of Bishop's Bay, a lovely spot on Loch Leven. The lawns of the house sweep down to the bay pictured above, inspiring scenery which I intend to do a studio painting of in the coming weeks. I did a little sketching and took many photographs whilst  helping and encouraging the guests with their paintings. My next painting holiday lead for HF is at Church Stretton in July to which I am looking forward to.


Below is my most recently finished painting which is of Waterhead on Windermere, like the photograph above I very much like the reflections which are a joy to paint.

Waterhead on Windermere