Sketchbook peek

Since Christmas I have filled a whole sketchbook with portrait and figure drawings, and I'm not going to stop yet. These are some of my favourites from the book. Some days I only spend five minutes, others half an hour or more. Sometimes a linear drawing, most often I draw in tonal values with shading because I think that gives me more help for my paintings. I've been using soft pencil, charcoal or graphite sticks and I'm enjoying the subtleties possible after years of shunning the simple pencil in favour of bold pen marks.

How do I find my subjects? Well some days I can sketch from life and that's preferable. Otherwise I sketch from photos that I've snapped on my phone during the previous week, or from paintings or photos I've seen online (Pinterest is a good source) or I pause a video on my iPad and sketch from that. That's a great way to sketch groups of figures in conversation, and I particularly like regency costumes so I tend to go for a Jane Austen TV/film adaptation! To be honest I'm not too fussy about the source for the sketch, and it's better to just get on and do it than to hunt around for ages for something special. The sketch always has its own life and takes on its own importance. 

By the way, they don't all work out and sometimes I have to break off when I'd like to have gone further. But I know there'll be another chance tomorrow.

Hot roasted chestnuts

Hot roast chestnuts, Christmas market no 7

Another beauty was the very Victorian chestnut stall, complete with vendor wearing a top hat and waistcoat. Again the red, and the dark mauve sky - a killer combination. There were also coloured lights around the top of the stall and in the trees which were a detail too far for this little study but would definitely have a part to play in any future large studio painting. I am such a sucker for coloured fairy lights - especially the ordinary lightbulb sized ones, strung up in trees. Maybe I should go to Blackpool? Or... the Christmas lights at Mousehole, that's probably more my scene!

I did intend to take photos throughout the painting process but only managed two and then forgot. It gives you a good idea of the goings on though, and it's the way I've tackled all of these market paintings.

I start with a warm mid grey and do a general block in of mid-toned neutral areas. You'll notice I'm not doing any kind of drawing of shapes, just dealing in broad masses.

I then work in the darkest darks, again it's masses that I'm looking for here. You can't really tell with the photo but this is not a general black, but subtly different colours - some cooler, some warmer, some reddish, some more violet. 

From here I paint in the yellow and red colour group and then the blues and then the lightest highlights. 

Squinting all the while, I'm aiming for the structure or skeleton of the scene. The viewer can put the meat on the bones.

Magic and bubbles

Bubble stall, Christmas market no 6

Back to the Christmas market theme, which I can't get enough of at the moment, my favourite part was the bubble stall.  I will definitely be painting a studio version of this subject because it was a 'coup de coeur' moment, I knew it instantly. The red and white of the awnings against the dark stonework and dusking sky, the life and movement provided by the figures and the fun - oh the FUN - given by the vapour and bubbles moving upwards and out towards the sky!

So what I'm really enjoying at the moment is working these small (around 10" x 12") studies on Arches 'huile' paper. It's like a very lovely watercolour paper but it's oil primed and I love using it. The paintings can still be framed without glass, you just attach the paper to a board and varnish as usual.

Anyway, I will perhaps work on half a dozen small studies of this very subject, while exploring ideas about colour and composition for the larger painting. I find it very freeing, this way of working. The big challenge will be retaining the freshness on a larger scale. We'll worry about that later though :-)

Christmas market

Christmas market no 1 - mulled wine stall
10" x 12"

I loved the lights, colour and busyness of the Lincoln Christmas market that I visited a couple of weeks ago. I did find a place to set up and paint but it was away from where I wanted to be and I got very cold! After a couple of hours of painting followed by a warm up in a cafe I decided to walk around taking photos on my phone if anything caught my eye. It was very busy by then and day was turning into dusk which was the very best time for me.  I find it magical when the artificial lights start to take over from the light from the sky.

Since that day I've been developing the theme in the studio, and trying some new approaches. In many ways this is easier to do in the studio than en plein air, when it's best to get the job done as quickly as you can (especially in this weather!).

With this one I really wanted to keep the drawing quite fluid, so I started with painting large shapes and masses rather than a linear or drawn approach. If you imagine screwing your eyes up so that you can only see a blurred vision of the subject, that's how I began. 

I carried on with large shapes and then assessed which places needed more definition and which didn't.

I wanted to describe a little more the two central figures and the lights and decoration of the stall, but to leave the background group of figures as loose marks and large shapes. I think it's best this way as the figures look as though they are moving and populate the scene without dominating it.

You can probably tell I really enjoyed the whole process, I think it shows in the juicy paintwork!

Detail

Detail showing broad treatment of figures

The long stretch of summer

The long stretch of summer
Oils 12" x 16"

Rather appropriate this as I've just been packing up for our summer holiday in France, can't wait to get there and relax! 

This painting's subject is some children enjoying rock pooling at beautiful St Mawes in Cornwall. It reminds me of that wonderful feeling when you're a child and you break up from school for summer. The holidays stretch out ahead of you, seemingly forever.

I asked my lovely Facebook friends for help with naming this painting and had loads of fabulous suggestions, I am sure to use some of them on future paintings. It's so nice to rope the Facebook and twitter communities in for fresh ideas. It's like inviting a bunch of friends round to the studio for a drink at the end of the working day. :-)

Speaking of twitter it's time for #drawingaugust to start again. I loved it SO much last year that I'm going to try again to draw and post a new drawing each day on twitter with the hashtag drawingaugust. If you are on twitter, why not look us up and join in?

I took a few photos of this one as it was going along...

Duke of York square

Saturday market, Duke of York square
Oils 22" x 24" SOLD

It was a fun and exhausting (and at times a little crazy!) weekend at the Pintar Rapido event in London. 501 artists were registered to take part in the painting event, although I think around 400 turned up on the day. Many may have been put off by the weather reports.. we were expecting constant rain and thunderstorms on Saturday! In the event we didn't have a single drop of rain and it was a gorgeous day. Many of my friends did what  I did and carried a large umbrella around all day, which wasn't needed after all.

So on the Saturday you registered in the morning and had your blank canvas stamped, and then you were able to paint outside anywhere you wanted within the borough of Kensington and Chelsea. I wanted to capture the life and action of the city on a hot summer weekend, and so I headed to the market in Duke of York square.

There certainly was plenty of life there! I chose a challenging subject and worked on a really large scale at 22" x 24". It was a lot to tackle in a day, with constant interruptions when I explained to spectators what Pintar Rapido was and why they were seeing artists with easels everywhere they went!

I was really drawn to the light coming through the orange sheeting at the back of the Sushi stall, and the light glancing along the tops of the market stall canopies.

The figures had to be placed very quickly, and painted mostly from memory. I'm really pleased that I managed to get a Chelsea pensioner in, walking towards me with his blue peaked cap.

It was such a special moment in the day when I met a couple who had come down from Lincoln especially to see the Sunday exhibition because they follow my blog and had read about the event. If you are reading this I'm so sorry I didn't get to see you on Sunday, but I really am touched that you came. 

I ended up packing away my kit in a rush at 7.00 pm, and had to get back to the Old Town Hall to get my painting framed and handed in before 8.00pm. It was a crazy scene when I got there, artists everywhere rushing to get their paintings framed, with tools, frames, glass etc covering every surface and most of the floor. It was hard to find a clear patch of floor to get mine framed and at the end of all that I was completely shattered and made my way gradually back to the hotel.

This is my painting hanging in the exhibition the next day, and I'm pleased that it sold. It was lovely to see all the different paintings and all the artists assembled together. Unfortunately it was exceedingly hot inside the exhibition and there were no refreshments, so I had to keep going out for a drink and fresh air. 

Apart from that it was a great event, well organised and a chance to catch up with lots of painting friends and I hope I can do it again one day.

Porthcurnick beach in summer

Porthcurnick beach in summer
Oils on canvas
14" x 18" 

I spent some time finishing off the demo painting from the weekend, as I was really pleased with the way it was going. It's got a lovely freshness of colour reminiscent of early summer. The sea in Cornwall often looks that gorgeous turquoise colour on a bright sunny day. 

What I wanted to show you in particular are some close up shots so that you can see the nature of the brushwork. For me it is incredibly important to see brush marks in a painting. They are as individual as handwriting, and they tell you a story about how the painting was crafted and what the artist was feeling. They remind you that you are looking at paint on a flat surface, and then when you stand back a few yards everything falls into place and becomes an illusion of space and depth.

A pleasing mix of thin and thick paint, and visible brush marks 

Up close it's just a few light and dark marks

Enough description to read as figures

It also demonstrates how little information you need to give the viewer for them to understand and read the painting. Take the section below for example. When you look at the whole painting from a reasonable viewing distance this reads as a distant headland with buildings and grass, trees, rocks and boats. What is it actually in terms of paint when you take a closer look? Very little information has been given but your mind fills it all in.

The trick is to give the right information I suppose!

Enough information

Putting figures in your paintings

The Artist May 2014

The new (May) issue of The Artist magazine is available in shops in the UK right now.  My latest article to be published is about putting figures into your paintings - why I think it's worthwhile, some things to think about when you're including figures in your work and exercises to try. I hope you enjoy it :-)

As always there is lots more inspiration packed between the pages featuring artists such as Lucy Willis, Geoff Hunt, Ian Sidaway, Ian Cryer, Chris Forsey, Ann Blockley, and Hashim Akib amongst others.

I have been told that in the US you can also buy this inspirational magazine in Barnes and Noble stores. If you can't easily get hold of a copy where you live did you know that you can subscribe and have every issue posted out to you? Read more about that here.

August on the island

Busy beach today!

Have now settled into our house on the island and I got out to the beach yesterday for two little paintings. I knew this one would be a difficult scene to tackle but believe that you have to take these risks in order to grow.
As the tide came in the beach got smaller and smaller and so of course more crowded as all the sunbathers moved up and up! I really wanted to describe the mass of people on the beach and in the sea without attempting to paint the individual figures. For the closest people, this side of the row of rocks I have paid more attention to the shape of individuals. Those on the other side of the rocks are just dots and dabs using a few choice colours, particularly a sun bronzed skin colour as I judged that to be the majority colour!
I think that you only need to provide so much information and then if your viewer stands a few feet away from the painting their brain fills in the rest and they see not the individual paint marks but a lot of people on a beach.

Florida here I come!

Great work from the figures workshop

I'm on the plane on the way to Florida, taking off in five minutes!
It's been a hectic few days (maybe that's an understatement!) so I'm sorry I haven't been in touch!
Just had to show you these paintings from my workshop yesterday called 'painting with figures in a setting', aren't they just amazing?!
These were all completed in less than two hours, as in the morning everyone was hard at work with drawing/design exercises and watching a quick demo.
I am absolutely bowled over by how well everybody did ! :-)

I'll see you in Florida!

Fresh fried fish, Essaouira

Fresh fried fish, Essaouira
Oils 30 x 40 cms

'Tis finished! I am over the moon with this because I now have another studio painting which actually beats it's plein-air brother, in my opinion, hands down!

This is exciting progress as, for a long time now, I have believed that all my best work is painted plein air. If I can now take plein air paintings and make a studio version based on them which changes and improves on my original vision this is a huge step for me!

I am now looking forward to doing the same thing with some of the plein air paintings I will bring back from Florida in a little over a fortnight's time.

Here's the original plein air painting so you can compare which was done in less than an hour to be fair...

And here is a detail from the studio version...

I absolutely love the depiction of the guy on the right and especially his cigarette! He became really friendly with me during the week as I was often painting in the area and he always called out to me as I passed. I wish I'd asked his name now! His job is looking after the toilets and he is sitting next to the entrance which is just around the corner.

I had to be so careful to keep the brushwork loose but descriptive, and when you are painting figures in a setting you must treat them just the same as you would any other part of the painting if you want them to look as though they belong there.

Sledgers in the snow

Sledgers at Belmont Tower, Grantham

I was really smitten with this subject yesterday. I wanted to go back today to see fresh snow but unfortunately we've had no further snowfall today or during the night. I did achieve a snow painting though, in the gardens of Belton House.

Here's a short video filmed yesterday (on an iPhone!) of me painting this at Belmont tower. It's lovely to feel the ambience of being there. I warn you though - you may feel the need for a hot chocolate after watching this!