How finished is finished?

Morning sunlight on the campo

Ah, the eternal question! When do you know a painting is finished... if indeed, a painting ever is finished? And does 'finished' mean 'finished off' as in, well... I think you know what I mean!

Here's an interesting case in point. I was working on this studio painting a couple of weeks back and then I had to put it on standby and get on with other work. In my head this painting was labelled 'needs further attention, needs a lot more work, must go back to it, it's quite a way off being finished (the dreaded word)'.

Now today it's caught my eye again and what's happened? Have the studio elves been working while I've been in France? It caught my eye and my mind said this 'that's an interesting piece, it evokes a mood, what more is there to say? By golly I think it's .... (insert dreaded word here)'

What do you think? How much information is enough? For me this is the eternal question. Firstly you should know what you are trying to say in your painting. Then, it's easier for you to recognise when you've said it. That's about all the help I can give today but I know it's a topic I'll come back to ;-)

And now I'm a teensy little bit excited because the suitcase is zipped shut, my passport is in my hand and I'm heading to Heathrow ready to fly tomorrow. See you in California!

Exciting times - new book!

Washing day, Venice

I must fill you in on my very exciting news! My Facebook friends may have already seen me mention this earlier in the year when I asked which topics you would like to see covered, but of course not all of my lovely blog readers are also on Facebook.

I have begun to write a book on oil painting. Its going to be full of information and inspiration and of course my paintings. A lot of the information will be useful for working in other mediums too, as it will be about the properties of a successful painting and how to put them into practice. I have had a planning meeting with the publishers so all I need to do now is work on the content - all 144 pages!

I'm hugely excited, but I also wanted to warn you that I have a very busy year ahead of me! I will continue to blog as often as I can but please be patient with me if you don't hear from me for a few weeks sometimes. I will be having not one but three solo exhibitions in 2015 so I need to be ultra productive and organised.

I've got lots of fab travel plans for this year - California, France, Umbria, Channel islands, Venice... which means there will be lots of good stuff to blog about when I get the opportunity ;-)

My annual review 2014 - October to December

City fish

Finally here I am with part four of my annual review so you might want to make yourself a cup of tea before you settle down to read it, it's a long one. Pleased to say I'm feeling well again, hurrah!

After 'A brush with the broads' I was quite soon back down to Norfolk to take part in Paint Out Norwich, a selected plein air event involving around 30 artists chosen from an open entry. Again this was another brand new UK plein air event so I was very excited to be taking part. I also had a role to play helping my injured artist friend Mo Teeuw to get around as she was unable to drive at the time and painting from a wheelchair! Luckily the event organisers were fantastic - helpful, enthusiastic and fun. 

I hadn't been to Norwich since I was a child and I didn't remember anything, so I was happy to go to any spot allocated to me. We had four three hour painting sessions in different parts of Norwich over two intensive days. In between times we framed the wet paintings and grabbed a bite to eat, and enjoyed jolly get-togethers in the evening.

Pulls ferry, Norwich

The painting 'City fish' was painted in Norwich market on a very cold morning, and I had lots of interest and chat with passers-by. As soon as I saw the old man with the flat cap I had to draw him in quickly (with the brush). I think he makes the painting really!

Pulls ferry is a much painted local landmark and when I was on my way there somebody told me 'there's a choice of only two views (to paint) there'. Really? There are millions of views everywhere in my opinion, so I set off determined to choose a personal viewpoint for the painting. In the end I settled on this reflection, as I loved the glowing brightness of the distant trees through the archway, and all the leaves littered all over the water and pathway like confetti.

Work to be done,  Elm Hill
First prize winner, Paint Out Norwich
Private collection

Another picturesque corner of Norwich is Elm Hill. I had seen a photo beforehand and was really looking forward to painting there. When I arrived I was surprised and initially disappointed to see the scaffolding covering the left hand side building and crossing the narrow street in front of me. At times the sun broke through the clouds and the plane tree cast wonderful shadows on the yellow building, which I liked very much. Then I decided to paint the scene scaffolding and all, as I do enjoy a chance to show the signs of modern life and plus, can't resist the red (road signs).

The lady in the cafe opposite loved it. She said she'd seen many pretty paintings of it, but that mine captured Elm Hill as it really is - her everyday view. So that was encouraging!

Apparently the judges (the artists Trevor Chamberlain ROI RSMA and Colin Self, and curator Amanda Geitner) loved it too, as my painting of Elm Hill won the £1000 first prize in the first ever Paint Out Norwich!

No I really couldn't believe I was winning another prize - absolutely amazing. 

And I was so happy for my friend Roy Connelly too - see picture below!

With prizewinners Roy Connelly and Chris Daynes ROI
Paint Out Norwich

I drove home in the middle of the night on a complete high and in a bit of a daze! I got home and crawled into bed at 3am. When I got up that morning I had to empty the car and unpack, and then pack for France and reload the car, as we were leaving for a week in France just a few hours later. There are sometimes drawbacks to fitting it all in the way I do!

Another fantastic trip was my time in Venice with artist friends Penny German, Felicity House and Wyllis Heaton. We also met with Ann Justin, Kelly Medford and Louisa Calder. So much fun to have company to paint with and spend the evening with. The extra good news is I don't have to wait too long for my next Venice trip, as I've decided to go again this year. 

The weather was absolutely ideal for painting, no fog or cold for me this time! We did have one day of rain, but there are plenty of places to shelter and continue painting in Venice.

Shadows in Campo S Giovanni e Paolo

The artist Felicity House

I love this one of Felicity working on the steps to a bridge. You can feel the heat in the sunshine, just look at that clear blue sky! People were most amused to see that I was painting the artist painting. I love the wonky shopping trolley too. This could translate well into a studio painting couldn't it?

Painting in Venice

Rising shadows at the Ospedale
Private collection

Some of my paintings from Venice are available to buy direct from my studio. If you'd like to take a look you can find them here.

Washing day, Venice

In usual style I arrived home from Venice in the early hours of the morning for a few hours of sleep before attending my own exhibition preview!
While I'd been away the brilliant folk at Patchings Art Centre had hung the exhibition and it all looked beautiful. I liked to see the title of my exhibition here at the bottom of the stairs, doesn't that look nice?

Opening day of my exhibition

A breath of fresh air exhibition
Patchings art centre

During the exhibition I went in to the gallery for some painting days, a couple of which were portraits from life. Here I am painting my mum for one of the demos. She has her feet raised on a box because she's only little, like me!

Painting my mum in the middle of my exhibition at Patchings

Portrait of my mum

In December I had several trips to London to see the Royal Institute of Oil painters exhibition at the Mall Galleries in London. I was exhibiting this painting there, which was painted en plein air in August on the island of Bréhat. 

Evening at the beach, Bréhat
Private collection

Another event in December was the ROI painting event evening at the gallery. My friend the artist Adebanji Alade was one of the sitters. I had a couple of hours on this and am very pleased with it. It was a really fun evening too.

Portrait of the artist
Adebanji Alade

Lastly in December I got really excited about a local subject, the Christmas market in Lincoln. I painted only one piece while there, but I've been working on a series of paintings in the studio. I'm really enjoying making painterly marks and as always, striving to say more with less.

Mulled wine, hot chocolate

Christmas market, mulled wine stall
Private collection

Christmas market at dusk

Christmas market, snow

I hope you've enjoyed the recap of my year. And now it's almost February, amazing! I have got an absolutely packed year happening, and so much to tell you about! Did you have any new year's resolutions? And how's that going? Mine was to draw every day and so far so good! I've kept that up for the whole of January and am feeling very good about it. I can already see how that regular sketch work is impacting on my painting and providing painting inspiration. I'm focussing on figure and portrait drawing because I want to include more people in my paintings, and possibly also because it's a challenge and a good practice, and endlessly fascinating. I will show you some more on the blog soon, but if you're on Twitter or Instagram check out my account as you can see nearly all the January sketches there. All the best ones anyway, there are a few I won't be sharing! ;-)

Early morning, Santa Maria della Salute

Early morning, Santa Maria della Salute
Oils 24 x 30 cms

It's nice to recall while watching the rain lashing down outside my cosy studio today that this time last week I was painting in beautiful Venice. I was really pleased with this one, painted on the Accademia bridge very early on Friday morning as the sun was rising.

It's such a difficult time to paint as the sun moves so quickly, and as it gets higher into the sky it brings more definition into everything you can see. If you start trying to keep up with this before you know it you're attempting to paint all the tiny windows and doors that you can see, and the buildings get darker as well as more clearly defined.

I really wanted to stick to my initial impression of the softness and muted greys of the buildings, the warm orange from the sky reflected into the sea and the relative darkness of the boats against the water.

I'm happy that I stopped as soon as I felt I'd 'said it'.

Painting in situ

I was also happy that I'd captured the difficult transition between the cool areas of water and the hot orange reflected light, and that I'd done so with a brevity of marks and colour.

Wyllis Heaton at work

It was a real pleasure to be painting alongside friends from the US and UK on that morning, and then to go off for a chocolate croissant and cappuccino afterwards. :-)

Penny German, Felicity House, Louisa Calder, Kelly Medford and Ann Justin

Spectacular San Marco light display

This time last week this amazing spectacle of light greeted me at San Marco, shortly before a rainbow appeared in an arc right over the top of the campanile.

Back from Venice to my show opening

Back from Venice haul

At my new solo exhibition

What a jet set lifestyle this week! From Norfolk to Venice, from Venice to home at 3.30 am yesterday, to the opening of my brand new exhibition at 11.00 am after a couple of hours of sleep. I felt absolutely brilliant though and had a thoroughly nice day at Patchings, thank you to everybody who managed to come to the opening day and to all the team at Patchings who did such a brilliant job hanging the exhibition and taking care of everything. Today I've had a lovely family day and tomorrow I'm raring to get back to work.

One thing I want to do tomorrow is take a look at the fourteen paintings that I managed to bring back from Venice with me, here's a sneak peek as I managed to get them out of the suitcase this morning. I'll show you better photos of them as I get them.

And don't worry there's still plenty of time to see my exhibition as it's open until the 23rd of November. I shall be there next on Saturday 11th October from 11.00 am and I'll be painting a portrait in the gallery.

I will then be painting a portrait for the Kirby Bellars group of artists on Monday 13th, attending the Royal Society of Marine Artists preview on Tuesday 14th, and a RSMA workshop on Wednesday 15th and running a workshop at Patchings on the 16th. Before the end of October I must also finish and frame my ROI entries, take part in a two day plein air event in Norwich and have a week in France with the family so no worries about October being boring...

Venice exhibition

Caffè Florian 15" x 19" £495

Pink sky over piazzetta 15" x 19" £495

Santa Maria Formosa 15" x 19" £495

Gondolas on the grand canal 17" x 17" £495

Although I haven't been posting much lately, I have been busy! I've hand painted and finished all these frames above because the paintings are going to take part in an exhibition at the Mine gallery, Carshalton in the London borough of Sutton. The exhibition is on for the whole month of March and I know it's going to be a fantastic show with work by Wapping group members Derek Daniells, Michael Richardson, Karl Terry and John Stillman and other great UK plein air painters such as Valerie Pirlot, Roy Connelly, David Bachman, Tim King... I'm sure there are many more but they are the names that spring to mind!

We all love to paint in Venice you see! It's going to be beautiful work, I promise you won't be disappointed if you can visit.

You might be hard pressed to leave without buying a painting though!

I decided to drive down with my paintings, it should have taken three hours each way according to my sat nav. Actually with roadworks and delays it took me about four and a half hours to get there and then I had to turn around and drive straight back - another four hours! It made me think of my friend Lori Putnam in the US who has just driven eleven hours to paint snow - the things we do! Mind you, Lori was with friends so I'm sure that journey was lots of fun ;-)

Information about the gallery can be found here!

Tomorrow I'm teaching a 'painting cats in acrylics' workshop at Fulbeck, starring my gorgeous ginger and white Charlie (although he won't be there in person!). There are still spaces on several of my day workshops this year, you can see which ones by looking at my website www.haideejo.com

Santa Maria Formosa

Santa Maria Formosa
framed size 15" x 19" £495

I remember painting this in Venice on a misty and cold afternoon. I wasn't too sure how it was going, as is often the way! I knew I didn't want to put too much detail into the church, in fact I couldn't see much detail because every so often the fog would thicken up making it difficult to see anything at all!

I was attracted to the characterful leaning of the church buildings - I'm pretty sure they were leaning, or maybe I was leaning? Anyway, there was a little bit of life in the square with people passing through in dribs and drabs. And I liked the small touch of colour which was a stall selling glass lanterns.

You know that I don't like to touch a plein air painting afterwards but sometimes needs must. In this case I had a tiny adjustment to make. The young couple on the left shared a very brief kiss which I didn't quite manage to catch at the time. I was determined to remember it for later though as the action seemed to lend a story to the whole scene.

This is the painting as I left the site, with sort of half a girl!

I couldn't really leave her headless, she was too large in the painting to not have a head! 

So I remembered the kiss and brought the pair closer together...

There now, that's better for the lovestruck couple! If you look carefully you can see that her previous body has now become a bit of background interest. I touched nothing else in the painting, for I fear I would lose the freshness. I love the sketchy marks and thin dribbles of paint coupled with larger simplified shapes that make up this piece. And the green greys. Plus a little extra warmth in places. And those lanterns. Sorry, I'm rambling now...

 

Small adjustment

Yellow morning, piazzetta

Sometimes I find it necessary to make a small adjustment to a plein air painting when I look at it later on. This was one of my favourites from the most recent Venice trip, but after only a couple of days I realised something was wrong and it bothered me, so I have fixed it now.
Can you spot what was wrong? The finished painting is above, and the painting as it left the Piazzetta in Saint Marks square below.
By the way the colours and tonal values haven't changed, that's just the differences in the photography I'm afraid!

Well it was just this area here...

The shadow cast by the Doges Palace (the building on the left) wasn't aligned with the side of the building, it should have been vertical. There was also a slightly dangerous lean on the palace (at the top) so I've corrected that too.
I easily resisted the temptation to fiddle with anything else because you don't want to spoil that excitement and freshness that you got from being in front of the subject do you?

I've now sold this painting and am in the process of framing it in one of six beautiful frames which arrived today. I'm going to be taking three or four other Venice paintings to a gallery in London next week and one Venice painting together with one London painting and one Bréhat painting are heading off to a gallery in Hampshire. Busy times!
I'll probably be showing you some of these in the frames next week when I've got them painted and waxed and fitted.

Looking at this reminds me of my next painting trip - in only four weeks time I am heading to Morocco to paint alongside Ken Howard which I am very much looking forward to.

Caffè Florian

Caffè Florian, oils 10" x 14"

Another Venice painting, this time I was standing outside my favourite place to have a coffee in Venice, Caffè Florian in St Marks square. At Florian prices you probably wouldn't choose to visit more than once in your trip, but it's a lovely treat if you do get the chance. It was established in 1720 and apparently must be one of the oldest coffee houses that has been in continuous operation ever since.

The waiters popped in and out so I started with a very quick sketch of them in my sketchbook in case they disappeared altogether.  I didn't want the painting not to have them in it, they were the focal point framed in the archway with the grand white canopies also offering a much needed contrast to the dark interior. At about 3pm I was surprised when they next came outside wearing black jackets, so I supposed they had changed into their evening wear!

On the second to last day in Venice fellow painter Valerie Pirlot and I treated ourselves to a warming hot drink and croissant in Caffe Florian, in between our first and second paintings of the day. Well even scruffy artists need a little luxury in our lives sometimes, don't we?!

I'm having a busy week planning big events for next year, there is so much going on I can hardly write it all in my diary fast enough! Plus I'm trying to organise Christmas in my spare moments ;-)

I'm very excited about tomorrow though, it's the preview of the Royal Institute of Oil Painters exhibition at the Mall galleries London. I will try to remember to take some photos to show you.
You can actually see the whole exhibition online which is fantastic, I think you'll love it! You'll also feel as though you're right there with me. To see the Royal Institute of Oil painters 2012 exhibition online click here!

Rialto bridge in early morning fog

Rialto bridge, early morning fog  16" x 8"

What do you get when you add one day's travelling plus three days of sickness plus one lovely family day plus two days of admin and a fab Christmas meal out with friends?
You get me, desperate to get a paintbrush back in my hands, that's what!
After spending half the morning cleaning the studio (yes very necessary after the cats have been left to their own devices in there for two weeks!) I spent the afternoon painting a self-portrait and I really really enjoyed it. Right from the beginning when I was squeezing out the oozy colours on to the clean freshly oiled palette. Ahh!
I couldn't get a photo of it because it's been dark here since about 3 o clock but I will show you it soon.
Tomorrow I'm going to be at the SAA headquarters all day shooting a little web clip video. Should be interesting! I think I'm going to demo how to prep a board for painting on. The video will only be four minutes long so I didn't want to take on too much!

This is another foggy Venice piece. Painting this I was standing on a narrow strip of pavement near the Rialto bridge (on the market side) which ends in a dead end just around that corner. I've stood in this spot and sketched on a previous visit. It's quite a private place because not many people walk past. Those that do soon pass back again when they realise they can't get anywhere.
On this particular morning the tide was very high. The water was almost level with the pavement, maybe two inches below. This made me a little nervous, and when a large boat passed nearby it also made me play 'jump the waves'.

Ponte dei Pugni

From the Ponte dei Pugni, looking towards Campo San Barnaba £285 

Another from last week's trip to Venice. I painted this one standing on the Ponte dei Pugni (which means bridge of fists), looking towards Campo San Barnaba which is one of my favourite spots in Venice. The large white building you can see on the right hand side is the Church of San Barnaba.
The ponte I was painting from is a bridge with an interesting history though - in the 17th century rival clans used to meet here to fight. In fact there are four footprints marked in stone, one on each corner of the bridge, to show where opponents should stand! Apparently the bridge had no railings at the time so you can only imagine the shouting and jeering and mayhem going on as grown men fell into the murky canal below. I bet it was quite a spectator sport.

Grand canal, slightly hazy

View of the Salute from the Accademia bridge

Finally the fog has lifted, after two days. I had a better day today, yesterday I was flagging and uninspired by the flat light conditions.
This is my first of three today, the Salute painted from the Accademia bridge. I do think it's a great view if you're lucky enough to see the sun rise. We've been getting up super early every day but the sun has eluded us so far.
I'll be able to show you all the other paintings when I get home later in the week, I hope they travel well!

Venice in the fog!

The morning's work on the ground, St Marks square 

The basilica appearing and disappearing the whole time!

The sun never made it through the fog today! This photo is of St Marks square when we arrived at about 7.45 this morning! These are my three various stages of fog paintings! I did another this afternoon in a different campo. The fog came and went in varying degrees but never lifted altogether!
It was pretty cold too!

Venice love!

Early morning light, Santa Maria della Salute

There's no other light like it, is there? It really is great to be here and the weather has been lovely today. This is my first painting of four today.
Within thirty minutes of starting this the sun came up and the whole scene changed completely. For a while I tried to continue with the original impression fixed in mind but realised I had to stop at this point.
This afternoon I stood in the shade painting gondolas moored in the foreground and the buildings on the other side of the grand canal in brilliant sunlight.
Then another facing across the canal to a terracotta building which was half in sun, half in shadow with fabulous terracotta reflections in the water.
My last painting of the day was a nocturne, I don't think it was terribly successful. In fact, I'm sure that when I see it in the daylight tomorrow I'm going to be horrified!

Piazzetta, Venice

It's so lovely to be back in Venice! Magical! We arrived yesterday early evening and today was our first day painting.
This is an oil that I did this morning, 10" x 14". The sky was just breathtaking! I also love the pink glass in the lamps. Everything is conducive to being painted here.