Rowing club at Putney

Rowing club at Putney

Things get hotter! The day after painting with the Royal Institute of Oil painters at Maidenhead I painted at Putney with the Wapping group - boy was it hot in the city! Thirty degrees celsius I found out later. There was actually a weather warning in place, we're not good at dealing with weather extremes in this country. Heat and cold both take us by surprise. We're fine with rain and drizzle though.
Anyway, of the four paintings spanning the two days this is by far my favourite one and it only took HALF AN HOUR to paint - how does that happen?!
In fact I confess that I almost didn't start it, thinking it was too ambitious a subject for the time frame but there you go! Surprised myself by managing to capture the essence of the scene, with probably no wasted strokes!

Rowing club at Putney - detail

This is the other painting from the day, the one I laboured over in the sweltering heat -

Towards Putney bridge

And this is a better look at the afternoon one from the day before - 

Basking in the heat

Fishing on the Thames

We in the UK are in a state of shock. I must try to explain to my international friends. We are currently experiencing what can only be described as ... summer.
The days are hot and long, the sun is shining and the sky is blue and clear. The thing that's really taken us by surprise this summer is that it hasn't been one glorious day followed by the default setting (rain) but actually waking up each day to beautiful sunshine.
It's like the summer we fondly remember/ dream of.
Sun screen has taken up residence in my painting kit and long may it continue!
Yesterday I was painting by the river Thames in Maidenhead with members and friends of the Royal Institute of Oil painters.
Today I'm heading to the Thames again but this time it's Putney to paint with members of the Wapping group. Maybe I will find another willing fisherman to model like this one.. thanks to you Dan :-)
I'll post a better pic of this when I get a chance to take one.

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