Watercolours

Refining watercolour skills has been taking up my time recently. In that regard I attended a demonstration of watercolour seascape painting by Geoff Hunt PRSMA arranged by the National Maritime Museum Art Club.

Geoff is one of the foremost marine painters in the world today so it was very exciting to watch him in action. It opened my eyes to some of the shortcomings of my techniques. I have been attempting apply some of the lessons learned. A few examples of my studies are below:

Clipper Hull Down

Sidmouth

Hull down on the horizon

Whistable Harbour

The Medway 1830 (After Turner's sketches)

Medway sunset

Racing for St Malo

This painting is based on an afternoon last Christmas watching a number of boats in the bay off St Malo struggling against some very gusty wind and a rising sea. I thought it would be an opportunity to push on the heavy sea painting technique.

Racing for St Malo

More Suffolk

I have reviewed the acrylic sketches I did in Suffolk and was taken by the colouring of Dunwich Heath, resplendent in its Autumnal colouring. I think I have done a reasonable job capturing the russets. The clouds were moving quickly and every time I looked up the lighting had changed.

Silver Birch on Dunwich Heath

More Birch trees on Dunwich Heath

Suffolk

A recent trip to the Suffolk coast has resulted in a few painting ideas the first of which is seen below. A stop at the Tide Mill at Woodbridge on a sunny winter afternoon was too good an opportunity to miss.

Painted on board (6mm MDF to be exact) rather than my usual canvas, it was something of an experiment. The board was gessoed first to give it a little tooth and the painting completed in acrylics. I found that initially when painting on the gessoed ground that the acrylic paint dried even more quickly than on canvas. Adding a little medium might be advisable if I repeat the exercise. Other than that I found little difference and my usual technique was up to the job.

Dream for sale, Woodbridge Suffolk

Stories from the Great War

I currently have three paintings on show as part of the Rochester Guildhall Museum commemoration of the First World War. (Plus Live Bait, 7th Cruiser Squadron 1914. See previous post).

The exhibition which runs from 24 May 2014 to 11 January 2015 is entitled
"Stories from the Great War" and looks at the impact of of the Great War on the people of the Medway towns.

My contribution is shown below.

Guildhall Museum, Rochester Hight Street

The Dawn of Flight

French SPAD over the front lines 1918

Opening the Account, The Battle of Jutland

www.guildhallmuseumrochester.co.uk

Great War Commemoration

I have had the honour to be commissioned by the Guildhall Museum Rochester to paint a commemorative work of the contribution played by the Medway towns in the First World War. The work will form part of the Museum's permanent collection.

After intensive research the subject I selected was the loss of three cruisers just seven weeks after war had been declared. Many of the crew came from the Medway towns and fifteen hundred men were lost when the three cruisers were torpedoed.

I chose not to depict the action in which the ships were lost, instead I chose to show them about to sail from the River Medway for the last time.

The painting was unveiled by the Mayor Councillor Barry Kemp and Mayoress of Medway Joyce Kemp.

Live Bait, 7th Cruiser Squadron, Chatham 1914

Unveiling at Guildhall Museum Rochester

Yorkshire Dales

A nostalgic trip back to my home county after an unforgivable absence of fourteen years has inspired a few themes for painting!

A whirlwind tour of the Dales resulted in a few quick en plein air sketches which will I hope develop into a number of finished works.

Dales sketches below.

The Yorkshire Dales near Kettlewell Watercolour

Aysgarth Falls

South of Kettlewell in Acrylic