Painting the night blue

I have wondered how to paint night scenes for quite some time now and had quite a few questions that needed answering: what kind of colours to use, how much detail to leave out and in,etc, etc etc! These are my first two rather timid and quite romantic scenes. They feel like movie stills to me! But it was fun to experiment

The First painting reminds me of a camping holiday way back when we first arrived in New Zealand. The moon rose at night and it was a magnificent sight. You know those evenings when the air is still, no clouds at all and the moon seems to take up half the sky? Well, that was this night AND it was reflected in the sea...truly amazing. I cycled up a steep road to the top of Shakespeare cliff and met a woman, walking her dog. She too had been attracted by the moon. Her enormous, shaggy and clearly deranged dog was responding  to same moon by trying to eat my tyres. I digress. So there we were, 10pm at night,on top of a cliff , admiring the moon. Such a special moment.I felt so brave and privileged!!

Anyway, I have replaced the nutter dog with a Scottie!

The photo is blurry and the yellow of the moon did not translate, sorry.

This next image  is purely form my imagination.

Fish fetish

Right. Apologies out of the way first. Sorry for not posting recently but , well, the mommy goddess had to do some overtime and secondly, my apologies for the corny title.

These are the three paintings I have submitted to the One Size Fits All exhibition at Thornton Gallery. It started yesterday and is on for a few weeks.

I promise, no more fish for a while.Not unless you beg!

They are all 10x10 inches,oil on canvas.

My camera is doing a gnome tour of Amsterdam South Wales and will hopefully return this Saturday so I can show you what else I have been up to.Tragically, not much, but I will post what I have.

Look Familiar?

I am revisiting my sheep theme.

I like looking at sheep.I like painting them and, in need of some downtime and  respite from fish,sheep ticked all the boxes.So, a dreamy, tranquil pastoral view of sheep it is.No excuses or explanations of what is right or what is wrong with the painting...it is just a simple painting of some sheep.

I enjoyed my time at the easel today.

Thanks, Dad.

I took some advice from my Dad and reworked the foreground. He said the original was too dark and too boring.(OK, what he really said was "you could think about lightening the foreground and adding some interest") As with most of the advice that he has ever given me, he was spot on.

This is now a landscape scene featuring Toe Toe (a miniature pampas like grass) . Thanks, Dad!

Working on a project

I am presently working on a three paintings to enter into Thornton Gallery's OSFA(One size fits all) competition. The one size refers to canvas size, 10inx10in (25cmx 25cm) and that's it! It makes for a lovely exhibition, seeing all those canvasses with so many different styles, subject matter and medium represented, side by side. I will publish my efforts here once I have handed them over to the Gallery in July. The exhibition runs from 8 July till 5 August 2011. So, till then I shall leave you with this image ,which is winging its way to California ,to Jo!

Graphic fish

Forgive me. When I am on a roll, I gotta go with it and it seems I have a thing for fish right now. I was having coffee with a friend, discussing this latest interest,  and it came to me that I think it is the whole juxtaposition of beauty and death. Or may not. Maybe I just like painting dead fish. Either way, something about it is compelling. Maybe beauty in death? After death? Anyhoo,I decided to paint a selection of mackerel (strangely enough, dead) but I realised I had only 30 minutes before the kids arrived home(sound the horn!Armageddon arrives at 4pm!) so I painted this somewhat graphic style interpretation of those poor, wee mackerel.
The fishmonger is starting to look at me strangely.

fish on ice

It is a rainy, cold day. What I want is to be somewhere sunny and warm. I ended up painting ruddy fish on ice. Freud would have a field day with that one.