Waiting To Be Painted: Saltburn

There are some scenes that jump right out at you, and you paint them straight away. Others, you know you will paint, but they have to wait for you to do it, or until the time is right. This painting is one of the latter. We drove to Saltburn a couple of years ago, in glorious sunshine, only to find a sea fret. It was chilly on the beach, virtually deserted, and very picturesque. I knew that I would do a painting from the photos that I took that day, but just didn't know when.
When we left Saltburn we drove back into glorious sunshine about half a mile in-land from the beach, and it stayed with us all the way home.
It's a long way to go for a bit of mist.

Saltburn: Sea Fret.

Looking Back At The Sky

I started running again at Easter. It's hard work getting going again, but it soon becomes quite addictive. Truth be told it's hard work every time for the first three miles, and then I seem to find my rhythm. Talking to other people they seem to feel the same - first three miles are hard, and then you are okay. I've even managed to drag myself out after school several times each week, and as a consequence have lost a bit of weight and feel a lot more positive.
It's good to get back outside. It's good to see spring develop; it's the best time of the year. A friend once told me that spring makes it's way up the country at walking pace, and I absolutely love that idea. It once formed the basis of a very long story that I made up for Archie, who went through a stage of preferring us to make up stories for him, to reading them to him. This story featured a boy, who's name I forget, who escaped from the Sunnyside Home For Wayward Boys, and embarked on an adventure where he had to get to the very north of Scotland before spring got there. He met all manner of creatures and had lots of escapades on the way. I made up installments everyday for about a month, and boy was it hard work! I eventually passed the baton to Sara. As I recall I dropped it in her lap as we drove to France, "Your mum wants to tell you a story now" (-"Thanks, darling!").
Being outside more, running, has found me looking at the sky again. The Vale of York has big skies, as does anywhere flat, and some of them are amazing. It's little wonder that they feature so prominently in so many of my paintings..

Alne.

oil on canvas

Having Really Bad Hair Days That No One Else Can See.

Do we ever see ourselves, or our own performance objectively? I doubt it.
I've spent the best part of this week invigilating the Y11 GCSE Art Exam. After getting the room (and students) ready, getting all the basic equipment out, trawling through y10 data, getting additional equipment out, as and when they ask for it, catching up on email issues raised at Parents' Evening, getting even more equipment out that the students decide that they also need, I was able to do some painting. I have to confess, sitting with them in their exam is something that I enjoy.
At the end of the final session, I said to G*****, a lovely, talented but under-confident student, "Well done. I'm really pleased with what you've done". She blew out her cheeks and said "Oh thank you for saying that. I've been so worried that this isn't very good". I looked at her painting, a beautiful picture of highly decorative, semi abstract carp, that I couldn't have done at her age, and thought..Why?...Why would you worry about that? I told her her work was beautiful.

It was good to do some painting, but it was great to see G****** leave with a real smile on her face.

This is one of the pieces that I managed to do this week. It is from a photograph taken from my Kayak on the river Ure a couple of summers ago. I love it when the sky gets darker than the land...always very dramatic!

Arboreal Magic

After reading Dark Sister by Graham Joyce, not to mention Some Kind Of Fairytale, Tales For a Dark Evening, Silent Land and The Tooth Fairy, by the same author, I wanted to go back to painting landscapes, especially woodland. What I really want to do is to suggest something of the magic that you feel in the woods at certain times of the day, when you are alone. I don't know if I am having a great deal of success with this, but I am enjoying leaving the built-up areas alone for a while. It's also getting me out of the house more, which is exactly what I need.
This painting is smaller than I have worked on for some time, and just as scaling-up presents challenges, so does scaling down. I have struggled with this, and interestingly I found myself tightening back up, adding details that on reflection I'm not sure I needed to add. I'm tempted to redo this painting, but on a bigger scale, and much looser in style.
We'll see..

The Path, Yearsley Woods.

Oil on Board

Back In The Woods.

Enough with painting York for a while. I might look at Sheffield and Leeds (going there for son number one's birthday present today), but before I do I am going to do some woodland scenes. Hopefully with a fey feel to them. I've been fancying this after reading several books recently by Graham Joyce, particularly 'Dark Sister' and 'Some Kind Of Fairytale'. 

This painting is of Yearsley woods:

I used linseed oil to thin the paint on this one, so much longer drying times between sessions.

'Last Light, Yearsley Woods'

A Work In Progress: High Ousegate, York.

I had intended spending Saturday and Sunday painting, but couldn't because I spent Saturday in bed with a sickness bug (which brought me home early from the cricket club on Friday evening). I did manage to start the following this afternoon, whilst Sara built 'The Great Eggscape' with Archie, for his school's egg decorating competition.
This canvas is an old one, saved from the skip at school, and is an odd shape. I have had several goes at painting it, with no real success. Hopefully this will be more successful than previous efforts..

I'm using linseed oil to thin the paint. I usually use turps...if I use anything. Oil makes the paint more fluid, which is quite nice to handle, but will inevitably require more drying time. I intend working on this painting over a longer period of time.

It's nice pushing the paint around, without 'scrubbing'. It's nice not have the sicative effect of turps/white spirit.

Slowly building up and indicating where the figures will go.

Detail. 

I intend keeping this much more painterly than some of my other paintings.

That's it for now.

Stage 2.

Having let the paint dry for a week, I have had another go at it.

I'm starting to build up some of the details a little, but trying to retain the painterliness.

Hmmm... I like the left hand side more than the right. Time to let it dry again and then work back into it.

Stage 3.

The paint had dried sufficiently to work into this (I have been working on another piece whilst waiting for it to dry - a woodland scene, to be added later). I have worked into both shops, left and right, cleaned the sky up a little, and worked into the floor. After this I had a look at the figures. I will leave it for a while now and live with it for a bit. I may feel like coming back to it later.

A few details...

High Ousegate, York.

More Paris

Friday night and we have just got in after going straight from school to town with Archie, so that he could spend his Waterstones vouchers. Four books later (2 Darren Shann's and 2 by some other author + a few ideas for yours truly), and we took him for a hot chocolate in Pret a Manger (do they pay corporation tax?) - by-the-way, it is currently cheaper to get your drinks by buying a £1.50 chocolate bars, because they throw the drinks in free. Having got home Archie has decided that he doesn't want to watch a family film tonight - he'd rather read. Excellent! That gives me chance to post the second painting that I completed after our Paris trip. This one is from some photos that I took out side the Pumpypants (Pompidou) centre.

Blocking in.

A little definitition.

 Establishing tones. 

Starting to build it up. 

 A little more detail.

Finished.

Paris Contre Jour