More Market, More Heads.

I started this canvas after adding a few final touches to one of my head (paintingshttp://richardspainting.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/heads.html). I wanted to carry on painting, so started a figure walking in the market, adding very loose stalls in the background. I enjoyed doing it, but knew that I would be painting over it, probably the next day, which I did. I scraped off as much tacky paint as I could, flipped it upside down, and started another head over it. A reminder that any mistake can be corrected, and painted over, even when the under-painting is wet..
This is the result.

A little more tinkering, particularly around the eyebrows.

Done.

Abstract Landscape; The Way To The Sea.

Another abstract landscape from earlier in the holiday. This was reworked on an old abstract that I found when I went through my cupboard.

The Way To The Sea.

Small Abstract

This is based, loosely, on the weir on the river Nidd at Nidd Gorge Knaresborough. Beautiful place.

Heads

I am painting a number of portraits at the moment. They are strangers from photographs taken in Northallerton. I'm taking a slightly different approach with these than I normally do. Most of my paintings tend to be landscapes, and I start off with a notan style blocking in of the main composition of masses, with very little drawing involved, certainly at the very first stage. I then work into the masses, lifting out lighter areas, refining the shapes, before applying values and colours. This works ok for landscapes, and I have used it fairly successfully with portraits, but recently I have done more drawing (with thinned down paint). These are loosely shaded as a grisaille, and then the values and colours worked in, working in decreasing masses. It is good fun. 

Painting portraits is forcing me to look closer at values, temperature and colour. I think this will have real benefits when I go back to painting landscapes, which I'm sure I will at some point. 

I feel like I've made good progress this summer, because I have painted almost everyday. The problem is going to be sustaining this as we go back to work next week, get a German exchange student, a dog,  move house, renovate the house...

 Early sketch..

 Basic grisaille.. 

 Establishing vales and colours..

 Starting to get there..

 Detail.

Finished.

Painting Down The Road

Another afternoon spent outside with my paints. Again, earlier in the holiday and not far from the house.

Archie's Den

Most of the painting that I've done this holiday has been outside. This one was painted just 200 metres from our house, and is the edge of the fields next to the train line. It is also where Archie and Hugo have their den.
I painted this one afternoon earlier in the holiday, when Sara had to go out, and worked more slowly than some of the plein air paintings that I have done recently, which is probably better. It's on a small piece of salvaged canvas (old swing seat), measuring only about 7x5cm.

The view.

Blocking in.

Ready to start adding colours and values.

Archie's Den.

Market Day

After dropping Archie and Joey off at the swimming pool in Northallerton, Sara and I went for a coffee and a walk around the market. I had the camera, so took a few pictures of people wandering around the market and shops, with a view to painting them.
This is the first of the paintings, which was started the next day. As often happens I spent time painting it, and then had  to leave it overnight to start to dry off (I'd used some oil to help the flow of the paint, but also added some liquin to speed up the drying), and then looked at it through fresh eyes the next day, only to find that I didn't like it. I was happy with elements of it, but the T shirt was too blue (Mr Parker, my old Art teacher was right when he told me that blue is a difficult colour to paint with - all those years ago!), and it was crudely painted. I thought about some whole-sale scraping off, but decided to work some paint over the top (of the still tacky paint). Much happier with the results.

 Too blue..

Better. 

In The Market.