Anemone Japonica

About a week ago these lovely flowers began to open, and although it is great to see that they have survived, I would not expect them to be in full flower is my north facing garden until the middle of August. If I could only choose one flower to grow it would be these. At the back end of the summer when the greens have lost their freshness and lots of the star performers have finished flowering, they are a beacon of light in sun and in dark corners alike. If they are out now, what are we going to be left with going into September. That's nature!!

It is a while since I painted these flowers, I have two examples hanging on the walls in the house, and often forget that I can have another go.
It is interesting to see if my style has slightly changed over the years.

there is not a lot to explain in this painting. I did the drawing first and because they are white flowers, I painted the background to give me their shape. I kept the colours very muted and soft so that the ring of stamens would be the focal point.

                                                                  'Anemone Japonica'
I am quite pleased with the result and it is nice to compare it with others that I have done in the past.
The painting was done on 'Cornwall' 450g matt paper by Hahnamuhle which I think helps the soft quality of the finished painting.

Field of Red

I had such a lovely time creating 'Bluebells Abstract' so I thought I would create a sister painting but of poppies.
The Bluebells gave rise to some debate about the actual flower depicted. There was some suggestion that it was more Hyacinth than Bluebell, so we compromised and I called it 'Field of Blue' ( See blog posted 3rd June 2014 ).Hence the title of this piece....'Field of Red'.

I used exactly the same technique as the previous painting so any details can be seen on the previous post, and I have become a little anxious about repeating myself, since Peter Ward was informed that his blog contained too many pictures and in future he would have to pay to post picture!!! He was then locked out of his site. He is trying to rectify the matter, but it does make me a bit wary of posting all the stages involved in my paintings.
I am sure I have lots still to go, as Peter has been going ages longer than me, and his posts are very picture based, much more than mine, but it does not hurt to be wary. If anyone reading this post has had the same experience we would love to here from you.

Anyway, back to Field of Red. I started by sticking some distressed builders linen scrim to the lower foreground in a slightly circular shape to produce some texture. I attached it to the painting with gesso.
 The background was then painted , using lots of Pyroll Red and Apatite Green Genuine, with other pigments added. I was very careful to let the green dry before adding the red, as if the two colours mix they become very dirty.
I then painted in a few field-like marks, and then using pva medium I stuck down my bits of painted doiley.
I completed the collage with circles cut with a hole punch from the edged of the doiley paper.
I finally added a few green streaks over the red area to give me some stems.

Sorry, the greens on the left look a bit blue, but they are actually very fresh 'new grass' colour. Must be the light when I took the photo!

Agapanthus

It is getting very close to the exhibition in Wells Cathedral and I have been busy putting together the flyers, posters etc. I realised that I was using an image of Agapanthus  as my contribution, (we both have a painting each on the posters etc) but I sold the painting quite recently. It felt necessary, therefore to produce another as similar as possible to hang in the exhibition.
This was no problem as painting Agapanthus could never be seen as a chore and I was pleased to have an excuse to get going.

The process was exactly the same as the last one I painted which is described in a previous post,(See post dated 30th December 2012) so I will just show the initial wash and the finished painting.

                                                                     'Agapanthus'

                            As usual the painting is on Fabriano Artistico Extra White Rough 300g paper.

Catching Up : The Squiggle and The Poppies

There has been quite a bit of upheaval over the past two weeks. I have been having work done on the kitchen and decided that this was just the right time to clear out and clean the kitchen cupboards. What a lot of gadgets we can acquire and then never use! They have all gone in the bin. Space is limited so I cannot be too fussy. Hence, no time for painting except at AVA.
We had the final session of the compulsory calendar, which is always a fun week. We are presented with a couple of squiggles, drawn by one of our members grandchildren and we have to choose one and create a painting or drawing. Our members really enjoy this session and it always produces lots of really creative ideas.
My choice looked like this.......

There were quite a few birds from this shape, but I chose to rotate the drawing through 90 degrees. The drawing has to be faithfully copied onto a piece of appropriate paper but it can be enlarged or reduced as desired. From this shape, I produced the following painting which I am quite pleased with.

The first week of the summer session, with freedom of choice, I was back to painting flowers. The Opium Poppies were out in the garden and so I took some photos ( I have never cut them to bring indoors so do not know if they would last long enough!) and had a go at painting them fairly loosely. I think they work reasonably well, but I would have liked the reds to be a bit fresher.

Its great to have a set programme as it takes us out of our comfort zone, but it is lovely to look forward to the summer months where we can experiment and enjoy our own special loves.

Bluebells Abstract

I have been quite determined to paint and put together another painting using my lovely doilies. I wanted to do something based on a bluebell wood, so thought I had better get around to it before I forgot what they had looked like. They grow quite well at the bottom of my garden under the trees, and because I am so used to them being there, I have never bothered to take photographs.
Anyway, not too important as it will be a very abstract interpretation.

I started by putting a fairly wet blue and green wash onto some rough paper, and where it puddled I used a straw to blow it into the centre of the paper which I had left white and dry. I tried to vary the strengths of the colour especially in the blue area.

When it was completely dry, I used some quite strong colour to try to define some flower shapes growing up to the pale centre. I then used the edge of a narrow strip of mount board, dipped into green paint, to add stems and leaf shapes.

I then painted a d'oily with the same colours as the original wash, but using less diluted paint as the surface of the paper has a slight gloss which prevents it absorbing colour very easily. I tore up the inner part into usable pieces and I used a hole punch to produce lots of small circles from the edge pieces.

I then used these pieces to collage the painting  ( can you collage a painting?) hoping to get the effect of lots of bluebells reaching for the sunlight. I never stick the pieces down completely, so that when the painting has a double mount and is framed, there is just enough room between support and glass for the strips of added paper to curl slightly to give a three-dimensional effect.

                                                                        'Bluebells'
                                     Abstract Collage on Fabriano Artistico Extra White Rough paper

Stormy Day

With so little time at the moment, with the garden like a jungle and accounts to be brought up to date, and paintings to frame for our coming exhibitions, there has been little time for painting. My only output, therefore has been what came out of the AVA programme this week.'Stormy Day ' is once again well outside my comfort zone, but as I haven't painted skies for a long time, it was the moment to give it a go. I used a piece of 300lb  Leonardo paper to allow for plenty of water.

I did a very simple drawing of a skyline of simple buildings and trees, keeping them very low in the frame and then simply adding the hills and sky, trying to make the clouds look threatening and the hills receding.
As a final touch, I fulled some of the approaching black clouds down to give the impression that it had begun to rain in the distance. This was perhaps a mistake!

                                                                'Approaching Storm'
                                                watercolour on 300lb Leonardo paper
                                                                     25cm x 15cm

On the Beach

Just a quick post to show you what happened at AVA this week.
I was totally unprepared. I have been busy with some occasional work and we had visitors all Wednesday evening. I was, therefore totally unprepared for the group meeting. On Thursday morning I grabbed a piece of 'Cornwall' paper, my bag of painting gear and a pot of Galeria's 'Heavy Structure Gel' which I had come across whilst clearing out a cupboard. I have no idea what made me buy the stuff and it was new and unused.
My idea was that I would use the paste for some sea or sand texture and if the whole thing was a disaster, I could blame it on the experimental work that failed!!

On arrival, I had to do something that I have never done before which was to paint from imagination. I kept it simple, dividing the composition into vaguely three strips....one third sky, one third beach huts on sand and one third water/shoreline.

I started with the gel. I sort of expected it to dry like gesso, but in fact it remained fairly soft throughout, a bit like the mastic used to seal double glazing windows or bathroom fittings. I spread the gel using a toothbrush and a palette knife to put in some water texture, and some sand and rock. As its white it was difficult to see what was happening. I did try to dry it with the hairdryer, as time was limited, and that was reasonably successful.

I painted in a wash for the sky, drew in a very simple row of beach huts and a wash for the sea and sand.

Then it was just a case of trying to remember what each of the elements would look like. I painted the sand too dark so it became a rocky outcrop, which meant I needed to devise a set of steps to access the beach, and I needed to link beach and sky together, so added a mass of trees, and greenery behind the huts.together with a little fence. When I added the sand and water, I was reasonably surprised how successful the gel was at creating little ripple waves.

As usual, a bit of splatter completed the effort.

In hindsight, I think the gel was a waste of money for me, as I do not think I will be tempted to use it again, so an acrylic painting member of the club might benefit from my mistaken purchase. But, as usual, it was great fun to give it a go!

                                                                       'Beach Huts'
                                              Mixed media on Cornwall paper by Hahnemuhle
                                                                         450 gms