MOZART AND AN ELECTRIC FIRE

will get me through this winter. When I am painting I do not notice the descending gloom that means it is now dark at 5pm! Painting through the darkness gives me a false sense of dedication, I feel like a committed painter even though my sessions seem to be getting shorter. The winter is definately having an impact. The sky has appeared, its obviously fundamental to my style of landscape painting, I want to look more closely at the dramatic connection between land and sky in terms of the light cast. This means dramatic skies, Constable like, I loathe blue skies for painting.

Alwinton. Day 3

PAINTING BY NUMBERS

I have got into the habit of drawing out the composition in pencil at the start of a painting. I regard this as an advanced form of ‘painting by numbers’. I would appreciate if someone else had premixed a wide range of paint, this would save a lot of time. One of the benefits I have found with this approach is that it highlights the importance of the line in painting, and the rhythms to be found in the landscape. Taking the line for a walk as Matisse would say. Painting is progressing well, I think the sky will open up, I just like space in my painting.

Alwinton. Day 2

TOO MANY GREENS

no, just the right amount, to mis-quote a line from Amadeus. I had been wondering what is it that I don’t like about the painting I had just done. There are several issues. One is there is just too much going on in terms of its colour range, its kaleidoscopic. Secondly, I often get the feeling, not only with my own paintings, that they are made up of many parts, like a jigsaw puzzle that often jar when viewed as a whole. These issues are created firstly by the choice of photo and secondly by the way I translate them. With this in mind I have chosen a landscape that is made up mostly of greens and I have chosen to simply block in the painting to begin with but really look at the range of greens in the image. Another question, if your more interested in the abstract qualities of the landscape, why include the sky?, I will keep an open mind about this.

Alwinton. Day 1

DIMINISHING RETURNS

Why can’t you just paint a great painting?, especially when you have spent so much of your life doing it. I can’t use the word ‘dedication’ and maybe that’s the problem. Does the rate of improvement have to be glacial? its exhausting having to move so slowly. Its a shame because I like the painting, I just want it to be so much more. My favourite painting quote is by Francis Bacon, you need to know something about him to get the humour: ‘ Artists are never satisfied with their work, though I believe Henry Moore is’. I will have to accept my fate and plod on, its part of the tradition. Painting is finished.

Evening in the Coquetdale Valley

ITS NOT OVER

I do hope the winter blues are not setting in, my enthusiasm quickly evaporated as soon as I started painting today and I decided I couldn’t take the picture any further. After half an hour I was finished. I am still struggling with the 2 foreground trees. They have moved in the right direction, but need a bit more work. The valuable lesson from this is knowing what to avoid in the future, not because I can’t paint it, but because it doesn’t fit my style. I am no Impressionist, I have always favoured an odd mix of the Renaissance with a sprinkling of Expressionism. Looking at todays painting I know it isn’t finished, lets hope for bright blue skies when I recommence.

Evening in the Coquetdale Valley. Day 7

PAINTING WHAT YOU KNOW

as opposed to painting what you see. You would think the two are the same, and for some people they are, but for most painters they are not. Its funny, but after painting and looking at art for decades, my assessment of my own work in progress is often ‘it doesn’t look right?’. That’s the feeling I have had for the last few days about this painting, and it was to do with the space, especially the far distant hills and the lie of the land in that area. I have adjusted it and don’t have the same doubts now. What keeps me interested in the landscape subject is this struggle to make the landscape bend to my will in order to make a good painting, I’d like to say ‘great’, but that may never happen, that’s what keeps me going.

Evening in the Coquetdale Valley. Day 6

START BEFORE DARK

and if your working in an outside studio in the countryside, maybe take a torch?, something I keep forgetting. The street light outside our cottage barely has enough light to justify its own existence. Somehow, despite its closeness to our property it doesn’t throw any light in our direction. These trees in the left foreground of the picture were going to present a problem. They consist of a million tiny shimmering leaves that make the trees look formless. A pointillist approach seemed to be the obvious answer, but of course, I don’t do obvious. I am still grappling with them and its a case of trial and error to find an equivalent solution, I think a suggestion of leaves will work.

Evening in the Coquetdale Valley. Day 5

WASTED PAINT

The worst thing about being inconsistent as a painter is the amount of expensive paint that is wasted. Its the first thing I think about when considering my commitments for the day. After a couple of missed days, I go into the studio and prod my piles of paint with my finger, knowing that most of it is unusable. And then for my sins I have to scrape the whole lot off and spend half an hour mixing up enough paint to get me started. This painting has had quite a bit of work but most of it is at the start, or half way stage, I like the way it is progressing though.

Evening in the Coquetdale Valley. Day 4

A PYSCOLOGICAL BREAKTHROUGH

I was wondering how easy it would be to paint through my first winter in an outdoor studio, I’ve never done this before. The trick, as I have discovered today, is to start before it gets dark. In this case at 3pm. It was only when I was starting to feel the cold did I look at my watch, it was 7pm, obviously now dark outside. I hadn’t even noticed the sun going down. Painting is the only activity I do where I lose track of time, I love the fact that it totally absorbs my concentration. It slows the mind down, something that is so necessary in the 21st century. This painting is progressing well, these curious shapes are emerging, the difficulty with that is to make them look integral to the landscape.

Evening in the Coquetdale Valley. Day 3

RESISTANCE IS FUTILE

My aim to withstand the cold until it was winter has failed within 24 hours, a proper test of my character. More importantly though is my determination to paint through the winter, hardly a real test, I am always within touching distance of my electric heater. If I hadn’t done the insulating of the studio myself I would start to question whether there was any, money well spent? I don’t know if I have the mental strength to paint winter scenes in the winter, better to carry on with my deluded summer landscapes. I am liking how this is starting to appear. I don’t know if its the effect of the photography but it does throw up some odd shapes in the landscape.

Evening in the Coquetdale Valley. Day 2

WINTER IN THE STUDIO

Heading towards the first winter in the studio, yet I am still painting bucolic pastoral scenes of my local landscape. Just goes to prove that I really am a studio based painter. Not that I am benefitting from any summer warmth, had a hat and a scarf on today, resisting the temptation to use the electric heater. Hope to keep a positive mindset as winter really sets in, I’ve always had the comfort blanket of a studio in the house. Good start for this painting.

Evening in the Coquetdale Valley. Day 1

HOW MANY TREES

does an Italian landscape have? I don’t know, but I have painted enough of them. I am discovering that what I am painting are souvenirs of the local landscape that I love. Is that the right way to put it? I think if a painter has a strong connection to the things he paints then, in the case of a landscape, he wants to bring back a strong memory of the thing he has seen, in that moment. When a painting is finished the effect is to remind me in a compelling way how I felt looking at that landscape.

Whittingham, an Italian landscape

MAKING IT FIT

My decision to sandwich in another sky from a different photograph was the right one. There is a real potential that the 2 won’t gel. I had a bit of a wrestling match with this and its not quite there yet but the risk was worth taking. The bottom right of the sky has not photographed well, it is quite reflective. The one thing I am trying to avoid is making pretty pictures, the landscape here is beautiful, but it also has a toughness to it, it can be wild and bleak. I am trying to give these pictures a worked and tough quality, not just for the sake of it, but as a result of trying to carve out the landscape as I see it.

Whittingham, an Italian landscape. Day 5

21ST CENTURY PAINTER

Being a figurative painter my work would be regarded as fairly conventional, I would argue most abstract painters today are also fairly conventional, its been around for over 100 years! Anyone applying paint to canvas is following a very long tradition. However, I do use technology a lot to prepare source material for paintings. I had to take a break yesterday, but also I wasn’t happy with the sky in the photo. I went out into the garden as the skies were a lot closer to what I was looking for. I then went into Photoshop and overlaid these onto my original photo. Haven’t decided which to use but both are better.

V2

V1

Original photo

ALCHEMY

This is basically what every artist is trying to achieve. One definition is ‘An attempt to turn base materials into gold’. I often trawl through all the photographs I have taken of the landscape and I am left feeling uninspired. Its only when you start to draw out the composition do the possibilities start to emerge. I find myself stretching out the ‘truth’ as far as I can and yet still retain the essential characteristics of the place. This is where the real excitement of painting lies for me.

2 STEPS FORWARD

Yesterday was 2 steps forward, 1 step back, so things are improving. Sometimes I will almost do the opposite of what I did yesterday in order to find a solution. Its a shame I don’t have total recall, I could simply avoid making the same mistakes and my progress would be a steep upward curve. You would think there would be an incremental and straight line to improvement, just keep painting? Then I think of a concert pianist still practising 6-8 hours every day, its just the way it is if you have any kind of ambition.

Whittingham, an Italian landscape. Day 4

RIGHT FIRST TIME

A philosophy I like to apply to all aspects of my life, apart from painting. Firstly because I rarely achieve it, and secondly, when I do I am suspicious of how easy it came about. You have to be prepared for disappointment and frustration if you change something that works. Am I happy with things that are ‘ok’, that is a question I am always asking myself. Today was a wrestling match, points were one and lost but overall I am still ahead. Feels like I am about half way with this.

Whittingham, an Italian landscape. Day 3

SHIFTING PRIORITIES

Funny how something so important one day is not so much the next. I have pushed my painting further up the list of my priorities, no one has noticed and no one is upset. I think this is a permanent shift, its certainly more enjoyable than mixing cement. This painting is progressing nicely, I have no idea where my painting is going, isn’t that part of its appeal?

Whittingham, an Italian landscape. Day 2

AN ITALIAN LANDSCAPE?

This view always reminds me of Italy. It is the 2 hills and all the trees, often in singles dotted across the landscape. Quite a bold start and its high summer, not this summer! the photo was taken last year when we actually had decent spells of dry weather.

Whittingham, an Italian landscape. Day 1

SUNDAY PAINTING

More than a week without painting, that’s not good, even with a long list of other pressing projects and shortening daylight. If I was a bit more focused I should be able to paint twice a week, and I want to. Anyway, this painting is almost finished. Its looking like a John Nash from the 1940’s but I don’t have a problem with that, I like John Nash, I have a book on him. Its my belief that you don’t choose your style, it chooses you and so I will continue. The best thing to do is not to think, just paint, as simple as this sounds its not always so easy. I am liking this painting, I like the very particular and contrasting trees, they look at odds with the landscape, they also look observed. The question is now, where does this lead me, with the choice of the next painting?

Springtime in Edlingham