Another TWO!

Summer Breeze by the Coly, Oil on Board, 10x14 inches

This is a painting I did back last summer and put to one side and forgot about, so I gave it a few tweaks today to finish it off.  The sun barely came out that August day near Axmouth in Devon, and there was a thick hazy atmosphere which gives that gorgeous quiet, cool blue colour to distant trees.  I placed myself to get the sweep of the river as a 'lead in' to take the eye round past the willows on the right-hand bank and looping up into the far distant hills and clearing clouds, then back down over the upper left/centre woodland to settle on to the cattle.  

The rich pink of the Himalayan Balsam provided that bit of contrast against the blues and greens. I noticed that these Balsam flowers were a much richer colour than the ones that grow in my local bankside vegetation.

Clear August Air, Oil on Board, 7.5x10 inches

This was another little painting I'd half done and put aside.  As a contrast to the atmosphere in Summer Breeze by the Coly, the air was clear and provided little in the way of recession, but having sunlight coming from the left, gave the middle tree a lit and a shaded side, providing the classic counterchange an artist likes - light against dark and dark against light passages.  This always helps give the illusion of three dimensions...if you're very, very clever, of course...cough.