Peter Barker's Musings

Whirling Dervish

2012-02-28T09:33:00.002Z

Pastel on Clairefontaine Pastelmat, 19x13 inches

This was an appealing subject for Soft Pastel on Pastelmat. People were feeding the ducks in Stamford last summer and they were all whirling around trying to grab bits of bread. Looking directly into the sunlight, this created beautiful patterns on the water surface, with little jewels of pure light flashing intermittently.

Unless you're a genius, with the speed the Mallards dart about, it's impossible to capture this without the aid of a photograph, so I waited about until I got just the pose I wanted. The drake's head has just the most superb, rich purples and greens, silhouetted against the light, with a shadow over it's breast. The painting was all about the whole - not just the portrait of the Mallard, but the water itself with all it's marbled patterns. It's easy to get bogged down concentrating on the individual marks and stabs of colour depicting the water, and lose the bigger picture, and I very nearly did. Just about got away with it I think. Don't forget that you can click on this and any other image to view it fullscreen.

Pastel Society Exhibition and Peter Brown's Exhibition

2012-02-23T11:15:00.001Z

Yesterday, I had a day out in London to see the Pastel Society Annual Show at the Mall Galleries and the Peter Brown One-Man-Show at Messum's in Cork Street.

The Pastel Society exhibition was, overall, predictably poor in my humble opinion, considering this is supposed to be the finest Pastel work in the country. There was some excellent work, notably by June Arnold, Ken Paine, Roger Dellar and Valeriy Gridnev, in very contrasting styles, but there really was a load of classic 'Emperor's New Clothes' too. I used to submit work to the Pastel Society, but having not had anything accepted since 2008, I didn't bother this year. I had one accepted in 2006 which won an award - not given by the selection committee I might add, but by the various sponsors who support the exhibition.

What constitutes good art is subjective of course, but the foundations of draughtsmanship, composition, colour rendering and tonal balance should, in my eyes, be evident in all work, be it abstract or figurative. You would be hard-pressed to see more than one of those constituents in a fair percentage of the work offered up in this show, masquerading as art. You can make your own mind up by looking at some of the work at http://www.thepastelsociety.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=74&Itemid=60

I long for the day when rubbish is consigned to the bin it belongs in, rather than put in a frame and hailed as high art by the deluded hierarchy and glitterati.

By contrast, the exhibition of Peter 'Pete the Street' Brown's paintings at Messum's, was an absolute delight for the eye. I cannot recommend a trip to see this show more highly. Pete's exhibition entitled 'Brown's Oil Sketches', comprises 133 of the very finest painterly masterpieces you are ever likely to feast your eyes upon.

Don't be put off by the title of 'Sketches' - rather a misnomer in my view - for there is a wonderful mix of small and fully rendered large paintings, each executed en plein air with the utmost skill of an artist at the peak of his powers. If he isn't at the peak of his powers, then god help the rest of us jobbing artists - we may as well pack up and go home! I can't even pick out one or two favourites - they are all simply superb examples of utter oil-painting genius, with figures flicked in at speed, but not just methodically daubed on, all looking the same, but each pose perfectly captured, very believable and enchanting. Equally, Pete's draughtsmanship, composition, colour rendering and tonal balance are simply perfect, all delivered in his trademark painterly style. The brushstrokes are bally delicious! He is truly a painter's painter.

When I see exhibitions, various artists catch my eye, but I generally feel I'm more or less 'up there' with them, but, along with David Curtis, Pete Brown's work has the effect of making me feel that I'm barely on the first rung of the ladder of learning how to paint and I have to 're-group'. I cannot imagine ANYONE not liking his work, so, if you find yourself with time on your hands, or going to London anyway, you MUST go and see this show! You can see the work online at http://www.messums.com/inventory.php?project_id=319

English Longhorn

2012-02-23T00:09:00.002Z

Soft Pastel on Pastelboard, 18.5 x 24.5 inches

Here's another painting that will be going to the Affordable Art Fair next month, the first of some Pastels after weeks of doing Oils.

It makes a nice change to do an animal portrait after my default landscapes. Cattle always make good subject matter, and this rare breed English Longhorn was great fun to paint, especially the horns themselves. With close observation of the way light falls on the right-hand horn, I was able to make it appear to be coming out towards the viewer - always a neat trick! I also loved the shadow of the same horn thrown over the face, describing its contours beautifully. I changed the pose for the sake of the composition, in that the cow's body was facing out to the right of the painting, so I turned her round the other way for better balance.

Two of the cardinal sins I see on some very well painted animals, which lets them down, are a) no thought given to the background and b) the neck of the subject sharply cut across, so that the portrait appears to be that of a decapitated head!

One of the most challenging parts of a portrait, is to paint the background in harmony with the subject. No background at all makes the animal appear to be floating ethereally, too much detailed background detracts from the subject, and a plain monochrome backdrop does nothing to lift the colours of the subject and is not part of the painting.

I always paint the subject and the background together, so that they are linked. I believe it is folly to either paint the background in first, to get it over with and concentrate on the animal, or equally, to put it in afterwards as an afterthought. You will see that I have varied the colours and tones of the background here throughout, to give added interest, and to 'lift' the animal from the surface, giving the illusion of three dimensions. The trick with varying tones in the backdrop is not just to use darker and lighter passages randomly with no thought, just for the sake of variation, but to place darker tones next to lighter parts, and lighter tones next to darker parts. You can see this throughout the painting if you look closely - click on the photo to blow it up full screen.

Why I tell you lot all these secrets I'll never know - if you all start doing it, I'll never make a living, so you carry on doing dull, lifeless backgrounds around decapitated heads, please - they look delightful, honestly!

Footprints in the Snow

2012-02-20T09:16:00.001Z

Oil on Board, 9x12 inches

I did this painting as a demonstration for the Boston Art Group last week (no, not Boston, Mass. - we named our Boston first for all my millions of fans reading this across the pond). As I always say, it's so difficult to achieve the same brightness of an early morning sky with the paint available to the artist. As in 'After the Snowfall' in the previous post, there is no pure Titanium White in the snow at all, but I used some in the tiny highlights of twinkling light on the water where the reeds are disturbing the surface, that's all.

To get this view, I stood on top of the hill looking down, so that all the footprints from the previous day's walkers were very evident, thrown into shadow with the strong sunlight. It's a very different feel to this painting compared with 'After the Snowfall', with this one singing with light - lots of contrast with the sunlit snow and beautiful blues and mauves of the shadows. I only used three colours - my 'primaries', Cad. Yellow Light, Permanent Rose and Cobalt Blue, with Titanium White of course. I love the simplicity and discipline of mixing any colour required with those three colours, and it saves carrying extra weight when you're painting on site.

The demo was only just under two hours and this is how far I got in the time, before finishing it off back in the studio:

This is the last Oil for a while. The next few paintings I shall post will be Pastels, the first being a portrait of a Longhorn Cow, so brace yourselves. I haven't painted a Pastel for a while, so the change of medium will be challenging, before I get my eye in.

After the Snowfall

2012-02-20T08:49:00.000Z

Oil on Board, 6x8 inches

For us here in England, or at least in middle England, a heavy snowfall with the snow hanging heavily on every branch is usually very transient and so it was this time, lasting only a day or so.

Snow is very interesting to paint - a classic case of painting what you see, in terms of colour and most especially, tone. This was later in the day, and the tones were muted, and in fact no pure white was used in the painting, as you can see if you compare the snow colour with the white border. Why paint it when it's dull you may ask, or perhaps let's have a cup of tea if you're bored stiff reading this drivel. Assuming you are still reading and you're mildly interested in why I bothered, I was actually taken with that lovely bit of yellowy cloud contrasting with the mauvey snow.

Balsam Shallows

2012-02-20T08:34:00.000Z

Oil on board, 6x8 inches

I did this little painting again for the AAF at Battersea Park next month. Painting deep, still water reflections is the most simple thing for the artist (keep that to yourself, though), but this was a more tricky passage, because the water is very shallow here, only a foot or so, with weed growing close to the surface and visible through the water. This introduces two more challenges to overcome - seeing what is under the water as well as the reflections of the trees and banks above, together with the resultant breaking up of the surface as the water ripples over the stones and weed on the bottom.

This a very colourful, Summery picture, with all the showy pink Himalayan Balsam in full bloom, with a buzzful (new word) of bees.

The Winding Welland

2012-02-10T00:18:00.002Z

Oil on board, 7x10 inches

Continuing on the Summery feel (in the middle of the coldest part of the winter) for the AAF show at Battersea Park next month, I painted this one to give us all a lift out of the gloom of the cold, ashen-skied days of this week. What a load of smug tosh! Of course I didn't - it's just that some Summer pictures are required. Go on, get out there in this weather and have a walk by your local river, fill your lungs with the biting air and feel glad to be alive.

This is really an exercise in the observation of the subtleties of greens in the landscape. This is what sorts out an interesting painting from a dull, soulless one. The brush must be constantly dipped into varying mixes of greens, rather than an overall single hue which is where many amateur painters fall down. Don't forget you can click on the image and see it full screen to really see the subtle changes of hue that have been employed.

Silent Sunset Hunter

2012-02-08T10:03:00.000Z

Oil on Linen Canvas, 19.75 x 27.5 inches

I had to do a big canvas for the Affordable Art Fair in London next month, so I produced this one after I got an idea in my head and employed my usual fleet of underlings to do it for me, as it's far too beneath me to daub it on myself (yeah, right - a nod to Damien H)

This was a bit of a hand-brake turn for me, using such vivid colours after my more subtle, quieter tones of late. When I took a reference photo of the fireball sunset last June from my village, an amazing mist had settled in the valley and produced this ethereal effect of just the tops of the trees poking above the ectoplasm. The trickiest thing about doing justice to a sunset is to paint the sun itself with sufficient brightness to appear convincing. As I've said before, the brightest paint in the artist's arsenal is totally inadequate to portray the intense, pure light of the setting sun. The fireball was just that, a fierce orange. I put down strong orange, but it looked dull compared to the lemon yellow of the underlit clouds above, so that didn't give the effect, so I had to compromise, using a strong yellow, with a halo of orange. I could have stayed with the orange sun, but that would have necessitated toning down the rest of the painting, and the foreground would have to have been too dark and the hanging mist would have been lost.

So, this was quite a struggle with tones and colour - probably even more so than my usual, more subtle paintings. When I took the photo, the wheat was still green and that's how I painted it. Sitting back, I felt it lacked what I wanted - the near harvest time of high Summer, so I grabbed the palette knife and scraped it all off, moved the time on a month and painted it in its more ripened golden hue with a smattering of crimson poppies (good job it wasn't a watercolour!).

By the way, have you spotted the silent hunter of the title? This wasn't a hopelessly romantic addition - a ghostly Barn Owl with its lopping flight can often be seen in just this spot, quartering along the hedgerows of his territory, so I felt he deserved his place in the composition to give it a bit of life. I tried a few different places, using a cut-out scrap of paper before finally settling on the best spot so as not to be too insistent.

Bright, Freezing morning

2012-02-04T00:04:00.001Z

Oil on board, 6 x 8 inches

I painted this one en plein air (outside, on site) this morning. I'm painting more and more on site these days, but this sort of scene is very difficult, or at least I find it so, to capture in the time available. Looking straight into the sun by a river, there is a twinkling sparkle on the water, which I adore to paint, but because our star moves so quickly, especially at this time of year being so low in the sky, you really have to get a move on and get the drawing and main elements down quickly - a demanding, but rewarding discipline if it comes off.

As in 'Winter Sunlight' posted yesterday, it was absolutely freezing after a light dusting of snow, but my glued on fingers worked surprisingly well. After an hour-and-a-half, the light had changed so much and gangrene had reset in my three previously amputated digits, that it was pointless carrying on. I took a photo of the scene half-way through the painting process and completed it back in the studio.

This is how far I got before packing up:

and here's a view of the scene and my plein air setup:

April Woollies

2012-02-03T18:33:00.000Z

Oil on board, 6 x 8 inches

Yes, I know this is a spring painting and we're in the middle of an icy grip, but necessity cries out. I have to do some paintings for the Affordable Art Fair next month in Battersea Park, and my Gallery doesn't want all winter pictures, so I've gone green, rather than the gangrene of yesterday.

It's lambing time with little jumpers springing about (it won't be long now). I'm never that fond of the bright, fresh greens of Spring, so tend not to paint many such paintings, but with my low viewpoint, I got a nice view of the distant bank of trees and the middle distant Willows, punctuated by the ewes and their nippers. It would have been a fairly boring painting without the river slicing diagonally across the lower half of the picture plain, but with its calm reflections and the Willow poking its branched fingers down from the upper left to stop the eye flying out of the picture, it's turned out okay, I think......

Winter Sunlight

2012-02-02T10:58:00.001Z

Oil on Board, 6 x8 inches

I painted this little guy yesterday morning, standing on a very sloping bank of the River Welland, having traipsed for about a mile with by tripod and pochade box. I was looking straight into the sun which provided gorgeous dazzling diamonds of light dancing on the water, but it's never easy to see the colours you put on the painting in these circumstances. The sun was shining, but it was freezing cold (about -60C) and I had to abandon it after an hour-and-a-half, with frostbite set in in three fingers in the right hand necessitating amputation with the palette knife. And now I'm left with one leg six inches shorter than the other, not from amputation, but from the 45deg angled slope. The things I do for you people.

I finished it off in the sanctuary of the studio, having put the three fingers back on with Super Glue. Amazing what it can do.

The Big Freeze

2012-01-31T23:44:00.000Z

Oil on Board, 6x8 inches

I did this little painting from a photo I took last winter in the freezing temperatures we had in December, when the River Welland partly froze over - a pretty rare occurrence. I embellished the sky a bit as it was a rather dull day, so I cheered it up with sunlight breaking through. The gnarled old willows were a challenge, being covered in hoar frost; just that bit darker, being set against the sky, than the frosted vegetation of the banks. The sheep moving away in the distant field provided a nice little lead-in through the gap in the willows.

Late September

2012-01-27T23:56:00.000Z

Oil on Board, 10x14 inches

Okay, how many of you are singing "It's late September and I really should be back at school"? Is it just me, or did you also immediately think of Maggie May and The Faces with Rod Stewart growling out the lyrics? Just me eh, oh well, please yourselves.

This one is another painting I'd put aside a while back; it was actually one I did as a demo for an Art Group last year and tweaked a bit today. The more astute of you will have noticed it's the same view as 'Clear August Air' posted yesterday. It's a month or so later, the vegetation has died off a bit, and the trees are on the turn, their green colour being replaced with a more yellowy, warmer hue. You will also see that the atmosphere in this one is totally different - a much more hazy sunlight, with more milky tones as the trees redede into the distance.

If you've spotted both the different atmosphere and the same view AND sangalongaRod, go to the top of the class and adopt a slightly smug look on your face.......

Another TWO!

2012-01-27T00:18:00.001Z

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.

Two New Oils

2012-01-26T00:16:00.001Z

I know, I know, it's been ages since I've posted - you know how it is when you're a top dauber of pigments suspended in oil, trying to paint from the soul (what a load of cobblers) when your cape keeps getting covered in brick dust from the builders in the next room. Yes, I'm having a bit of building work done - inglenook, beams, knocking walls down, the usual everyday things you have going on around you, and I've been aging beams, looking at woodburners, carpets and sofas........

I've taken on far too much work this year with two solo shows at Marine House at Beer in May and at John Noott Gallery in November, so there's going to be no peace for the wicked, or you, so get ready for a whole load more paintings coming forth.

Crisp Frost, Oil on Board, 10x14 inches

ANYWAY, back to painting, the painting above that is. This one will probably going to the Affordable Art Fair at Battersea Park in London in March. It's as a result of a walk along my local river two weeks ago. The early morning severe frost adorned everything with that gorgeous, crunchy, dusting of ice, that I find adorable to paint. It's probably my favourite painting subject, a real challenge of close-toned observation, almost monochrome landscape, with subtle changes of hue and colour. It was great to get back to painting again.

Spring Greens by the Windrush,

Oil on Board, 12x17 inches

This one is actually a re-painted picture from a couple of years ago. I felt I hadn't quite got the colours right, so, with some adjustments, ie., painting the entire picture again, it's somewhere nearer what I wanted. The view is of the River Windrush (isn't that just the best name for a river?) near Burford on Oxfordshire, my home county. The river had a milky green quality to it after rain, which muted the reflections somewhat, but slow-moving water is such a delight to paint whatever its look, and contrary to popular belief, is far away the easiest bit of a landscape to paint, but keep that under your hat, otherwise everyone will be doing it...........

David Hockney

2012-01-08T21:45:00.002Z

I watched 'Countryfile' on the BBC tonight with interest. David Hockney was giving us a sneak preview of his upcoming exhibition at the RA, much of it based around the East Yorkshire countryside. Ellie Harrison introduced him as 'Britain's greatest living artist'. That is a statement open to argument. Whilst Hockney is a superb draughtsman, is his work 'greater' than the subtle, painterly, yet utterly perfect work done by Ken Howard, David Curtis or Peter Brown? I see no subtlety in Hockney's work, but a rather brash, unsubtle, lurid display of colours in his landscapes. For me, the painters mentioned above have to work harder to attain the mesmerising quality of their work, but that's personal. I would like to think that I have an inside, more qualified opinion as a professional painter, than the average Joe, but others may disagree.

I do agree with Hockney's attack on artists who don't actually create their own work, - a thinly veiled side-swipe at Damien Hirst, the darling of the installationists, who thinks of the idea but gets others to actually put the idea into reality.

"It's a little insulting to craftsmen, skilful craftsmen." Hockney went on to say "I used to point out at art school, you can teach the craft, it's the poetry you can't teach. But now they try to teach the poetry and not the craft." He quoted a Chinese saying, that to paint, "you need the eye, the hand and the heart. Two won't do". Bravo!

Hirst himself has defended using assistants to make his spot paintings, saying they could do the work better as he found it boring to paint them himself. That says it all does it not?

River-Eye View

2012-01-06T23:01:00.001Z

Oil on Board, 14 x 20 inches

I produced this river-eye view from some reference material I gathered at the end of September - hence the extraordinarily, cunningingly engineered title.

I've painted this viewpoint of my local river on many occasions, but I wanted something different, so risking life and limb, I clambered down through the vegetation, off came the shoes and I slid into the beautifully crystal clear water and waded across until I got the view I wanted, looking straight into the sunlight, so that the reeds growing in the middle of the water were dazzlingly lit. I loved the way the light caught that one leaf of the Himalayan Balsam in the foreground as I looked up at it, lighting its underside so that it appeared bright yellow-green. Little things please me!

I do love these tricky exercises in tone observation; the sky reflections in the water appear very bright, but have a bluish tinge, and are a tone down from the piercingly bright sunlight reflecting off those dazzling reeds. As I've said before, no paint is adequate to simulate pure sunlight brightness, so you just have to try a few tricks to get as near as you can to fool the eye of the viewer. Did I?

As it was my Birthday on the 3rd and virtually ALL of you failed to shower me with cards and presents, I thought I would mention it now, at a discreet two days down the line. It would have been crass for me to have mentioned it on the day, because you all would have sent the interweb into meltdown - I'm considerate like that.

Golden Light by Duddington Bridge

2011-12-29T10:55:00.000Z

Oil on Board, 8 x 6 inches

This was a view looking from the steep bankside of the bridge at Duddington, a village near me. Looking straight into the light, the sheep were silhouetted against the late afternoon sky, giving each one a lit halo, and the golden light picked out bits of vegetation and foliage. And, of course, the intense reflection of the sun itself bouncing off the water was a joy to paint.

This was really an exercise in tones to make the picture convincing - the water was bright, but a tone down from the pure white diamonds of light. You have to squint and paint what's there. It's all about tone, tone, tone....no, not Blair - that was education, education, education!

The Approach to Lyndon

2011-12-27T21:22:00.001Z

Oil on Board, 7.5 x 10 inches

Painted this morning en plein air by a nearby village. It was freezing cold in a brisk wind, but managed to get the bulk of the painting down, wearing gloves, before the sun went in and the view changed totally.

It's not the greatest composition ever, with the house almost dead centre and road going out of the picture plane, but I loved the sunlit distant trees and the orange glow of the red brick house. I also liked the big foreground shadow which was like a giant human hand creeping over the road and hedge - that helps keep the eye in the picture as well as the gable end of the house on the far right - that's my excuse anyway!

River Welland at Barrowden

2011-12-24T00:10:00.001Z

Oil on board, 6 x 8 inches

This little painting is my local river again in the next village to where I live. The river provides a nice 'lead-in' to the picture, taking the eye to the focal point of the church to the left of centre and the bluey distant trees. The bare Willow trees in the foreground were painted in layers with my big household brush.

May I wish you all a very happy Christmas and a prosperous New Year and thank you so much for reading my jottings and looking at my paintings over the year. Have fun!

Wothorpe Towers from Tinwell

2011-12-19T10:34:00.000Z

Oil, 3.625 x 5 inches

Painted after fresh snowfall from the road down to the River Welland from Tinwell village, this view shows the ruins of Wothorpe Towers standing starkly against the early morning sky. There is hardly any pure white as can be seen comparing the snow colour against the white border of the photo. Lots of subtle blues and mauves mixed from my usual primaries of Cad Yellow Light, Permanent Rose and Cobalt Blue with Titanium White.

This is the last of the tiny paintings for now, six in all, so if you want a Christmas present priced painting (£225) get on down to Stamford Artists Gallery in Maiden Lane in Stamford. The Gallery doesn't have a website, but you can call them on 01780 764074 to enquire about availability.

Day out at the ROI

2011-12-16T01:36:00.002Z

Yesterday I had a day out at the Royal Institute of Oil Painters (ROI) where the cream of the country's Oil painters have their annual open exhibition. It was a feast for the eye I must say, with a really broad mix of styles and subject matter, from the very loose to the ultra tight in terms of execution.

I took my camera for a day out to London too, but as I forgot to put in a memory card, it just had a lazy day, unused in my bag, durgh!

So, I had to resort to sketches both on the way down on the coach and at the show. I've included my doodles below. I'm not much of a sketcher actually, apart from when I'm composing a wildlife subject - I prefer to sketch with my paintbrush as I go and get straight on with the painting.

Roger Dellar gave a demonstration at 2pm, painting the ROI President, Peter Wileman's daughter Olivia. A good crowd gathered and Roger did a fine job - no photo, obviously, but here's my quick drawing of him painting:

Then at 6pm, it was the annual Art Event Evening, when several ROI members and ordinary mortals paint from three models. I was only able to watch for 30 minutes as I had to get to the last coach home at 7pm, but it was really interesting seeing the completely different ways of 'getting into' the portrait. Lucy McKie kind of brought the head shape tentatively into being from an ethereal background, David Curtis (the guv'nor in my book) started on a very dark toned ground, nervously dabbing in the features then wiping away the lights of the background with a rag, Luis Morris went straight in on a white canvas with blocks of undiluted colour, Roger Dellar blocked in the features (of Peter Wileman doing the modelling) qhickly with broad, strong umber marks, Tony Merrick sketched out the form in his impressionistic manner, whilst Dennis Syrett drew out the head shape with a light colour on a dark background, a new one on me, and others whose names I know not, sketched out the form in dry orangey colour on white ground, very wet washes on toned ground, and so on. In short, no two started the same way, so ther are no rules for how you start a painting. I like to start with thin, dryish paint on a toned ground, plotting the darks, then work up with thicker, juicier paint towards the end.

I would love to have seen all the end results, when another master, Trevor Chamberlain was going to give a critique. A great evening I'm sure!

Back to the exhibition, I met Aderbanji Alade, John Shave, David Curtis, Peter Wileman, Roger Dellar...I know, I'm such a name-dropper, and they all met me! I'm sure you're all perched on the edge of your seats, wondering if I had anything accepted for the show aren't you...AREN'T YOU? Well, yes I did, one solitary picture, below. I thought it wasn't as strong as the other four that were rejected, but again, what do I know?

I need to loosen up to curry favour with the judges, so I shall strive for just that next year. So far the painting hasn't sold, so the buying public in London, at least, seem to prefer the more impressionistic style.

Oh, here are the doodles I occupied my time with on the coach journey down:

Don't know who the character was staring back at me through the reflective plastic shield between me and the driver, but he looks a bit shifty with those up-tuned eyebrows......

Well, they're only very quick sketches - maybe I need to attend the Royal Academy and have some tuition from Professor Tracey Emin, RA...............everyone I spoke to at the ROI couldn't understand it, apart from Aderbanji Alade, (a brilliant painter - see his blog on my list) who said he thought it was great, and I think he was being serious. The only drawings I can find of Dame Tracey (it's surely only a matter of time before Dave C. recommends her majesty to anoint the chosen one for the honour) are the ones of the parts of her body that most of us prefer not to see the light of day, never mind thrust upon us to exclaim her sexual experiences of her tortured yoof.

Poplar Remains, Bright Willow and Sundown at Tinwell

2011-12-16T00:27:00.000Z

These three tiny paintings are very much in the Christmas season, all featuring my local waterway, the River Welland in all its snowy glory. I'm not much into making twee pictures with children in red duffle coats and sledges and cottages with smoke rising from the chimney and a light in the window. I paint what I see, and in its winter garb, the landscape takes on a gorgeous mantle of white with blue and mauve shadows. I love its beauty in the raw.

Sunlight Through Beeches & Hoar Frost near Ketton

2011-12-10T22:24:00.000Z

These are two little Oils (3.625 x 5 inches) I have done for Stamford Artists Gallery. I've photographed them together, because being so small, they don't look right blown up larger than life if you click on the image, so two at once is little more truthful.

I used to paint a lot of these little guys, but not so many these days. They are a bit more fiddly, but contrary to popular opinion, I don't use extra small brushes. In fact, the majority of the work is still done with my trusty mate, the 1" household brush.

Calendar update

2011-12-08T21:28:00.001Z

Due to overwhelming demand, I have run out of the Calendars as shown in my last post, until more stock arrives, but I can't guarantee delivery before Christmas until I know when they will arrive.

However, I have just two Calendars with black borders as shown below:

2012 Calendar

2011-12-07T14:01:00.000Z

Here is my 2012 Calendar launched on to the world. There are 12 seasonal images (all shown below) and the size is 8.5 x 11 inches, or 16 x 11 inches hanging open, as above.

The price is £8 including post and packing, available on my website (link on right, click on 'Shop' then on the drop-down menu) where you can pay by Paypal for your convenience, or email me if you wish to pay by cheque or cash.

Limited supplies, hurry while stocks last...said a spokesman.

January

FebruaryMarch

April

May

June

July

AugustSeptemberOctober

November

December

NEAC Exhibition

2011-12-03T00:34:00.002Z

Yesterday I went to the NEAC (New English Art Club) Annual Exhibition at The Mall Galleries in deepest London, for a look at the opposition. I met Karl Terry (hi Karl, hope lunch was good!) also having a look at the show.

It's a fine show and well worth a look, from the atmospheric impressionistic oils of Diana Armfield, loose oils of Francis Bowyer, Bernard Dunstan, Luke Martineau and Richard Pikesley, the quirky oils of Alan Kingsbury, the colourful landscapes of Andrew Macara and interiors of Susan Ryder, the delicate watercolours of Charlotte Halliday, the sublime oil cityscapes and studio interior of Ken Howard and the utterly brilliant, realistic yet painterly plein air street scenes of Pete Brown.

There were a few paintings that seemed to me to be classic cases of the Emperor's New Clothes, and I shall forever fail to see what others (think they) see, but maybe I'm missing something.....but I don't think so.

If you find yourself anywhere near, pop in and give yourself a treat, and don't whatever you do, miss Pete Brown's paintings - they alone are worth seeing and I can't imagine anyone would not like them. Many find mine too 'tight', as do I, but Pete's seem to be all things to punters and painters alike - he's damned annoying! All five of his paintings have sold, not surprisingly, and that's a mark of the man's talent and stature.

Talking of art selling, I can't pass commenting on young Kieron Williamson's latest sell-out exhibition (in just 10 minutes) of 12 paintings, for, wait for it.....pointless drum beat to waste a few seconds, a la strictly or X-Factor.....£106,260, averaging nearly £9,000 a painting...at age 9.

Now, this is going to sound like sour grapes, but can it be right that, entirely because of hype/hysteria, a 9 year old with a modicum of talent is selling at the same prices or more, as Ken Howard, David Curtis or Pete Brown, at the pinnacle of their careers with a whole apprenticeship and a lifetime's (in Ken's case at least) damned hard work behind them? If young Kieron, a lovely little chap, were my age, or say in his twenties, he wouldn't even get a foot in a Gallery door, let alone sell anything, but because he has been hyped up and all the network television companies have had him on as a novelty because of his age, his promoters can ask almost whatever price they like and there are still enough people with a lot more money than sense, willing to buy them regardless of the artistic merit. Perhaps they are making a wise investment and young Kieron's paintings will go up and up in value, but to me and all the professional painters I know, it is, sadly, representative of some of the ridiculous capriciousness of our profession.

Hopefully, he will stay a nice young lad, but there must be a danger that he will believe the hype that is whipped up about him, and because EVERYTHING he paints is sold, guaranteed, at least for long enough for him and his parents to become rather wealthy, he will think he is the genius that the unknowledgable say he is. He is undoubtedly very good for his age, but no better than any other professional artist I know who started painting as early as him, myself included, not wishing to blow my own trumpet, but true. But then, we know much of the art world is mad, don't we?

November Frost

2011-12-03T00:32:00.000Z

Oil on Board, 10x14 inches

I do enjoy painting frost. So few artists seem to paint frost and I don't know why; it's such fun to paint compared to the rich greens of summer, when all the dying vegetation is dusted with icing sugar. On a cursary glance, it produces a monochrome landscape, but when you really look, there are lots of subtle blues, purples and greys, with touches of warm oranges and browns.

Just keep it under your hat everyone - if all the others realise frost is great to paint, that's the end of my career, so mum's the word...............

Summer Water

2011-11-25T23:22:00.000Z

Oil on Linen Canvas, 20x30 inches

This large-ish painting is a commissioned piece of my local River Welland. Set in July, the greens of the trees are a little more muted than in their vibrant Spring garb, so more satisfying to paint.

I seem to be living life on the edge at the moment, with so many committments, only just getting this latest painting finished tonight, in time for a lick of retouching varnish before fitting in its frame ready for courier collection.

Now, I can look forward to painting some late Autumn/Wintry landscapes - my favourite time of year.

Iona House Exhibition & new work at John Noott's

2011-11-24T17:52:00.001Z

I have 11 paintings included in the Winter Exhibition, running from this Saturday 26th November until 15th January 2012, at the Iona House Gallery in Woodstock, Oxfordshire http://www.ionahousegallery.org/modules/standard/viewpage.asp?id=776

The 11 PB paintings are these, previously posted on the Blog:

I also have 8 new paintings at the John Noott Gallery in Cotswold Court, Broadway, Worcs., details at: http://www.john-noott.com/artist/barker~peter/barker~peter.php

Hare in North Leigh wood

2011-11-16T18:49:00.000Z

Oil on Linen Canvas, 20x30 inches

Paintings of Bluebell Woods are always going to look a bit twee, but the sight of a sea of English Bluebells in Spring is just a stunning sight, so I can't resist.

This quite large painting is, in fact, a re-painting of one I did over a year ago. I've included the first draft below the revamp for comparison. It's abit like those 'spot the difference' pictorial quizzes.

I actually covered the entire surface with fresh paint, so there is a lot of texture that can't be seen in the photo. I also felt the massive Oak was a bit central and the composition was therefore imbalanced, so I painted in the Silver Birch in the gap to the right of it to add balance, colour and depth. I think it looks much better, but what do I know - I thought it looked alright last year until I got it back after it didn't sell at a Gallery. We can always learn, even global megastars like me!

The colour of the photograph lets the painting down a bit - greens hardly ever reproduce well, and neither do lilacs, so this was always going to be a struggle getting the photo to look anywhere near the painting. So, rest assured, the painting looks miles better than it does here! If you're anywhere near Broadway in the Cotswolds, pop in to John Noott Gallery in Cotsold Court - that's its new temporary home as from Tuesday 22nd November until a new permanent home can be found for it. It is very well behaved, needs minimal looking after and all its jabs are up to date, so are you the home this Hare is looking for?

If anyone is thinking "what's he doing putting a Hare in a wood - they live in open fields"...well, there really was a Hare that scampered off when I was there. There were fields near, so I guess he was also stunned by the riot of lilac colour!

Summer Banks

2011-11-14T10:47:00.003Z

Oil on Linen Canvas, 16x22 inches

This and the last painting I posted, Down in the River, are commissioned pieces if you were wondering why I'm painting Summer pictures in Autumn.

High Summer by the River Welland near me is a riot of Summer colours in July and this is really a study of greens. Whenever I have given a critique of amateur painters' work of similar subjects, the one thing that lets them down is the uniformity of their greens. At the risk of repetition, you must train your eyes to really see what's in front of you. There really is a rich variety of subtlely different hues and tones of green, and it is just that variety that makes a painting appear convincing, and not just a boring sea of monochrome green.

For any of you who have seen me paint at demos or Patchings Art Festival, you will have witnessed me using a 1" household paintbrush to paint the dense bankside vegetation and tree foliage. Some of you have taken a leaf (see what I did there) out of my book and tried the same technique. If I see any paintings subsequently produced that are better than mine, there's going to be a LOT of trouble - I know where you all live......

Down in the River

2011-11-11T15:54:00.001Z

Oil on Linen Canvas, 16x22 inches

This is a painting produced from my wading about in the river back in July, from the Dragonflies' perspective.

I'm generally not that keen on really green pictures, when in high Summer, everything is green, but the bold pinks of the Himalayan Balsam and Willowherb add a touch of non-green to the composition.

I love painting water when, as it nears you, the painter (or the painting viewer) in the foreground, you can see through it and what lies beneath the surface, and not just pure reflections the further away from you the water is.

Sparkling Dew

2011-11-02T09:53:00.001Z

Oil on Board, 12 x 9 inches

This little painting was completed in the studio with the aid of a photo, after getting as far as I could en plein air (on site).

The glorious Autumn sunlight glinting on the water and the little jewels of twinkling dew were the catalysts for the painting, and of course, I knew the light would change very quickly with the sun much lower in the sky at this time of year, so speed was of the essence.

Hands and brushes a blur of frenetic activity, I managed to get enough of the intense sunlight reflecting on the water (a common theme of mine for those of you paying attention), the colour and hazy atmosphere done in the hour before the view changed far to much to continue. You can see just how much the light changed in the photo below showing my outdoor setup with the painting abandoned; with the sun much further to the right, the haziness had gone and there was more colour and definition in the distant trees - completely different feel.

Teasels in Frost

2011-10-27T01:07:00.000+01:00

Oil on Board, 12 x 17 inches

I do like painting frost, probably more so than the rich greens of summer. The colours are so subtle, much as I love the buzzing life by the river in warmer months. The trickiest part of this painting was doing the backlit Teasels, their dark seed-heads lifting the foreground vegetation from the receding bank. Each head has a lit halo around it, but lit a little more on the right than the left - awkward little devils, but worth the labour I think. Without them, the darkest tones in the painting, it wouldn't 'sing' as much, don't you think?

This is my last possible offering for the ROI show to be taken to London at 6.30 Friday morning. I've now got to decide which ones of my recent paintings to submit. I'll have a meeting with myself and make a decision.

ROI Paintings

2011-10-26T01:03:00.002+01:00

I'm working on some paintings to submit to the prestigious annual ROI (Royal Institute of Oil Painters) Exhibition at the Mall Galleries in London. Here are three possible candidates for submission to the selection committee next week:

Dazzling Water, Oil on Board, 12 x 17 inches

This was a typically breezy September afternoon, looking directly into the sun. One second the water was calm with reflections of the trees, the next it was ruffled by the breeze which had the effect of reflecting the brilliant sunlight way above the tree-line. As I've said before, Titanium White Oil paint is hopelessly inadequate to portray the brilliance of pure sunlight, but with a few tricks, you can assimilate the effect. When you squint at such dazzling light, and you have too, of course, you will see a kind of diffuse, yellowy-orange halo around the edge of the reflected light, and, as I always say to my onlookers when I give demos, paint what you see, as I have here. If you paint pure white against the grey-blue of the water, it doesn't quite convince and fails to get the effect seen.

You will also see that the sky tones are darker than the light on the water (stand on your head to see what I mean); again, this is as it appears in life, unless the sun is very low in the sky, but here, the sun is way above the top of the painting, but its pure light appears on the water because the angle of the ripples reflect it.

There I go again, giving away secrets, trashing my own career.......

Sunlit shallows, Oil on board, 10 x 14 inches

The inspiration for this one was the sunlit water, giving it that gorgeous ochrey colour, and the lovely diffused dark blue shadows from the trees above. Without the brightly lit weed and shadow on the water, it would be a more boring painting - put your fingers across to obscure to see what I mean - but to me, these made the painting. I'm a man of simple pleasures...

Glint of sunlight, Oil on Board, 7.5 x 10 inches

I must admit, I really enjoyed doing this little painting. I love painting frost anyway; it provides a close-toned, almost monochromatic landscape and is great fun to capture in paint. I only used three colours in this, as I do predominantly in all my paintings: Cad Yellow Light, Permanent Rose and Cobalt Blue, plus White of course. These colours in various mixes provide all the subtle greys required and using my 1" household brush, the crunchy reeds are a joy to paint.

Here again, I angled my viewpoint so that a few twinkles of sunlight glinted on the water - see that orangey edge?

Swan Family

2011-10-09T20:45:00.000+01:00

Oil on Linen Canvas, 195/8 x 275/8 inches

You're probably wondering what I've been doing since posting my Pastel last week. Well, I've been getting things framed and spent a lot of time dipping in and out of this painting, finally completed tonight.

Those of you who are familiar with my work know that I often paint Swans and I happened to be in the right place at the right time when this splendid family came upstream and settled in front of me, happily feeding. I like to think they know and trust me now, as I'm a frequent visitor to their home and have observed them for several years. They have successfully raised seven kids this year, despite both Otters and Mink inhabiting the same stretch of river. That's what you call great parenting because predators like that will readily snap up young bobbing Cygnets.

Anyway, the family grouping provided a gorgeous focal point for an otherwise very decent composition, so I felt it warranted a generous size on one of my Classico canvases from GreatArt. All the lush foliage and bankside vegetation was painted with my big 1" household brush and the water with my fabulous Mongoose Flats from Rosemary Brushes (click to read my recommendation for them at www.rosemaryandco.com/whatothersay.php?osCsid=ehub3ovl7gaprisobiksftogj4) The Swans and Cygnets were damned fiddly on this scale and they were painted entirely with the same Mongoose Long Flats size 3.

Well, I can't spend any more time talking to you all, giving away my secrets - I've got to go and cook my dinner...................

Wednesday 12th Alert !!!!!

2011-10-09T08:52:00.001+01:00

Hi folks! Don't forget - I shall be taking part in an Exclusive Charity Fundraiser called Chic Boutique this Wednesday. I shall have some originals and some new Limited Edition Prints, 2012 Calendars and Postcards for sale at:

The Pinfold, Ridlington road, Preston,

Nr Oakham, Rutland LE15 9NN

Wednesday 12th October

Come along anytime between 10am to 7pm

Entry £1, including tea or coffee

The event is in aid of Cancer Research UK and Air Ambulance, so please come along and support these two good causes - it would be great to see you!

7 other traders will also be taking part: Jewellery & Accessories, Arbonne Beauty & Skincare, Phoenix Cards & Stationery, Jamie at Home, Banjocrafts, Lady Captain French Fashion and Waterloo Cottage Farm Foods.

Anatomy of a Pastel Painting

2011-09-26T19:39:00.003+01:00

It occurred to me that some of you might be interested in how a painting evolves from start to finish, so I took some photos during the process of painting Stonethwaite Approach:

After sketching in the composition with charcoal, I placed in the easy bit - the sky, then the background sunlit hill and the darker Eagle Crag

Blocking in with roughly the right tones, I continue down the painting

Now I draw in the buildings and the skeleton of the trees

Before getting bogged down with any detail in any one place I continue to block in more colours

The entire block-in completed now, I have a roughly toned image of the painting, with the darkest darks in the foreground wall progressing through to the lighter tones in the background

Now I give some attention to the hills again, refining as I go and give the trees some definition, with their sunlit branches

More definition is now given to the cottage, barns and other paraphernalia and trees

Here I've painted the wall in shadow on the right

Finally, I do the sunlit stone wall on the left and give attention to the road and the cast shadows of the wall and posts across it. Once finished-ish, I cast my eye over the entire painting and correct any drawing errors and re-state important bits like the sheeps' legs, then voila, finito (I'm multi-lingual)

Chic Boutique

2011-09-26T18:00:00.000+01:00

Just a diary note for anyone interested and near enough to warrant a trip out to get near enough to touch me....I shall be taking part in an Exclusive Charity Fundraiser called Chic Boutique. I shall have one or two originals and some new Limited Edition Prints for sale alongside seven other traders: Jewellery & Accessories, Arbonne Beauty & Skincare, Phoenix Cards & Stationery, Jamie at Home, Banjocrafts, Lady Captain French Fashion and Waterloo Cottage Farm Foods.

where?

The Pinfold, Ridlington road, Preston,

Nr Oakham, Rutland LE15 9NN

when?

Wednesday 12th October

10am to 7pm

Entry is £1, including tea or coffee and there will be a tombola with prizes to be won!

The event is in aid of Cancer Research UK and Air Ambulance, so if you fancy supporting two good causes AND meeting me and seeing some paintings LIVE, please come along. You will be surprised just how approachable I am, despite the extraordinary global celebrity status I enjoy..........................

Stonethwaite Approach

2011-09-26T10:44:00.000+01:00

Pastel on Pastelmat, 19 x 27 inches

Here's my last Pastel for the time being which is going to be framed with the new ClearColour plus UV glass, which you need a mortgage for! The glass alone for this one will cost around £90...gulp, but the clarity is unbelievable compared to standard picture glass. I've long thought that my Pastels have taken on a less vibrant look when framed and found that standard glass has a slight grey cast which, of course, dulls the image underneath. The new glass also has reflection control and it actually appears that there isn't any glass! The price for this will obviously reflect (get it, ha ha) this glass...I thought about £750,000....oh no, what am I thinking - that's just for talentless daubs requiring zero design and skill...................

Pastels lack the crispness of Oils, but I love the softer feel, and this one was a joy to paint. I loved the Eagle Crag towering above Stonethwaite hamlet, adorned in mauves, blues and beiges, silhoetted against the sunlit hills behind it, yet lighter in tone than the foreground mountain, which in turn provided a gorgeous backdrop for the right-hand tree in its winter garb. The road of course acts as a nice lead-in and invites the eye to roam through the composition, and the tree on the far left stops the eye flying out of the picture. Lots of light and dark in this picture, especially in the wall, sunlit on the left and deep shade on the right.

Grange-in-Borrowdale

2011-09-21T09:32:00.002+01:00

Pastel on Pastelmat, 13 x 19 inches

Yes, I've switched disciplines and swapped my Oils for Pastels. I painted a similar view of Grange in Cumbria in Oils recently and thought I would see how the subject looked with the dry medium. The subtleties of tones and colours in the mountains is a real challenge with Pastels and, hardly surprisingly, gives a different look to the painting. As with Oils, by far the most challenging and time consuming part of the painting is the painting of the trees and mountains, whilst the water, the coup de grâce in any painting, takes very little time.

Being a dry medium, Pastel is a very different kettle of fish to mixing Oil colours on a palette. Personally I don't find Pastel a practical medium to use en plein air, because I have literally hundreds of colours arranged in boxes around my easel, and even then, mix the colours somewhat with the finger. Conversely, with Oils, I use only four colours to mix ALL the colours I need for 95% of all subjects I tackle, so I find it a very transportable medium for use on site.

Again, as I mentioned before, trying to replicate the colours of the painting in a photograph is frustrating. My Nikon D70 always seems to accentuate the reds, no matter how much I've tweaked the settings. I even bought a Canon EOS 500D recently to see if it would solve the problem, but I still prefer the Nikon's results overall.

GreatArt Canvases

2011-09-19T11:24:00.000+01:00

I've just bought some more canvases from GreatArt in their sale - this time the white, universal-primed Classico range, which are very good quality Belgian linen - infinitely better than the cheaper cotton canvases available in art shops. If you fancy having a go with canvas, or upgrading from cotton, now is the time to treat yourself as they are offering many at half price for packs of four or six. I bought a pack of six 50x70cm (about 20x28 inches if you're over 50) which works out at under £6 a canvas, an absolute bargain for that size!

I usually make my own up from a 10 metre roll of Belgian linen with stretcher pieces, but these made-up ones are cheaper than the stretcher pieces themselves and avoid a lot of time assembling! They're available in many different sizes, so if you fancy having a go (you can use acrylics or water based oils if you must, as they are acrylic primed), click on the banner above or to the right and click on the 50% off Gerstaecker Classico canvases on the home page of their website.

A word on stretching - no-one ever seems to mention this - when you tap in the wooden wedges (which are too short, a bug-bear of mine) in the corners to make the canvas as tight as a drum before you paint, make sure you put in a piece of cardboard behind the wedges when you tap with a hammer, otherwise, you will get scars and bumps on the canvas where you graze it with the hammer. Honestly, the tips and wisdom I impart, at no cost........

Mirror Reflections, Derwentwater

2011-09-19T11:09:00.008+01:00

Oil on linen canvas, 15.75 x 24 inches

This is another Derwentwater painting that is perilously close to being chocolate-boxey, but I think I've just got away with it. With mirror-reflections on still water, it's not easy to stop it looking twee.

I ummed and arred about whether to put the big foreground rock in, but without it, it would have looked even more twee with perfectly symmetrical reflections. I did reduce the size of it so it didn't dominate too much, but the darks in the shadowed parts of the rock provided a nice foil to the lighter tones of the band of trees and mountains and it also had lots of interesting contours with varying degrees of lit surfaces within it.

Painting the actual reflections is the easiest and most enjoyable part of the painting technically, though a sustained period of concentration is required to make the tones slightly duller than that which they are relecting, to convince the viewer that this is water. If you squint you will see that the sky reflections are darker than the sky itself - although still water acts as a mirror, because you are looking through the water as well as light bouncing off it, it always appears a little duller than the ground above. Have a look next time you're by still water, especially on a sunny day after rain when the silt is disturbed and the water becomes muddied - the reflections then can take on a very glazed colour and can be really beautiful.

By the way, I've made every effort to make these images as accurate as possible, but the camera is not adequate enough to capture the nuances and subtleties of colour and tone in paintings, and of course, each of you will be looking at your own individual screen, which most likely is not calibrated unless you have a bit of technical kit so to do. Therefore, in short, the paintings will look a lot different to how you see them on your monitor, and hopefully, a lot better. Just in case you wonder why I paint blue trees, or pink grass, or green sheep........

Calm Morning, Derwentwater

2011-09-12T22:25:00.002+01:00

Oil on board, 12 x 17 inches

Continuing my current theme of Lake district paintings, I gave a 2-hour demo to Horncastle Art Group and painted this beautiful view of Derwentwater, reaching this stage in the time allowed:

Having got absorbed with the task and commentary as I painted, I forgot to take a photo of the Group to post here. You'll just have to take my word for it that the two thousand strong crowd........were a knowledgeable, happy and appreciative audience.

I finished off the painting back in the studio, refining the colours and tones and placed the two Canada Geese to break up the symmetrical reflections.

The Langstrath Valley

2011-09-08T00:04:00.008+01:00

Oil on canvas, 19.75 x 27.5 inches

This painting was done on clear-primed Honsell Naturelle linen canvas, rather than my usual universal white-primed choice. If anyone would like to try these canvases (they are medium-grain texture, not fine-grain as advertised) have a look on Great Art's website by clicking on their red and white banner at the top or on the right. They have a sale on until the end of October, with lots of other materials, they pack things very well, delivery is swift and I thoroughly recommend them.

I've spent days on this painting, but I'm pretty pleased with the result. The view was a good composition as it was, without any manipulation, and begged to be given a decent sized platform to depict the scene. The beck meanders through from front to back, with moss-laden trees in the foreground and middle distance, with the hills progressively more blue as they recede into the distance. The right hand bank, devoid of trees has two handy stoppers to stop the eye flying out of the picture, namely the rocky outcrop a third of the way out into the beck and the man-made walls with the gap between to invite the viewer through. I also loved the mauvey shadow of the foreground tree across the sunlit white water.

Yesterday, I heard the terrible news from across the pond, that my friend Carol Marine and her husband David and son Jacob, had their beautiful house in a pine forest in Bastrop, Texas, burnt to the ground in an awful forest fire, which even made the news over here. Thankfully, they're all okay, but escaped with just a few small paintings, hardly any belongings, and their two cars and camper. Carol's new custom-built studio, together with a huge collection of still-life objects....all gone - can you imagine it?

You can all help Carol by looking at her very entertaining Blog (link on the right) and see her beautiful paintings with her luscious brushwork. I've bought five of her little paintings and they are all available on the Daily Painters Auction site - she will still be posting the new paintings she's already done, so have a look and help her out by bidding on them and get yourself some superb artwork, too. She will post to the UK for $30.

Looking Downstream, Stonethwaite Beck

2011-09-02T23:47:00.001+01:00

Oil on Board, 10x14 inches

This composition is a little unusual for me, in that the sun was almost behind me, thus lighting up everything in front of me, à la a picture postcard.

However, I loved the orangey winter garb of the Larch trees on the far bank set against the blue sky and the dark blue of the distant mountainside. And, of course, that gorgeous fast running water, tumbling down to the bend, enticing the viewer to wonder what's around the corner.

Running water is another handbreak-turn for me - I'm so used to painting the reflections of the slow moving waters of the rivers at home, but this was an enjoyable change. Painted with my usual 3 primaries, Cadmium Yellow Light, Permanent Rose and Cobalt Blue, if you look closely at the water (click to enlarge full screen and click again to hone in) you can see the subtle changes of colours - lots of blue in the middle section, reflecting the sky, with some slightly warmer tones on the left section, reflecting the hillside, and lots of warmer browns and greens in the near water, partly reflecting the Larches and partly revealing the stones on the riverbed. Just a few flicks of white where the water breaks over the rocks in the water completes the painting.

Clear Water, Langstrath Beck

2011-08-30T00:42:00.003+01:00

Oil on board, 14x20 inches

Having slotted in a commissioned painting since my last post, here is my second offering to be shipped up to the Lakes very soon. This is from surely one of the most beautiful valleys in all England......where? Well, I'm hardly going to tell you that am I...I don't want all of you going up there.

The water was absolutely crystal clear, with every stone on the bottom visible, appearing slightly bluer in the deeper water on the left where the beck has gouged out its contour on this bend. This called for an intense period of concentration to get that subtle shift of colour and tone (value if you're reading this in the U.S., pronounced vair-you if you're from the deep south) and make the water appear convincing.

Painting the slow rivers around my home is easy-peasy compared to this - you just paint the reflections, but this is a different kettle of fish altogether, looking through the water, too. The stones and boulders littered about the banks were pretty tricky to paint, too - well out of my comfort zone of painting dense, bankside vegetation. Quite a lot of palette-knife work to get that appearance of the solid, lit surfaces. The bare, spikey tracery of rusty-coloured branches and twigs of the near trees on the right were no pushover to do in paint either, mostly done with my big household brush and a few heavily laden swipes of my single or double-haired home-made brush (a bit like the brilliant Seasick Steve's home-made, Blues, two stringed guitar). And the slightly more blued-off, paler tones of the distant hill were darned tricky too. Come to think of it, it was a right royal battle, touch and go all the way, but I'm pleased to have scored a narrow points victory on a split decision.

Paintings like this always run the risk of becoming overworked, but I think I stopped just about in time, leaving enough for the onlookers' eyes to complete the story in their minds, hopefully!

Glassy Water, Borrowdale

2011-08-24T10:33:00.001+01:00

Oil, 10x14 inches

I'm currently doing a few Lakeland paintings to take up to Cumbria, so here's the first offering.

I am drawn to painting water, having always been fascinated with rivers and lakes as a boy, when I spent all my time (before picking up a golf club) fishing, following the 'Peter' in the 'Mr Crabtree Goes Fishing' by Bernard Venables, that genius of a book about a bygone era of the 40's and 50's. I no longer fish, but In the Lake District I'm like a boy in a sweet shop - at every turn there is a painting. I'm off up there again soon and can hardly wait!

Anyway, this little painting of the river Derwent in Borrowdale, was a gem of a subject. Looking into the sunlight, the deeper water on this bend shimmered with glassy light and I hope I've done it justice.

I had the pleasure of meeting David Miller and his wife Lisa at the Bird Fair at Rutland Water on Sunday. I've long been an admirer of his work - David, as well as a superb painter of birds, is a brilliant painter of fish in their natural habitat, a fairly unusual genre and one in which he really excells. His passion for his subjects shines out from the canvas. I bought his excellent book, 'Beneath the surface', which is a must for anyone who loves fish especially, or who just loves great art. He paints what's in the water and I paint what's above it. Hmmm, that's not a bad idea for a show sometime.............

David Cameron

2011-08-21T12:49:00.004+01:00

Well, you knew I would comment didn't you? David Cameron, who I think is a pretty genuine kind of guy, as much as a politician possibly can be, has just had installed in No10 a Tracey Emin 'work', below:

Brilliant, isn't it? A neon sign with two words cunningly arranged with two stunning lines artistically placed beneath. We are indeed lucky that it doesn't contain any spelling mistakes and has no slang for female reproductive organs included.

Mr Cameron admits to being a big fan of Miss Emin's 'work'...................my respect for the man has plummeted. He needs to concentrate on running the country methinks and stop being deluded like the other prats who have had the wool pulled over their eyes, seeing the king's new clothes in the plethora of garbage out there, masquerading as art.

Here's my own nod to tracey's brilliant new work:

Less Crap

I think I posted this link in an earlier diatribe about modern art and Miss Emin, but it's worth clicking on again. Brian sewell hasn't yet commented on No10's acquisition, but I'm sure he will and I'll post it here if and when he does, but in the meantime, settle down with the greater Oxford English dictionary and read what he said about dear Tracey's exhibition at the Hayward Gallery:

www.thisislondon.co.uk/arts/review-23951482-terrible-tracey.do

RSMA Acceptance

2011-08-17T22:09:00.002+01:00

Well, I got two of the three paintings that I submitted for the Royal Society of Marine Artists Annual Exhibition accepted, hoorah:

Sunlight on Mud, Brancaster Staithe

Moored in the shade, Brancaster Staithe

I'm hoping to become an Associate Member of the RSMA at some point - to be invited to join you have to have a number of works accepted for the Show every year for a number of years and then if the Committee, all fine painters, consider your work is of sufficient quality, they may ask if you would like to join the Society. I've had sixteen paintings accepted in the last six years, so fingers crossed.

Obviously, if I am offered Associate Membership of the RSMA and I can put ARSMA after my name, my paintings will quadruple in price overnight, so to beat the rush and be canny, I would STRONGLY advise all of you to snap up all my paintings currently available in the Galleries representing me.......

LPS Annual Exhibition

2011-08-11T23:34:00.001+01:00

To any of you who are interested, the Leicestershire Pastel Society Annual Exhibition starts with the Private Viewing this Friday 12th August from 6.30-8.30pm and on Saturday 13th and 14th from 2-5pm at St. Philip's Church, Evington Road, Leicester LE2 1HN.

This will be a bit of light relief from watching the little impoverished darlings running around smashing up their local shopping centres because they've had zero discipline from their equally undisciplined moronic parents, knowing they'll get a nasty 1 day prison sentence in some cases - yes, one day. These 'clients' are really scared of receiving such ruthless punishment...yeah right. Ooh, bit of politics Peter, steady on...................

So, did I paint the third one?

2011-08-11T22:49:00.001+01:00

Moored in the shade, Brancaster Staithe Oil 10x14 ins

(Click to enlarge)

So, you've all been wondering, did I finish the third painting to submit to the RSMA Annual Exhibition? Sorry to have kept you all biting your nails all day long, on the edge of your seats, worrying, unable to sleep or eat properly - most unfair of me to not to have told you earlier, for which I apologise....what's that, DID I MANAGE TO PAINT IT? YES! But not without incident........

I was painting up until 3.30am this morning before I was happy with it and finally hit the sack at 4.15am after fitting the painting in a frame, setting my alarm for 6.45am for a refreshing two and a half hours sleep, ready to meet Mike Challoner of Picture Post, who takes artists' paintings down to The Mall Galleries for each Society exhibition, at 7.15am on the A1 at Stamford. The alarm went off and......yep, you guessed, I failed to rise, only to be woken by Mike calling me at 7.30 to see where I was. Having leapt into clothes and driven to Stamford in double-quick time, still fast asleep and running on fumes, I finally gave mike the 3 pictures at 7.40am, making Mike half-an-hour behind his schedule, for which I was most embarrassed - sorry again Mike!

Having got back to have some breakfast before going off to Leicester to help set up the Leicestershire Pastel Society Exhibition, in which I have three paintings, I remembered I had to fit one in a frame - a task I had put off because of trying to get three paintings done for the RSMA. So, another panic, no shower, no shave, managed to get to Leicester for 10.20am, sporting a very attractive designer stubble......

Enough of my travails, you want to know a bit about the painting. One of my favourite painting locations, Brancaster Staithe in Norfolk provides a wealth of subject matter. The bright crimson fishing vessel was a lovely splash of colour to act as an obvious focal point, lit by some dappled sunshine in the shade of the foreground. The rivulets of water running through the mud provided a nice directional tool to take the eye through the composition and I particularly liked the gorgeous red reflections in these little watery trenches.

I also enjoyed the challenge of depicting the bluish hued mud in the shaded foreground, set against the orangey sunlit mud of the middle and far distance.

Unfortunately, I didn't get the chance to put a lick of retouching varnish on the painting before it went off to London. The thin varnish always gives a lift to the colours and unifies the whole picture, but, it's beyond my control now - I'll have to wait and see if the acceptance committee of the RSMA consider these efforts of suitable quality for the exhibition in October.

Winter Dawn, Thornham

2011-08-10T00:54:00.000+01:00

Oil on Board, 10x14ins

(Click on image to enlarge)

This is my second offering for submission to the prestigious RSMA to be collected at 7.15 this Thursday morning. I was hoping to produce 4 new paintings, but this one has taken me ages to paint, so unless I can paint another pretty complicated Brancaster Staithe subject later today after I've had my usual 5-6 hours sleep, it looks like I shall only submit two this year. You can submit up to six, but unless you are a member (voted for and invited by the committee) you are only allowed to have a maximum of four accepted. Last year there was what is technically known as a cock-up - they accepted all six that I submitted, then had to call me to explain their error and get me to withdraw two of my six. So, that error won't be replicated this year as my Devon exhibition has prevented me producing enough boaty paintings.

Listen to me, dear dear, you don't want to hear all about that, you want to know about the painting itself.

The appeal for this one was not just the beautiful, piercing yellow light of dawn, with the sun rising behind the group of trees, but the amazing, fleeting light effect of the boat cabins lit up, just as if electric lights had been switched on. This made for a dramatic painting, full of visual impact, with soft, purpley darks, bluish mud and boats, all receiving reflected light from the water, and those intense yellow highlights dotted about the composition. Very concentrated painting with subtle shifts of colour and tone - phew, I'm exhausted after the fight!

Must get to bed to rise early to attack the third painting to see how far I can get...............

Sunlight on Mud, Brancaster Staithe

2011-08-05T22:54:00.004+01:00

Oil on Board, 10x14 ins
(click on image to enlarge)

Here's the first painting I'm submitting for the Royal Society of Marine Artists (RSMA) annual exhibition at The Mall Galleries in London.

This is absolutely the sort of subject that gets my creative juices flowing. Looking directly in to the sun throws all objects into silhouette, with highlighted edges that catch the light. When you look at these dazzling highlights, like on the car roof and bonnet and the rims of the two foreground boats, the space around them is diffused and that is the trick to make these edges look convincing. Obviously, only a genius like me can possibly capture such effects.......

Also, looking into the sun, you would imagine the sky to be the brightest and lightest part of the composition, and indeed the actual sun itself would be, but having cunningly placed the horizon high up on the board, the reflected sunlight on the mud is the lightest passage of the painting, so the sky has to be painted a tone darker, reserving pure Titanium White for the blindingly bright mud.

The background buildings and trees are close-toned greys and purples and difficult to get right. This makes for an absorbingly tricky and concentrated period of painting that only modern-day painting giants can pull off....cough.

It's me - I'm still alive!

2011-08-03T23:10:00.002+01:00

Hi everyone, I bet you've all been wondering what I've been doing since my last post 25 years ago. Well, I've had my exhibition in Devon which is now finished - thanks to all of you who came down to try and catch a glimpse of me in the melee on the opening day......and to see the paintings. Nineteen sold, so I'm solvent again, but still not rich beyond my wildest dreams.......

I forgot to add - if any of you reading this bought one of my masterpieces in Devon I'm eternally grateful - you've made a very young man (cough, nasty catch in throat) very happy.

I've been catching up with commissions and am now trying to get four new paintings done for the RSMA (Royal Society of Marine Artists) Annual Exhibition at The Mall Galleries in London, so I just thought I would tune in. I'll post these new masterpieces as I do them in the next few days.....

Bravo BBC4 !

2011-07-12T15:52:00.002+01:00

Credit where credit is due - last night BBC4 aired the first of a series of three programmes called 'British Masters' about British painters from 1910 to 1975, presented by art historian James Fox.

I expected the usual pseudo-intellectual clap-trap served up ad-nauseam by our flagship broadcaster, but what a refreshing change; James Fox showed work that involved composition and design, superb brushwork, with attention to tone and colour, painted by superb technicians of the profession, including Walter Sickert, Wyndham Lewis, David Bomberg, Christopher Nevinson, Paul Nash and Stanley Spencer. The programme showed the emotional power that the work of these artists projected to the viewer.

Having read some of my rants on modern 'art', you might be surprised at my comments about these 'modern' artists, especially Bomberg and Lewis, but whilst not being what I would necessarily want on my walls, I can SEE the extraordinary thought and skill involved in creating these works. My objection is the self-congratulatory thoughtless garbage masquerading as art, rammed down our throats by the media (especially the BBC) and further validated by deluded art critics who know sod all about creating works of art, spouting their unintelligible verbal diarrhoea about such pieces (a word I detest, like 'installation' and 'contemporary', almost invariably meaning crap).

I found this quote in one of my favourite art books, Harley Brown's Eternal Truths for Every Artist:

Just maybe God will come to visit me; along with him will come one of his favorite angels, Jackson Pollock. God will then give me a swap on the back of my bald head: '"What's the matter with you?" he demands. "Here I am, sending subtle, deep messages to earth by way of my artist laureate, St.Jackson. And you, you keep muddying the water with your superficial nonsense about, 'who does Rothko think he's kidding' and, 'my kid brother can do that blindfolded.' You got a few centuries of pergatory waiting for you, mister. You're holding back progress with your not very clever nonsense. Now, get with the times; I'll be keeping a keen eye on you!"

St.Jackson blindsides me with a left hook, "Smarten up, Brown; I've been the butt of your snideness for too long: Mark, Pablo and I have a special interest in you. We're going to email you a list of New York art critics just to get you up to speed. We're counting on you to get the message right this time."

If this does happen, I will take out a full page in the New York Times, detailing the error of my ways; that all of humanity had better smarten up and see the light. But until then, you can count on me to keep delivering sharp kicks to the rear end of much in Modern Art.

Bravo! Harley Brown is a fabulously gifted American artist, infinitely more qualified to speak on the subject than I am, so how about the rest of you professional artists out there? Stop hiding behind your canvases and speak out about the drivel in modern art that gives us all a bad name!

I'm embarrassed to tell people what I do for a living and always feel obliged to quickly qualify 'artist' by saying what and how I paint. Sadly, both I, Emin, Rothko, Pollock, Hirst, et al, are all classed under the same category. Let's come up with a term for the nerks who try to pull the wool over our eyes, and in many quarters succeed, sadly. Any suggestions ? Start the ball rolling and leave a comment below.

'The World's Most Expensive Paintings'

2011-07-11T00:59:00.010+01:00

I tuned in to BBC1's 'The World's Most Expensive Paintings' last night, to be confronted with Rothko's 'White Center' work at number 10, which sold for $72,840,000. That is 72.84 million dollars, about 45 million pounds sterling - more than enough for a new cancer hospital I should imagine.

This 'masterpiece' as you can see consists of a band of orange paint, a band of black, a band of white in the middle (hence the brilliantly cunning title) and a band of pink on a red ground.

Then we had the usual burk of an art dealer pontificating about the genius of the 'work'. You can see more examples of Rothko's genius at

http://www.europic-art.com/Rothko.html?gclid=CLunwszJ96kCFUoc4QodWQs0Xw

unless, that is, you've got something better to do, like watch some paint dry (excuse the pun). If you do have a look, you will see that he really expanded on his brilliant concept of painting horizontal bands of colour, even using different colours on some.

I wonder if Mr Rothko really thought he was a genius and believed the hype heaped upon him by prize prats like the art dealer in the film, or was he just taking the mick and couldn't believe that deluded idiots would pay huge sums of money for garbage and so painted loads more to secure his future?

What an arse-about-face world we live in, when when the mere fact that a Russian oligarch will pay ludicrous sums for something painted by a 'named' artist, regardless of its artistic merit, which, in Rothko's case is self-evidently close to zero.

At least the genius of Rembrandt or Rubens is self-evident, whilst Rothko, Pollock and similar pillocks who think they have talent, are yet again classic nailed-on cases of the King's new clothes, and I wish a few more artists would come out of the woodwork and tell the truth about this garbage foisted on us, especially by the BBC. I will argue to my grave against this crap masquerading as art. It might be visually pleasing, but it DOES NOT require any skill whatsoever, just an idea.

Words nearly failed me, but not quite.

Last Little Pictures

2011-07-10T07:46:00.005+01:00

These are the last two paintings for my one-man-show at the Marine House Gallery at Beer starting next Saturday, 16th July. I shall be at the Gallery to meet and greet all day from 11am till 5.30pm, so I hope to meet some of you. If you do come, please make yourself known to me - I'll be the one with the cape and shades, signing books and bodyparts, surrounded by dozens of fawning women, trying to calm people down, but megastardom has hardly changed me, honestly...................

All 45 paintings can be seen on the Gallery website at http://www.marinehouseatbeer.co.uk/catalog/artist.php?artistid=282&galleryid=22&page=1

Incidentally, for those of you who are on the gallery mailing list and have therefore received an illustrated catalogue, please ignore the colours of the images - due to circumstances beyond my control (what's technically known as a cock-up), almost all the images have a green cast on them. Rest assured, I don't have cataracts, I don't paint green skies and yukky emerald green grass and trees ! Please ignore these diabolical images and see the Gallery website or this Blog for truer images.

River Meander, Oil 6x8 inches

This is the first painting produced from my wading in my local River Welland the other day. It's a very green, but warm, sunny, summer painting and it was a nice feeling to finally get the last one 'in the bag'. Now, I have to frame all the paintings ready for delivery to the Gallery.

Backlit Teasels, Oil 6x8 inches

Looking straight into the low winter sun on a crisp, frosty day gives a very special sparkle to water, which is particularly tricky to portray with paint. Titanium White is the painter's hopelessly inadequate lightest light at his or her disposal, so you have to pull a few tricks to create the illusion. I can't possibly tell you how or I'd have to kill you, obviously. This contre jour light also gives teasels a gorgeous halo, so I decided to include this in the title.

Two more little 'uns

2011-07-08T01:04:00.002+01:00

November Sunlight, Oil 6 x 8 inches

This is on my favourite stretch of river, the Welland, near my home. here, it's in its late Autumn garb, with just a few leaves left on the trees and just a hint of mist on the water by the far bank.

Just this morning and yesterday morning I was at the river, in fact IN the river, wading in with my Croc shoes and shorts, drinking in the river (not literally). I often paint from the bank, but I thought I would try a different angle and nothing quite compares to the water eye view, looking up at the banks, instead of down at the river. In my mind I was a boy again, wading in the River Cherwell in Banbury, catching Bullheads, Sticklebacks and Minnows in jam-jars. It really was a joy, wading in that crystal clear water, with hundreds of the very same tiddlers darting in front of my feet in the channels between the bright green flowing Water Crowfoot. It might be challenging to set up my pochade box and tripod in the river, but I might have a go. Watch this space...........

April Growth, Oil 6 x 8 inches

This was a typical April day, with fresh green vegetation growing through the rotted, straw-coloured reeds of the previous year.

Demo at Nether Broughton

2011-07-08T00:55:00.001+01:00

On Wednesday this week, I gave a still-life demo at Nether Broughton in front of a very appreciative audience. Here's a photo of the Group:

and below is a photo of the unfinished painting. I wanted to show the group how to tackle different textures; metal, glass, fruit, china and brushes, with particular attention to tones and reflections in quite a high-key painting. As usual, I bit off a little more than I could chew in the allotted time, so I'll have to finish the painting at a later date.

Youtube Slideshow

2011-06-29T21:23:00.004+01:00

I haven't posted for seemingly ages, having been tearing up and down the country collecting frames, giving a demo (getting lost going only 29 miles - pathetic if your reading this across the pond!), sorting out prints and generally getting ready for my exhibition in my village this week. I've also spent interminable hours on trying to put a vido-slideshow on to Youtube. I've tried 5 different software applications to this effect, all but one to no avail - it seems you need as a minimum a rudimentary understanding of quantum Physics to fathom the jargon and understand how to use the programs.

Anyway, I DID manage to post a video of the pictures to Youtube, but the images are disappointingly not sharp and half the outro message has been chopped off, despite looking perfect before it was uploaded, but if you fancy a look at my efforts, click on this link : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPEh1VP-7rQ

I look forward to seeing some of you on Friday at the Preview Evening!

Paintings in My Village Exhibition

2011-06-22T15:32:00.007+01:00

Here are some of the paintings that will be in my Village Exhibition, details below on the 18th June Post. Some are new, some are old and if I was poncy I could call it a retrospective, but really the older ones are those that haven't sold in the Galleries and will be at knock-down prices. Please form an orderly queue outside the church, say 3-4 days before the Friday Viewing, and no unseemly fighting, please.

Again, if you do intend coming along to the Friday Preview on the 1st July, please let me know so that we know the numbers to cater for, thank you!
Also, please remember there is an entry of £5 (proceeds go to the upkeep of the church) but there is wine and canapés!

Walking the Dogs, Pastel 11 x 15 ins

Barrows 'n' Boats, Oil 9 x 12 ins

The Mooring Post, Oil 7 x 10 ins

Across the Marshes, Brancaster Staithe, Oil 7 x 10 ins

Early Winter Light, Brancaster Staithe, Oil 14 x 20 ins

White Bull at Sunset, Pastel 19 x 24 ins

Setting Sun, Br. Staithe, Pastel 9 x 12 ins

Autumn Stroll, Pastel 11 x 15 ins

Chasing Coots, Windermere, Oil 18 x 26 ins

Spring greens, Oil 7 x 10 ins

Snowy Sunset, Oil 9.5 x 14.5 ins

Broken Willow Sunset, Oil 11 x 15 ins

Frosty Bridleway, Pastel 15 x 23 ins

October Reflections, Oil 10 x 14 ins

Winter Swan, Oil 9 x 12 ins

August on the Welland, Oil 11 x 15 ins

Pentewan Beach, Cornwall, Oil 12 x 17 ins

Distant Storm, Burnham Overy Staithe, Watercolour 10 x 14 ins

Poppies near Cottingham, Oil 10 x 14 ins

Frost by the Rapids, Pastel 10 x 13 ins

Bluebells and Campions, Oil 10 x 14 ins

Spring Reflections, Barrowden, Oil 11 x 13 ins

The Creek, Brancaster Staithe, Pastel 10 x 13 ins

Moorings at Thornham, Oil 18 x 30 ins

Two new little-uns

2011-06-22T09:09:00.001+01:00

Slow River, Oil 6 x 8 inches

I filmed the entire painting of this one, with the intention of posting it speeded up on Youtube, if I can figure out how to do it! If my brain CAN figure out how to, I'll post here with a link.

Incidentally, I've been asked SO many times about my DVD. The lie on my business card that says 'Instructional DVD available', will, I have every faith, soon be a true statement. Moves are afoot and in the not too distant future, it WILL be available! Actually, it's just a cunning marketing ploy on my part so that you are all GASPING to get hold of one. Sometimes, I think I'm too clever for my own good..........

Winter's Carpet, Oil 6 x 8 inches

When Autumn is done and winter sets in, the gloriously thick carpet of russet leaves adorns the woodland floor, and is delicious to paint. Even in a painting this size, I have used lots of palette-knife work on top of my big-brush foundation, almost sculpting the paint to give the illusion of leaves.

These two paintings will be in my Devon exhibition next month.

Village Exhibition

2011-06-18T20:12:00.000+01:00

Advance notice: To all of you who read my blog, you are invited to attend the Preview Evening of an exhibition of paintings by me, wildlife painter Sue Van Silver and painter and designer Sarah Stillman, together with some truly stunning flower arrangements by stars of that skill in the village. I shall have some of the originals already posted on my Blog, plus five brand new Limited Edition Giclee Prints for sale. I look forward to seeing thousands of you !

Venue: South Luffenham Church, Rutland, LE15 8NX

Date: Friday 1st July

Time: 7pm - 9pm

Entry: £5 (proceeds go to the upkeep of the church)

wine and canapés

If you intend coming to the Preview Evening, could you please email me to that effect so that we know the numbers to expect, thank you very much.

The exhibition is also open on Sunday afternoon, 3rd July, from 1pm - 6pm, as part of the Open Gardens event. The charge will be £5 again, which will also grant you entry to the fabulous gardens in the village (not mine!) Superb Cream Teas will also be available in the Village Hall from 2pm, with stalls of homemade cakes, preserves, plants, tombola and the Grand Summer Draw with a holiday for two in the Algarve as the first prize.

I shall be in attendance to meet and greet on Friday night, but only from about 5pm on Sunday......40 years ago, my brother decided to get married on this day, without a thought that his Ruby Wedding celebration lunch might clash with this exhibition, but that's brothers for you.

Bluebells and Campions, Wakerley Wood

2011-06-17T23:40:00.003+01:00

Oil on Board, 10 x 14 inches

Those very astute ones among you may have spotted in the last photo in my Patchings Post, that there was a woody painting on the easel.......this is it finished, having had my fingers removed from the acute frost-bite suffered on that last day.

This is a glorious ancient wood near home, where Bluebells and Red Campions thrive. Isn't Campion just a glorious word ? You can see the exposed roots of the trees on the uphill path and I enjoyed putting in the two Dandelion clocks in the right foreground as a subtle touch against the gorgeous blue-lilacs and pinks of the woodland carpet.

The RA Summer Show

2011-06-17T01:44:00.002+01:00

The BBC has done it again - last night they had the usual Culture Show Special on the Royal Academy Summer Show. True to form, it was an hour overwhelmingly centred on the pile of weird and bizarre male sperm receptacles that passes for art.

Watching the art critics spouting their pseudo intellectual garbage about thoughtless daubs was classic - you could easily have been watching an episode of The Fast Show (for those of you in foreign parts, it was a comedy sketch show on the BBC). Three 3 inch parallel strokes of white paint on a small turquoise square adjacent to three similar 3 inch turquoise stokes on a white wall......I rest my case m'lud.

I went to the RA Summer Show once, about twenty years ago and have never bothered to submit anything to it, nor ever will, having seen what does get accepted. On that occasion, one 'artist' had an old washboard on one of the walls, with a single squirt of Orange paint on it. There was a lot of excellent art as well, as no doubt there is in this year's show, but that never gets any airtime, naturally, on the BBC - it must be avant garde, darling - anything well drawn, with attention to perspective, colour and design is so passe.

Sadly, in my opinion, having RA after your name is now downgraded and largely meaningless. Tracey Emin, RA....need I say more ? There's just a C and a P missing ! It's an acceptance by a load of art critics who haven't a clue what they're talking about, having been to art college but can't actually DO it. My friend and brilliant artist across the pond, Carol Marine, said she learnt nothing at art college except how to impress critics which is something she couldn't care less about and I wholeheartedly agree with her. She and I and hopefully you reading this and thousands of others will live happily with the scorn of the burks who can't paint, but talk the talk.

Pictures from Patchings Art Festival

2011-06-15T01:10:00.003+01:00

September Haze, Oil 10 x 14 ins

Poppies near Cottingham, Oil 10 x 14 ins

Spring Reflections, Oil 11 x 13 ins

The paintings above are 3 of the paintings I completed at Patchings Art Festival last week. September Haze was done a couple of weeks ago as a demo to Penn Art Group and finished on Day one.

Thanks to everyone who visited my stand and watched me painting ! Here are some more pics from the festival:

With some fellow painters at the end of day 1, from left to right: Steve McLoughlin (Bush-Baby), Me (looking like my Dad in this one), Helen Parsley (a very friendly Lion) holding a glass of red provided by Richard Harpum (out of shot) and Alistair Butt (Halibut or Beaker)

Scrubbing in my next painting with thin Alkyd Oil

The block-in completed with my palette loaded with paint

A bit further on......

Further on still, with the distant trees more resolved and placing in the foreground tree with my big household paintbrush

Not far off now

Posing with the finished painting (close-up at top)

With Helen Parsley

The block-in of the next picture

Some details added

And more......(finished pic at top)

An attentive audience on day 3

"How does he do that with THAT brush?"......

"Looks easy to me"......

Wrapped up in my operating gown on day 4, when it rained all day and got very cold - I had frost-bite in three fingers

Dazzling Sea, Sidmouth

2011-06-08T00:33:00.001+01:00

Oil on Board, 12 x 17 inches

Back on Oils now; I wanted to capture the intense light of this breezy day at Sidmouth on the south Devon coast, when the wind-whipped breakers were dazzling with pure sunlight bouncing of them. Intense light like this is difficult to portray with the miserably inadequate brightness of the lightest colour in the artist's armoury, Titanium White. The trick is to reserve the white for the lightest bit of the painting, the sea below the hill, fuzz the bottom of the hill to give the impression of the dazzling sunlight, then paint the highlights of the clouds a tone darker and warmer than the sea. There, now I've told you, my career is over. I shall just have to kill all of you.

My parents married on February 15th, 1947 after a Valentine's night works dance, then drove down to Sidmouth in one of the worst winters on record, with my dad's open-topped Hillman, with the top down ! There's flash !

Shan't be posting again until next week - don't forget to come and see me demonstrating (painting, not with placards) in the painting Marquee No23 at Patchings Art Festival if you are going !

Patchings Art Festival

2011-06-04T00:38:00.003+01:00

Just a reminder to any of you who are interested - Patchings Art Festival http://www.patchingsartcentre.co.uk/patchingsfestival/patchings_festival.php starts on Thursday 9th June and goes on for four days. I shall be demonstrating every day and will have four brand new Limited Edition Giclee Prints for sale; 'The Langstrath Valley', 'Cob and Pen', 'Glorious Autumn' all on good quality cotton canvas, and 'Waterproof Whizzers' printed on beautiful Hahnemuhle Paper. The originals can all be seen in my previous posts and the Prints will be lifesize.

Please say hello and say how much you enjoy my Blog and generally what a great painter and all-round wonderful human being I am; anything along those lines - you choose your own words but say them loudly. I shall be in Marquee 23, the painting tent. I look forward to seeing any of you !

Breezy Day by the River Axe

2011-06-04T00:22:00.000+01:00

Pastel on Pastel Card, 11 x 15 inches

Following on from last night's Blog post, this is the re-painted disaster painting. Easily the most time I have ever spent on a painting of this modest size. In fact, it was an ambitious enterprise in the first instance tackling such a complicated subject on this scale - it would have been much easier to have done it twice the size. It's fiddly trying to make the cattle and swans convincing using thick stubs of Pastel, but I got there in the end. Having spent such an inordinately long time on this, twice, this will be my very first painting with a £1,000,000 price tag, in my own lifetime, and I'm not Damien Hirst or Tracey Emin ! Hoorah for me !

Art Disaster !

2011-06-03T00:30:00.003+01:00

Today I had a disaster. Some of you may have see the Mr Bean film Whistler's Mother in which our hapless hero destroys Whistler's great portrait of his mother. I've gripped you now haven't I - you've shuffled to the edge of your seat haven't you? Marine House Gallery, where my one-man-show is on 16th July, wanted a new mugshot of me in the studio, so, as I had to use a delayed shutter and focus on my 'operating gown' set up on a plank of wood on my chair (don't ask) and then quickly sling it (the gown) out of the way as I sat on the chair to compose myself in time before the shutter released, I didn't notice exactly where I slung it. You're ahead of me now aren't you......yes, that's right, I slung it onto my nearly completed Pastel painting that I was REALLY pleased with.

I looked down after the camera took the photo, with an aghast and disbelieving look. I had all but completely wiped three quarters of the painting off the surface. I, like others, have wiped oil paintings that have gone wrong, but I've never wiped one that I was so happy with. I'll post the re-painted Pastel when I've finished it, but for now, here are three more Pastels completed this week:

Built for Dartmoor

Pastel on Pastel Card, 22.75 x 22.5 inches

This little guy just had to be painted - all legs and head with a big, beady eye, and covered in junior fluff.

Donkey Oaty II

Pastel on Pastel Card, 24.75 x 19 inches

Donkey Oaty - get it? I've painted 'Oaty' before; he lives at Banbury Hill Farm at Charlbury near Chipping Norton, a lovely Bed and Breakfast where I've stayed. Donkeys have a calm, benign look about them and they make superb subjects for an artist.

Winter Sunlight

Pastel on Pastelmat, 16.75 x 19 inches

This is a cold, but warm painting if that doesn't sound daft. The yellow, orangey sun through the tops of the trees is a perfect complement to the blues and mauves of the fresh snow. The fallen poplar tree provided a nice foil to drag the eye back into the right half of the painting. Try covering up the tree with a pencil - the composition doesn't work so well does it - too left biased, right?

Waterproof Whizzers

2011-05-24T15:34:00.000+01:00

Pastel on Pastelmat, 16.5 x 19 inches

Ducklings are like little clockwork toys, never still, whizzing about over the water, occasionally dipping in and bobbing up like corks with globules of water glistening on their downy feathers. This is what I've attempted to capture in this painting, with the surface disturbed into marbled patterns and sparkling stars of sunlight.

How do I decide what medium to use, I hear you ask ? Well, this one yelled out "Pastel" to me - I find the ripples and mauvey sky reflections are a lot easier to depict in the dry medium than Oil - don't get me wrong, still incredibly difficult........and only I am capable of pulling it off....ahem.

English Bluebell Spring

2011-05-23T00:14:00.000+01:00

Oil on Board, 14 x 20 inches

Yes, I know it's a bit twee, but Bluebells in a wood ARE one of the most spectacular sights of Spring in England. This is from a wood local to me at Fineshade, part of the ancient Rockingham Forest. I wasn't after a pretty scene, so opted for my favourite angle of looking almost straight into the sunlight.

The flowers had just about gone over when I went down there early one morning, so I had to embellish what I saw a bit, but I made good use of the back-lighting with lots of light and shade, with most of the painting done with my well-loaded 1-inch household paintbrush, apart from the tree trunks and branches anf=d the few impast dabs with a palette knife.

Highland Red

2011-05-23T00:00:00.000+01:00

Pastel on Pastel Card, 19 x 24.75 inches

Highland Cattle are such benign looking animals, but you need to steer clear of those horns - they're made of cow-horn you know. In the words of Jonesey "They don't like it up'em Captain Mainwearing, they don't like it up'em !"

I had some fun with what we artists call counterchange (sounding clever again), ie dark passages against light passages and vice versa. This is a trick employed to make the painting appear less flat, more three dimensional and generally more interesting. If you'd like to send a large cheque to me for divulging these secrets, please feel free - I won't be the least bit embarrassed.

Hazy Hills

2011-05-22T23:42:00.000+01:00

Pastel on Clairefontaine Pastelmat, 19 x 26.75 inches

This was one of those lovely hazy summer days, when distant trees appear increasingly bluer the further away they are, because you are looking through so much atmosphere (sounds like I know what I'm talking about doesn't it?). The cattle dominate, obviously, but did you spot the two rabbits I placed in the right foreground on the short-cut grass ? A pastoral pastel don't you think ?

Another word for you other Pastellists; further to my comments about using Pastel Card on the 'Hitch-Hiker' post, I've just started using Clairefontaine Pastelmat, and it's wonderful. To quote my friend and painting colleague Mary Herbert, "where has it been all my life?!" Pastelmat is a deceptively smooth surface that really grabs the Pastel pigment, and is a joy to work on and I think once my current supply of Pastel Card has been used up, I shall be painting exclusively on Pastelmat.

Ugly Ducklings

2011-05-22T23:23:00.000+01:00

Pastel on Clairefontaine Pastelmat, 19 x 26.75 inches

What is it about Swans with me ? Those of you have seen my work in the past know that swans seem to feature quite a lot in my wildlife studies. They are just the most beautiful birds, and being big and white, they do make wonderful subjects for painters.

I called this one 'Ugly Ducklings' after the Danny Kaye song, so often played on Junior Choice in the late fifties and sixties (that dates me) Anybody under 40 probably won't know what on earth I'm talking about...who's Danny Kaye ? Educate them everyone....oh, and sing the song ! I bet you'll be cursing me for the next couple of days - you won't get it out of your head will you...."with feathers all stubby and brown...............get out of town"

The Hitch-Hiker

2011-05-22T19:12:00.000+01:00

Pastel on Pastel Card, 19 x 31 inches

You can just see the little guy cadging a lift from his mum while his four siblings are paddling furiously - there's always one rebel.

This is about as big a Pastel as I paint. It was as much a portrait of the water as the Swans, and I had quite a battle to make the water convincing as a wind-ruffled surface, making the reflections very broken up.

For the Pastellists among you, I have used Pastel Card for some years - its gritty surface is made from thousands of cork particles, but many people don't like it because they find it too abrasive and you can't wet it because the surface lifts off. I've never seen the point of putting a wash over an already tinted ground, but if you accidentally get a bit of spit on the surface when you blow loose Pastel dust away, if you leave it to dry, there is no problem - just cover the offending spot with a little Pastel. I, too, find the surface a little harsh, so I rub it with a piece of 240 grade Wetordry paper. You can be quite agressive with it, so that the resulting surface is fairly smooth, but it still grips a lot of Pastel. I use my fingers a lot with Soft Pastels, so it's a very tactile way of working and that's why I want a smoother grit.

The Culture Show

2011-05-20T15:01:00.009+01:00

Well, what a surprise, the first of the new series of the Culture Show last night featured who else but Tracey Emin RA, y-a-w-n. Miss Emin makes good copy for the media in the same way Wayne Rooney does, in that you never quite know what they're going to do next, but it will most likely be controversial and foul-mouthed; the difference being that Wayne Rooney is really good at what he does. Their is no evidence of any equivalent artistic skill in Tracey Emin's 'work'.

Everything she does is autobiographical and because she has managed to pull the wool over so many contemporary art buyers' eyes for so long, she can 'do' anything, give a personal story to it and it's part of another voyeuristic exhibition. A classic case, if there ever was one, of the Emporer's new clothes.

Do we really care what banal things she's done in her life, and do we really want to see an animated film of her drawings, rodgering herself, or her used tampons? The Culture Show confuses me and I suspect the vast majority of the country's art-loving population with someone who gives a damn, but if the Saatchis of the world wish to further swell Miss Emin's vast fortune, more fool them.

For Brian Sewell's priceless review of her exhibition, far more eloquent than mine, settle down with a cup o' tea and a dictionary and read it at www.thisislondon.co.uk/arts/review-23951482-terrible-tracey.do

If only the Culture Show would give similar air time to the other great exhibitions going on in London and the provinces all the time, by artists who can actually paint, like Ken Howard, Trevor Chamberlain, David Curtis or others too numerous to mention. There is a fabulous one on right now in Bath at the Victoria Gallery by Peter Brown, link http://www.victoriagal.org.uk/exhibitions/future_exhibitions/peter_brownbath_between_snows/catalogue_page_1.aspx
All Peter's work is completed en plein air, in all weathers, together with some stunning interiors. What a breath of fresh air it would have been for the BBC to have done a 10 minute feature of Peter's work, showing him painting and talking about his work without the bullshit, backed by his grafting away for years to produce truly superb, honest, skilful paintings - a feast for the eye. Pete gets good money for his work and rightly so, but ironically he will never be a multi-millionaire like Miss Emin. David Lee, Charlotte Mullins and Roy Bolton should go and have a look and see what real 'art' is, though I expect they'd dismiss it as unoriginal and derivative.

As my friend said to me yesterday in an email, I really should stop sitting on the fence and say what I really think ! Back to the bull...the portrait of one I'm painting in Pastels.

Show me the sodding Monet !

2011-05-18T22:25:00.001+01:00

Words almost fail me, but not quite......on today's debacle of a show, David Lee pronounced Jamie Hageman's superb mountainscape (no mention at any time of the medium used) not good enough, whilst Charlotte Mullins and Roy 'the voice' Bolton were astonished that Jamie was self-taught and hadn't been to art college. I would have been astonished if he HAD been to art college, producing that work !

Unbelievable - they clearly know nothing about painting and how it is learned. Most really decent professional artists have developed their own way of working from studying and PAINTING, not going to art college and fannying about with dripping paint and freeing one's soul, abandoning draughtsmanship, design, perspective, tone, colour and brushwork. In the words of Inspector Grimm in 'The Thin Blue Line' (left) "there's far too much arty-farty, namby-pamby, hoity-toity, wishy-washy, lardy-dardy, sun-dried tomato eating, decaffeinated fannying about !"

Let's see what tomorrow's show coughs up........I may burst a blood vessel.

Eagle Crag From Stonethwaite

2011-05-18T17:47:00.001+01:00

Oil on board, 9 x 12 inches

This little painting was painted on site in March, on a beautiful early Spring day. I was so warm lugging the painting gear around, looking for a good vantage point, that having found the view I wanted on a rocky outcrop by an old sheepfold, I pulled my wellies off and painted barefoot (risque - get me !)

The light changed quickly and by the time I finished two hours later, the sun had cleared off and it was pointless carrying on. So, with the aid of a couple of reference photos I took after an hour into the painting, and the memory of the original light, I finished it off in the studio. Eagle Crag itself was sunlit on one side, as were the foreground meadows, walls and bare trees, but the mountain in the middle-distance was thrown into dark relief in blues and purples. I hope I've done it justice.

During the painting on site, the herd of Herdwicks were gathered up by the Stonethwaite farmer's sheepdog, running the full length of the meadow, right down to the far walls by the conifers - it was a joy to watch !

Show me the Monet

2011-05-18T01:28:00.004+01:00

I felt I had to put my two-penny's worth on this BBC2 programme, presented by the cheery Chris Hollins, with three art critics (groan) selecting paintings to go into an exhibition at the RCA (Royal College of Art)

The selection process is bizarre and sadly, predictable for the BBC. The oft-repeated mantra is that the work must be 'original', show good technique and evoke an emotional response. How sad it is that a well-painted picture is summarily dismissed as 'un-original' and painted so many times before. So, if no-one had ever heard of Rembrandt and he offered one of his paintings, his would be dismissed for the same reason - "we've seen Van Dyck's work and this is very derivative"

Take Karl Terry on last Wednesday's show - Karl offered a fine painting done entirely on site in Rye Harbour :

This was dismissed as being un-original, never mind the technical skill of Karl's brushwork and years of grafting in all weathers to catch those fleeting light effects.

Then the three critics went mad over Caroline Thatcher's painting of herself as a child standing on a chair with a vulnerable look on her face. The painting was crude, technically awful, but this was swept aside because of the emotional response it evoked. No light or shade in the painting, awful bright green monotone background (view at www.saatchionline.com/profile/152108).

Then today's (Tuesday) show we had them fawning over Katy Sullivan's portrait of her daughter, (view at www.katysullivan.co.uk/portfolio.php) obviously painted (very well) from a flash photograph - no light and shade on the face at all, single colour and toned background, then David Lee of all of them rejecting Andrew Kinsman's brilliant portrait of a man blowing a bubble (view at www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=158100726686&set=a.158100031686.118698.157030626686&type=1&theater), saying he doesn't like paintings done from photographs ! Absolutely bizarre - obviously hadn't occurred to him that Katy's portrait had been done from a photo, a flash one at that as was evident if he knew anything about flash photography - it flattens and bleaches the features and leaves a white highlight in the centre of the eye. And how did he think the daub of the little girl standing on the chair was done ?

Whilst art is always going to be subjective, especially when chosen by critics who don't know enough about painting, it's such a shame that 'contemporary' always wins out in the media, like the annual Turner Prize joke. Talent is not a prerequisite, in fact a positive drawback - just be different. Put some excrement on a canvas - though I dare say Tracey Emin's already done that.

Such a pity the BBC didn't think it would have been a good idea to have at least one, preferably two artists on the hanging committee - proper artists who know how to paint and can see that a painting has been thought about, has good composition, good technique, an understanding of tone and colour, has meaning and not just paint daubed on randomly or crudely and the artists then waxing on about it with utterly meaningless drivel.

The sad fact is, talentless 'artists' are coming out of college and are being told that they do have talent, further enforcing the myths in their deluded minds, thus assuring the longevity of the garbage offered up. We in Britain are SO far behind the art produced in the U.S. and destined to stay that way unless and until the media give a voice to 'old-fashioned art'. There are only two sorts of art - good and bad, and bad prevails in the media. Wake up you idiots !!!

Line Of Enquiry

2011-05-17T23:51:00.003+01:00

Oil on linen canvas, 20 x 30 inches

The last of my big oils for now, this one. I've figured out a shorthand for painting shingle, but I still need therapy - see you all in a couple of years........

Fishing boats are such wonderful subjects - all that bit different, weathered from their hard work, each painted in jolly colours. My favourite light again, looking straight into the sun, which is the most challenging task for the painter. All the white cabins are thrown into a very subtle blueish silhouette, apart from the tops of them. Tone is everything - colour is important of course, but if you get the tone of each object right, the painting 'reads' right in the eyes of the onlooker.

The brightest part of the painting is the sea itself, which is catching the pure sunlight from the overhead sun - that particular intense light phenomenon you get looking at an expanse of water straight into the sun. Usually the lightest part of a painting is the sky, but not here. You can see I've painted the clouds very bright, but a tone down from the sea.

I love dramatic lighting like this. Yes, it's a portrait of boats on the beach at Beer, but it's more an observation of a light effect. As I said tone is so important, but if you can get the colours right too....but to get that, of course, you have to be very, very clever...............cough.

Summer Grazers

2011-05-14T22:57:00.008+01:00

Oil on board, 10 x 14 inches

This painting was done as a demonstration piece to The Weldon Art Group a while back. I've only just got round to finishing it. It was originally painted from a reference photo taken in June by my local river, but I decided to change it to August with the colourful pink Himalayan Balsam and Purple Loosestrife adorning the vegetation.

Glorious Autumn

2011-05-10T01:10:00.000+01:00

Oil on Canvas, 20 x 28 inches

There's an awful lot of texture on this painting that doesn't show on the two dimensional photo. I deployed my long, flexible palette knife combined with my big household paintbrush for much of the russet foliage and fallen leaves. Generally speaking I'm a fairly lean painter, but you'll get real value for your money with this one - the paint's fairly sculpted on !

I put in the Fallow Deer stag with his harem at the suggestion of a friend and slightly re-arranged the perspective of the foreground logs to lead the eye to the focal point - dashed clever what, Jeeves ?

I was painting late into the night in the studio under my two 5ft daylight fluorescent tubes, and it being a warm May evening, the windows were being bombarded by Cockchafer Beetles, commonly known (and less suggestively) as Maybugs, photo below. These are enormous beetles, nearly two inches long and if they collide with you when you're out at night, it's a bit like being hit by a little buzzy helicopter ! They don't mean to hit you, even though they look fearsome - they're just clumsy, blundering, harmless guys who've staggered out of the pub, a bit worse for wear, so if you come across one, just put him out of harm's way to stop him being squashed.

Cob and Pen

2011-05-06T01:38:00.007+01:00

Oil on Canvas, 22 x 22 inches

You're thinking "he's lost it, he's giving his swans funny names now"....well, to the unitiated among you (sounding smug now) the male and female of the swan are called the Cob and the Pen. Nice looking Pen.

I usually paint animals and birds in Pastel, but on this occasion, I decided to do it in Oils, and I'm pleased with the result. The greater bulk of the painting was done with 3 colours, my primaries, Cadmium Yellow Light, Permanent Rose and Cobalt Blue, plus white of course. I always say in my demos that you can make any colour you want from just those 3, and I fail to see the point of buying four or five shades of each and every colour. It just complicates the issue and only frightens those who are dipping their toe into the water of Oils. (bad analogy, oil doesn't mix with water, but you know what I mean) The only additional colours used were Burnt Sienna, French Ultramarine and Raw Umber, but only tiny quantities of each.

The main brushes I used for this one were Rosemary and Co.'s (www.rosemaryandco.com) fantastic Long Flat Mongooses, which are just wonderful to use - great for the ripply water - they take a lot of pounding and keep their beautiful sharp, chiselled edge. I can't praise these brushes enough - nothing else compares to them. They're soft, but springy at the same time and you can put slabs of paint on sideways, turn them at right angles and get those gorgeous fine lines, or add tiny impasto blobs of highlights with the corners, all with a big No 6 brush.

I bought some Langnickels from America a few years ago at great expense and the hairs fell out of 4 of them, then I discoverd Rosemary's Mongooses right here and they are miles better in quality - I've used them a lot and not one hair has come out and they just keep coming back for more and retain their shape beautifully. But all you amateurs - you must look after your brushes - rinse them well in white spirit, dry them with a rag, THEN wash them with warm water on a bar of soap and rinse under the tap.

Blimey, it's 1.40am - I can't stay up all night talking to you lot, giving away all my secrets ! I'm orf to bed.

Hard Frost

2011-05-02T01:11:00.001+01:00

Oil on Canvas, 16 x 22 inches

This is a hark back to the big freeze in December before the snowfall. The river was partly frozen over and everything coated with hoar frost - a bit like icing sugar on a doughnut, but tastier.

I love painting frost - an exercise in close tones, almost monochrome, with very subtle colour changes. I love our country with all its glorious seasons.

Don't forget you can see a full screen sized image if you click on any image, and hone in more by clicking on that again. Any comments will be gratefully received by clicking on 'comments' in the light blue box at the foot of any post. Thanks for looking !

S-Bend on The Welland

2011-04-30T23:39:00.000+01:00

Oil on Panel, 9 x 12 inches

Just a smaller panel this time amid my bigger paintings; the river near home at Duddington where its course glides through an S-bend, flanked by Ashes and Oaks. It's a very warm, summery painting, with lots of subtle greens throughout. The Ash tree's boughs dipping into the water on the left stop the eye flying right out of the painting.

Frosty one coming up next......................

Grange in Borrowdale

2011-04-29T08:42:00.001+01:00

Oil on Panel, 12 x 17 inches

Here's my version of the oft-painted Grange-in-Borrowdale in the Lake District. You're probably wondering why I haven't posted for a week....well, I've had a friend staying with me and we've been painting furiously, so will be posting 2 more new paintings over the weekend.

Obviously, I shall be at the Abbey today for a couple of hours, then straight back to it...............................

Hazy September

2011-04-22T22:08:00.004+01:00

Oil on canvas, 22 x 30 inches

I was going to call this one 'The Cobweb', but 'Hazy September' describes the painting well I think. This was one of those lovely, bright, hazy, late summer days, much like the unseasonal ones we are experiencing over this Easter period. Dewy gossamer was adorning all the bankside vegetation, with one big cobweb made all the more visible with its watery embellishment (I think I've turned into a poet).

Again, it is my favourite sort of light effect - looking straight into it - which gives that gorgeous sparkle of sunlight on the water. I find painting these light effects extremely taxing to get the tones of the receding planes of trees light enough. I seem to invariably make them too dark and have to repaint them much lighter than my eyes are telling me. Paint what you see Barker, not what you think you see, as I always drum into the folks who attend my demos. I've only been painting for a living for 28 years, so you wouldn't expect me to get it right first time yet....ahem. It took longer than I would have hoped for that reason, but I'm happy with the result, I think, at this early juncture.

The Spelling Mistake

2011-04-19T22:43:00.000+01:00

The Spelling Mistake, Oil on canvas, 22 x 30 inches

Mackerel ! You can't actually make out the sign on the pole on the left of the painting - it says 'Mackeral Fishing Trips' - hence the title.

This was a triumph over adversity; there are 2,623,714 pebbles on this bit of Beer beach in Devon. Did I paint them all you're asking ? Don't be ridiculous, I only painted the ones on the surface. How did I do this ? If I told you that, I'd have to kill all of you..........

The fabulous reflected light was the inspiration for this big painting, for me. I love a subject looking directly into the light, especially when that light is bouncing off water. I wanted to capture that blinding light that almost obliterates anything set against it, in this case the flags on the light blue boat and the fisherman in the dark blue boat beneath it, about to launch. There's also lovely pure sunlight catching the damp boards and metal rails on the two foreground boats. Pure Titanium White is the hopelessly inadequate brightest colour an artist has in his arsenal, so you have to employ a few tricks to try to create that illusion of blinding reflected light. Again, I can't possibly tell you how it's done, or....................

I never think bigger paintings photograph as well as smaller ones, and I had a lot of trouble trying to get the colours anywhere near the colours in the painting. This is the best effort, although the warm shades are a bit hot. You'll just all have to come to my show in Devon in July to see it 'as is'.

I've now done a hand-break turn and am painting another 22x30 of my local river, the Welland......will post soon.

Walker below Eagle Crag

2011-04-14T00:34:00.001+01:00

Oil on canvas, 18 x 24 inches

This is the last of my Lakes paintings for now. The inspiration for this one was the sparkling, clear water with the stones on the bottom appearing almost turquoise, with the jagged rocks on the right catching the bright sunlight, set against the dark far bank, with the giant blue Eagle Crag looming out of the top of the canvas. Don't you just want to get into that water ? I did and it was wonderful.

The Langstrath Valley

2011-04-10T00:05:00.001+01:00

The Langstrath Valley, Oil on panel, 18.5" x 26.5"

Here's my latest Latest Cumbrian painting from the truly glorious Langstrath Valley of The Lake Distirct. I loved the different textures in this composition - the calm water just before the rapids, the jagged, angular, rocky outcrops with the tree in its winter garb and the distant blue mountains shrouded under the clouds. Lots of different brushes used for this one - hogs, mongoose, riggers and my trusty household paint brush.

Don't forget you can see a full size version by clicking on the image, and zoom in by clicking again.

Thanks for looking and please leave a comment if you wish by clicking on 'comments' in the box below.

Lakeland Paintings

2011-04-05T23:16:00.005+01:00

I've just painted these three Lakeland scenes after my recent trip up to that fabulous part of our country. I was going to say back in my comfort zone, but those still-lifes I posted earlier were a blast and I really enjoyed the hand-brake turn !

'Derwentwater' Oil, 18 x 26 inches

This was a beautiful, calm morning by the south end of the lake, with mirror-like reflections and Mr and Mrs Mallard in the foreground - Mrs doing some preening and Mr with his head stuffed in his feathers, wondering just how long she's going to be...............

'Stonethwaite Beck' Oil, 18 x 26 inches

As I mostly paint rivers down in my neck of the woods, this was a right challenge, painting tumbling water through a valley of thousands of rocks. Painting the way I do, it's tricky to paint these anything like loosely. There is such a lot of light and shade on every damned one, it was great to finish it ! What a stunning valley, though.

'River Derwent, Borrowdale' Oil, 16 x 22 inches

Blue distant mountains, un-clad trees, wonderful reflections and just the odd few orange leaves left, like little jewels - what a subject, largely close-toned with muted colours, save for that bit of orange as a complementary colour to the blue of the mountains.

"How'd he get in there?"

2011-03-27T00:58:00.003Z

I gave a demo of a still-life set-up to the Melton Mowbray Art Group on Thursday last. The bottom photo is how far I got on the night. On getting it home I realised that the coffee pot and jam-jar were leaning to starboard a bit, so I set the still-life up again in the studio to re-assess, correct the draughtsmanship and take to the finish. Of course, setting it up away from the original setting and lighting necessitated re-painting most of it again, but hey-ho.

I'm quite pleased with the final draft, the last still-life for my upcoming solo-show in Devon. Again, it was an elliptical challenge - I must be a masochist ! The main idea of this demo set-up was to show how to tackle three very different textures; the waxy skins of the satsumas and lemon, the see-through distortions of the angular jam-jar and the highly polished reflective surface of the coffee-pot. Can you spot my distorted left hand in there (reflection, that is) ?

It was an absorbing contest to capture all those reflected lights and colours on each surface, but as I said and always say to my audience, it's simply a matter of close observation and painting what you see, not what you think you see. Easy-peasy really, but observation is the key. I think artists (representational artists, that is) see the world differently than most people; we get so used to REALLY looking, that putting it down with paint gets easier the more we do it, and that is my advice to any aspiring artists - look and look again - there's no secret, it's just training the eye to see, then applying the paint to replicate what you see. Style is another thing - that's how you apply the paint.

Now, how did that satsuma get in the jar .............................?

"Yokel"

2011-03-21T19:34:00.003Z

This was a joyous struggle...ellipses...phew, the drawing's got to be right or it doesn't 'read'. It needed a little adjustment - I don't draw out the composition in pencil or charcoal, but go straight in with a brush and paint - I find that easier, more flowing, especially as the panel surface has a real grippy 'tooth' to it. Looking through a viewfinder and holding the long brush at the end also allows the drawing to flow better, then I find it easier to refine with subsequent brush strokes.

I've painted eggs and eggshells before in pastel and watercolour and gouache, but I really enjoyed this in Oils and am pleased with the result. Back to landscapes tomorrow, then one more 'live' still-life when I give a demo at Melton Mowbray on Thursday in 3 days time.

You probably all know, but if you click on any image on my Blog you get a larger version.

Thanks for looking in !

"You'll soon grow up"

2011-03-18T12:26:00.000Z

Here's my latest effort at still-life, 6"x8" Oil. Painting glass with liquid in is a joy; the subtle colours and reflections and distorted bends of the flower stalks was an enjoyable tussle. No secret to it, just paint what you see, not what you think you see - that's real-life painting in a nutshell.
I've tried painting these still-lifes a little looser than I normally do with my landscapes, but it's tough to change the habits of a lifetime! Regardless of how loose you paint, the drawing of objects, especially round ones, must be accurate - if the ellipses are wrong, the whole painting collapses and just doesn't read right.

Beckstones Art Gallery

2011-03-18T11:51:00.002Z

I've just returned from a painting trip to The Lake District; did a lot of walking around the Borrowdale/Stonethwaite area, collected tons of reference material, did one plein air painting and ate lots of good food! The Stonethwaite and Langstrath Valley is surely the most beautiful place in all England!
I also had two paintings accepted by Beckstones Art Gallery at Greystoke Ghyll (www.beckstonesartgallery.co.uk/index.php/Artists/Peter-Barker.html), images below:

Little Langdale Tarn, 12"x17" £1425 SOLD

September sunshine, Grisedale, 14"x20" £2150 SOLD

STILL-LIFES !

2011-03-12T00:34:00.004Z

Yes, don't rub your eyes, these are my first forays into still-lifes for about 20 years ! I've been following two brilliant artists, Carol Marine and Qiang Huang (links opposite), who predominantly paint still-lifes. Their wonderful paintings have inspired me to have a change of tack from my landscapes and wildlife and here are my first efforts. Any comments would be gratefully received.

So What Happened To You ?

Oil 7 x 10 inches
I thought I would play on the 'normal' onion and the red onion, so inclined them towards each other for the composition

D'you Know Him ?

Oil 6 x 8 inches
I arranged the Red and Yellow Peppers so their curled stalks were talking to each other about the Green guy following them.

Does My Bum Look Big In This ?

Oil 6 x 8 inches
I had forgotten the joy of painting metal ! I dug this little tea-pot out of the back of the cupboard and placed the Garlic and Apple so their distorted reflections showed prominently. But which one is asking the question ?