Post 19 Oh dear!!

Oh dear what are we going to do about the weather! It has been so terrible it's even made the national news this week (not for the first time but you might be forgiven for thinking it would be for nice weather and not torrential downpours and flooding.)

Walking up around Peniel Heugh earlier in the week the rain was never far away. The sky was beautiful and changed from moment to moment, looking north grey dominated and then south and west, blue.

Setting off, the light was beautiful.

Approaching rain, Eildons in the distance

Big Skies

Ruberslaw in the sun

Peniel Heugh 

As for me it's the first few days of the holidays and I've been in the studio concentrating on those cloudy skies and  rain soaked landscapes. I am like every one else fed up with the rain, but like I've said before rain means painting and I can't complain on that level.

Work in progress

Work in progress- today

Sketch book today

Studio today

Being too wet and unpredictable to draw on location I've been trying hard to work from memory. It's a challenge and as a way of being more disciplined about the process I'm not printing off  photographs and not taking my laptop into the studio. It definitely is aiding a more expressive approach. I just hope I can keep things fresh.

Day / Post 18 Cool and Loose for June

Nearly two thirds the way through my 30 day blog and it 's nearly half way through June! Having started this blog way back in March I thought it was a good time to reflect on the things that have popped up along the way. Below is the photograph taken at Back Bowden Doors in March, interesting to compare it with the next one taken this Thursday. Strange to think the temperature this week was 5 degrees lower than back in March!

Back Bowden in March

The sun is higher now casting deeper shadows

Along the way I started a number of paintings some more weather related than others. Below are image details and the final painting of the one I started back in April and blogged about on day 7.

Oil & Wax on canvas 100x100cm

Since then I 've been on a quest to loosen up and return to an earlier and personally more interesting way of working. This is something I genuinely feel has come about partially due to this weather blog. For a time I feel I  had been slipping back into representation. Nothing wrong with this, if you want to a paint an image of a  tree that resembles a tree then why not? But for me the interesting parts of the world around me often are the ones that are like the mists and light, the ethereal non concrete elements that are continually shifting and changing. I'll always endeavour to paint in both ways but for now I'm set on a course towards a more abstracted less representational form of expression.

Oil and Wax on canvas (work in progress)

The cotton flowers around Bowden are in  full bloom

Looking up

Working it out

It's a steep learning curve and  at times I have slipped off and continue to,undulating along the way. 

Day/Post 17 Coloured greys

 Into June and no surprises as far as our lovely British or more specifically Scottish weather is concerned. Rain, grey skys and wind!
 We did have a really good day out along the Aonach Eagach ridge last Saturday and that put me in good form for the rest of the week. On the drive up  to Glencoe the weather didn't look too promising,it was grey and really quite cold but around about mid day it cleared leaving blue skys, puffy white clouds and bright sunshine to enjoy. Immense views in every direction you care to look. The snaking ridge has been inveigling my inner eye ever since. More of this later.

Looking back along part of the Aonach Eagach ridge

Bidean nam Bian

Mountaineer in the making!!

All this getting out and about has been a real tonic and the remaining  residue of memory is proving fairly productive in the studio so far. Not really a residue more like an over flowing vat!! (That's the optimist in me.)
In my last post I was bemoaning the fact that I find it difficult to respond in paint to these mountain landscapes. Well today I feel I've had a small but potentially promising break through. 

I started the day not entirely sure what or how I was going to proceed. The grey skys were a starting point in the morning....they got me thinking about  colour and grey, coloured greys in particular.

10am 7/6/2012

Colour mixing was the order of the day. Over the years I have been experimenting with colour mixing using a fairly traditional approach which stretches back to Impressionism and beyond. Increasingly though I have been introducing other colours which come ready mixed...turquoise and azure blue for example. It was interesting then to come across the real colour wheel...I'll be ordering some transparent yellow and magenta  tomorrow. In the meantime todays mixing looked like this...

More greens and browns than greys

Grey greens

Warm browns ..a result of the traditional colour wheel

More like the grey I was aiming for

Work in progress  100x100cm  Oil & Wax on canvas

Work in progress 20x20cm
Sgurr an Fheadain sneaking in there

Work in progress  20x20cm
Here's that memory residue /vat stuff again

More musings on art and the weather to come, in the meantime lets hope June brings a bit more in the way of  sunshine and warmth.