Day/post 16 A Remarkable spell of weather!

Just as I finished my last post the weather changed as promised and we have had (as everyone will know) a brilliant week or so of blistering hot sunshine!
Excitement mounted this time last week as we deliberated about a trip to Skye...with a  forecast too good to ignore we packed up the car and headed off last Thursday.
Skye has been a regular destination for us for the past 21 years and as we have found,once experienced in  good weather, the Black Cuillin mountain range are an addictive and powerful force drawing us back time and time again.
Our days out have always been dictated by the weather and over the years our increasing experience of being in that particular landscape has never altered our respect and concern for it's unpredictability. Last week however our only concern was for avoiding getting sun burnt and running out of water. Rare and welcome concerns.

Heading up towards Sgurr Sgumain , John pointing out the Cioch

Sun coming up over Sron na Ciche

Looking back down to Glen Brittle

Blaven in the distance

Views to die for, from the summit of Sgurr Alasdair

Sgurr Dearg and the Inaccesible Pinnacle on the skyline

The neck of the great stone shoot, the decent route off Sgurr Alasdair

Coir a Ghrunnda

Views across to the Thearlich -Dubh gap, Sgurr Dubh Mor and Sgurr Dubh Beag

Knowing that we would only have two and half days actual walking and climbing I deliberately didn't pack any drawing materials...a slight regret when we sat and soaked our hot and weary feet in the cool of the  fairy pools but at least I did have my camera.
I have had a long held fascination with the Cuillins. From the first time I set eyes on them I knew we had to venture up and into them. The initial point of intrigue was the enormous scale, firstly of the moor land leading into them and then the massive bulk of mountains themselves.
I have always been so overwhelmed and intimidated by this landscape that it wasn't until relatively recently that I even attempted to represent it in some way on canvas.My attempts have been fleeting and I am still not sure if I really want to commit to surfaces something so majestic and immense.

Fairy Pools    76x76cm   Oil &Wax on canvas

 Without great expertise my efforts will always remain somewhat feeble in comparison to the real thing.

That amazing turquoise grey/blue again.....

Fairy Pool magic with Sgurr  an Fheadain and Waterpipe gulley in the distance

One lonely cloud

Posing for the camera, coming down from Coir a Tarneilear

Bidein  in the distance

Sgurr an Fheadain 

The unique element about Skye and its mountains is (not surprisingly) the quality of the light.The light reflecting  from the surrounding sea makes the atmosphere appear airy and ethereal. For us it's a 6 hour drive from home and on days like we had last week it truly feels like a  beautifully wild and remote place.

Day/Post 15 Slim pickings for May

Nearly  into the last week of May and we have not even had one day of warm sunshine! So disappointing and incredibly frustrating. Looking through my photographs from the past week you might be led to believe that the weather has not been too bad and you would be right in some respects...there has been plenty of blue in the sky, and at times bright sunlight. What you can't get a sense of from these images is the temperatures...cold, cold and colder. We have even had early morning frosts again, something I thought we'ed left behind last month. 

Wild garlic at the back of our house

The apple blossom is looking very healthy despite all the rain

Needless to say I haven't been getting out and about at all. No rock climbing, no proper hill walking and definitely no drawing on location. I have been doing a bit of looking though and on the  drives to work each day the oil seed rape filled fields have been peaking my interest.

In principle I can't say I'm fond of this increasingly common crop. The sickly sweet aroma can be a real nuisance when you're out of puff on a steep cycle climb. Fellow hay fever sufferers will know what I mean! However there is something visually pleasing about this crop, when it's hard to place yellow hue is set against an overcast sky. Grey and yellow are a curious mix.

Water in the tractor tracks gives an indication of the ridiculous amount of rainfall lately!

Sweetie colours

Mid week rainbow 

...preceded by a really lovely sun shower

sun shower magic

Meanwhile back in the studio I have been getting on with long held plans for some collage work which pick up from where I left off with the Sheep Circle project.
I think I'm getting closer to how I would like to make screen prints. The painterly areas (which I see as the weather bits) are something I just didn't have the ability to work out during my all too short spell at Edinburgh Printmakers last year. Later....

Collage & Oil on canvas

Lastly there's a good deal of chat about a spell of better weather hitting our shores next week. Well here's hoping!!

Day 14 Visual memory,not worn or weathered enough

We are certainly not getting our fair share of warm sunshine, not yet anyway. It's making my diary entries become more and more spread out, not a bad thing but I didn't quite envisage that 30 days/posts would span so many weeks! In some ways I suppose it's making it more interesting and to be honest who wants to watch paint dry?!

Gates near Maxton    Wax & Oil on Canvas 76x76cm

Wet Green Summer  Oil & Wax on Canvas 80x60cm

Having insomniac tendencies often leads to seemingly significant thoughts about lots of things especially  painting and art!! It occurred to me again last night ( not for the first time) that using my visual memory is something I  need to investigate more and more.

Cotton Flowers near the Eildons     Oil & Wax on Canvas 76x76cm

 I don't mean recording exacting representations of a place visited or seen daily but a memory store if you like which would hopefully contain enough detail to conjure up  convincing and workable images.
Over the years I have worked this way but I know there are huge gaps that need to be filled. Reflecting on past work I can see patterns emerging which relate to this...places, moments in time,and  all in a variety of weathers have been laid down on canvas.
 The less photographic aids are used, the better. What emerges as a result of  the more remembered experiences are paintings and drawings which seem more real. They are in all their artifice  somehow the least artificial of all.

Rain       Charcoal on Sugar Paper

Untitled      Oil & Collage on Canvas 30x30cm

Opening   Oil & Collage on Canvas 100x100cm

Places and the time you spend in them become etched on your memory. Again the weather impacts.....moods related to weather without deliberate awareness have resulted in numerous paintings that take on moods of their own whether melancholic or less so.


Notes on the images
Gates near Maxton , Wet Green Summer and Cotton Flowers were part of a series of paintings made in haste for an exhibition in Ireland. It was a pretty wet summer or maybe it was the rainy days I remembered most? What I do know is that it was a particularly sad time.. and I think this is reflected in many of the paintings made at that time.

Rain was a drawing I made without much thought about actual  representation...the title followed the drawing.

Untitled This should have a title...it was made in a direct response to a walk out near the cheviots.

Opening is an older piece. For me the  dark stormy sky and lonesome track say something about the unnatural but often beguiling forested areas of the Borders.

Day 13 Another week of weather

Into May already and temperatures are  closer to what they were at Christmas time!

I'm an avid forecast watcher and it's a depressing prospect to hear that the outlook for May is much of the same,with no significant warm spells coming any time soon.

Driving as I do to work Monday through to Wednesday on the same route I always notice three things...firstly whether or not the Eildons are in full view and on my return from work whether or not both Ruberslaw and Fatlips are clearly visible on the road into Ancrum. 

 These three local landmarks don't sit particularly high but they are, so to speak like barometers for local weather conditions, a small and insignificant thing perhaps but something that punctuates my journeys with interest to and from work.

Monday am  Not an Eildon in sight!

Tuesday am  Mist clearing 

Wednesday am  Tops just catching the mist

Quick memory sketch pre painting

 Eildons from Springfield  Oil on canvas  

Thursday was a much better day. Weather in the west was forecast to be good with temperatures sitting at 18 degrees c so having a free day we took ourselves off for a days rock climbing in the Lakes.

 A bit on the rusty side, it's been about 6 weeks since we were climbing outdoors and getting your eye in again takes a wee while.

I didn't do much contemplating about art or painting, I was too bothered about keeping my cool and not falling off!!

Even though I was on the end of a rope my pride still does get  a bit bruised!

Incoming cloud signalling a change in the weather

Looking towards Borrowdale

The ferns are just beginning to unfurl

John in the background coming back down.

Looking up on the last pitch of  Brown Crag Wall

Day 12 A walk on the not so wild side...

Yesterdays planned walk was abandoned even before it began. A  large  sign was attached to the entrance of Cocklawfoot farm alerting walkers to the fact that lambing was in full progress and that they should avoid the area until May 10th.  Understandable (it is the farmers livelihood after all ) but  momentarily frustrating! Anyway we drove back and headed up by way of Hownam Grange farm where roaming permission was granted by the  farmer there and headed up Hownam Law for a circular walk taking in Wideopen Hill and Gubbitlaw.

These opportunities to get out and walk whether it's here in the Borders, or further a field are really important. The benefits for the body and mind are many of course but the additional element I take away is (hopefully)subject matter for future ideas for painting.

Clouds everywhere you look

Showers blowing through

 The forecast yesterday was fairly accurate although the passing showers were alarmingly more wintery than you'd expect! Baltic is the only word to describe the temperature up there  and it makes me wonder how those little lambs manage to survive at all.

Trial screen printing from last year working on the Sheep circle theme

Sheep circle screen print  (map reference,sheep skeleton and sheepfold)

Screen printing opportunity at Edinburgh Print makers was kindly awarded through the Visual Arts Awards & funded by SBC and Creative Scotland. Liaison was through CABN.

Local environmental artist Kate Foster has been doing really interesting work about this landscape and her observations and thoughts have made me think more about my approach to my own work.
This along with the  the  limited access to the Cheviots yesterday and just thinking about the landscape in general  made me think about  just how managed the landscape round this area is, walls, fences,new farm buildings and sign posts abound. Although you are in a rural, fairly wild and potentially inhospitable place the mark of human habitation runs deep.

Nice bit of hail thrown in for good measure!

 The notion of a sense of place with regard to my work is something I feel will have to have more significance in future. After all our experience of the landscape is a here and now phenomenon.
 As an artist you can choose to represent what you wish, editing as you go. The weather is a constant and in some respects the more changeable it is, the better, for painting at least! So along with the weather I'll be continuing to seek out some temporary constants to represent the here and now.

Light and shadow on the hills

Snaking stone dike with sheep fold.

More incoming showers

Brighter skys...Eildon hills in the distance.