Friday 16th January
The sprained wrist didn't get better by Monday, so I wore a wrist brace and decided to get cracking on the requested Buckingham’s tree paintings. The boards hadn't arrived so I repurposed a demo painting which already had some trees and a nice river with some reflections in it. The demo had been of a snow scene so I began by painting everything with a yellow glaze, leaving a small area of sky and a sunset reflected in the river. This transformed the painting into a more Spring-like scene. Adding more trees, foliage and undergrowth and a final sprinkling of early bluebells completed the picture. A predominantly palette of greens and yellows gave it a Spring vibe despite the sunset element.
I have talked about these Buckinghams "woodland pictures" before. They do take a long time (for me) to paint. For the price I get for them it's probably not really worth it but in order to stay connected to Buckinghams it is necessary.
I managed to do 5 smaller ones this week, re-purposing boards for 4 of them and actually enjoyed painting most of them. They all had a fair amount of spattering in them which I found to my cost, wasn't very good for a sprained wrist!
They're a bit like a jigsaw puzzle. They start as very loose washes of colour and are then build from back to front layering on previous layers. A lot of the early work such as tree trunks, foliage and branches of distant trees can end up being painted over by later work. I have a demo with The Acklington Art Group next Thursday and have been asked to do a demo of one of these woodland pictures. One advantage of this is that I will have another one done or at least partially done as I'm not sure I'll be able to complete it in the 4 hour session.
I think the group will be surprised at the initial messy stage and how the painting is constructed, something the buyers of these pictures never see.
Buckinghams have asked me to include some "birch tree" woodlands. I did some or included some this week. The birch trees look great but take an age to paint. I have also decided to put bluebells in some of the paintings as bluebells sell. They are a symbol of early Spring and although, like the birch trees, they can become a bit of a cliché they are very popular. They do come in different shades of blues and purples which contrast nicely with the greens and yellows.
The Buckinghams boards arrived on Wednesday and I gave 9 of them 2 coats of primer. They have sent 20 boards so I've got enough to go at in the next few weeks. I will get bored doing these but I'll probably do a collection of 10 or 12 so I've made a decent start this week.
I intend to take all my paintings for Felton Gallery on Saturday. The quantity might give them a bit of a shock. They'll have plenty to choose from for their "Wild Northumberland" Exhibition.