Bringing gifts (re-work) painting figurative surreal

This painting has been sold



Acrylic and pastel on board 12" x 12"

I was inspired in this painting by a memory of going to the local market on Saturday afternoons with my mum and we would buy flowers and cream cakes from a shop called "Price's" which they packed in a white box and tied with string. We weren't very well off but not many Saturdays went by without this special trip.

Since first posting this painting I have re-worked it. I love taking a painting which in my terms shows promise but needs something else doing with it. This was one of them. Having used charcoal successfully on the May Queen painting (above) I worked on this with my soft pastels. I'm pleased with the result but now I need to find out how to "fix" the pastel work seeing as it is done on top of dried acrylic paint. An internet search led me to acrylic spray fixative so that's what I'll try. Anyone else got any ideas?

Free spirit painting garden park figures surreal landscape

This painting has been sold



Acrylic on board 12" x 12"

This went through so many changes, I can't tell you. It's a real struggle to recognise what your subconscious is telling you. Not only struggling with the meaning of it and the design and choice of elements but struggling also with colour - as if there wasn't enough to worry about. I ended up mixing a range of greys with blues (cobalt, ultramarine, cerulean) and earth tones (raw and burnt umber, burnt sienna). I don't know if the girl is me. I never had a dog although I like dogs, but that is definitely my school uniform again. Someone mentioned my figures in landscapes reminded him of a Canadian artist, Jean Pierre Lemieux. I looked him up and yes, I do feel an affinity there but I need to work harder!

Pigment to surface

There must be nearly as many ways to apply pigment to a surface as there are varieties of facial expression. I’m not talking here about “water colour” versus “oils” or “plein air” versus “photographs” . I’m talking about the way we actually push the paint around (or the pastel) on the chosen surface with the intention of producing a painting. What choices we make and why, not so much in terms of the colours we squeeze out onto the palette and the mixes we make (more of that in another post soon to come) but more importantly how we use those mixes, how we actually get the paint, the brush or knife and the surface to interact to produce an image. A favourite generalisation is “loose” or “tight”. Another is “blended” or “not blended” . I get a bit fed up when I read some painters implying that “loose” is better and then you find people who are perhaps not as experienced saying things like “I really need to loosen up”. I mean “why?” (From this point of view maybe the Impressionists have got a lot to answer for, LOL.) I have even heard painters saying “This is the right way to use oils” or whatever other medium. There isn’t a right way. I am reminded of my years of teaching computing. I encouraged the ones who quickly got the hang of things to move around the room helping out their less experienced peers. When I spoke to a colleague about how beneficial I found that he replied that he thought that was a dangerous practice because the “poorer performers” might be shown “the wrong way to do things”. Oh, help. There isn’t a wrong way or a right way. There are thousands of ways. It’s just pigment, application tool and surface. Let’s not forget that. Nor all the great Masters who have gone before us showing us a thousand million different variations, all of which can work to produce miracles.

Views from all you practising painters and anybody else out there more than welcome!

Ps. Working on a bigger Garden scene – 24” x 24” – I might be some time, LOL. Got to sharpen the secateurs.

Thinking of England painting landscape park surreal figures

Oil on board 12" x 12" Please contact me if you are interested in purchasing this painting

I always seem to be creeping in there somewhere. There I am at the front in my school blazer (dark green - now you know why the fixation on green). I am wearing a straw kind of boater hat though. They were an optional summer addition to the uniform but my mum didn't see the need. I always craved one so I've given myself one.

Facing the sun painting park figures surreal

This painting has been sold



Oil on board 12" x 12"

I wanted the painting to have an almost dream like quality. I love those big, sculptural spruce trees. This is spring sunshine - the tree at the back has no leaves yet. The fashion seems to be to paint "loose" but in these dream paintings it seems appropriate, at least for me, not to have that distraction.

The Journey (re-work)painting park north england figure surreal

Oil on board 12" x 12" Please contact me if you are interested in purchasing this painting

I have worked on this painting all week, substantially revising it (I mean taking out structures and figures not just "fiddling"). When work comes mainly from your imagination it takes time and energy to tap into that. Following my intuition meant being patient with myself. You will see the descriptor "surreal" above. Well, what is surrealism? When I look at past Masters such as Dali, Magritte, I often see the "impossible" being painted. I am more interested, I think, in the "improbable" - things that are unlikely to happen but still could happen.

As to the story here, well you will have to make that your own.

Since first posting this I have worked on it yet again. When I had finished "Facing the sun" I really liked the effect of the oils - their density - so I over painted this one with what was left on my palette.