Pointillist portrait

I’m struggling to get a good image of this painting, but these should give a general idea. The one of the painting on the wall is closer to the actual colours and also gives a sense of the painting in the round. Its 30cmx30cm. I dismissed painting a portrait in this style for ages and didn’t think it would be worth trying. I have…

Changing light across dartmoor

Here the change from light to shade, and the kaleidoscopic colours that result across the hills on Dartmoor in typical English weather. I loved painting the blues and deep violets against the ochres and umbers in the shadows. I love colour! That’s why I love painting. This is all painted in a looser style than my pointillist paintings, and I feel more comfortable painting…

2 styles of landscape painting

Hi there I wrote this for a presentation as part of a show recently, so I thought I would put it up here I spend a lot of time in the local landscape, especially Dartmoor. The landscape here is always changing and the main subject of my paintings is the depiction of this changing light and weather, and how the landscape can look so…

Dartmoor from Haytor, first pass

This is the result of the first go at this painting of beautiful Dartmoor. I will definitely give it a glaze but its nice to have a record of this stage. The important thing is not to overdo it! Like Pisarro I have been trying to ‘escape the dot’, and am relishing a return to a more open painterly style.

Thoughts about dots and landscape painting

I had to write a brief statement for an upcoming show so thought I would share it here: The British landscape has always held a deep fascination for me. Living in south west England means I spend a lot of time in the local landscape, especially on Dartmoor, a beautiful landscape in all seasons, and everything is always changing. The main subject of my…

Pointillist landscape painting

I’ve been on a journey this year, as has everyone else. In the studio I have started painting landscapes again, and my artistic journey, with many twists and turns and uneven paths, has led me to a series of pointillist landscape paintings. It ties many different strands in my work, but I think the main reason this style suits me for the moment is…

Harlequin

This blog has been filled with a lot of portrait paintings and thoughts about portrait paintings, but I also make other work which I add from time to time! This is a fairly recent work, that I have been working on it for the last year or so, and it has developed in a surprising way, with dots! I have been banging my head…

Portraits in a landscape

I can’t take too much credit for the composition of this one which was originally photographed on the Cornish coast, one of my favourite places! I like the dribble of seawater coming off the net on the left. Its a good dribble. This was another painting that I began in acrylics and finished in oil paint, and its a method I am going to…

Portrait in acrylic and oils

This is a portrait I did a while ago but have never shown it. Its actually a posthumous portrait from a photo. I found it in a folder titled ‘other portraits’ and not having seen it for a while I thought in the end it is probably something worth revisiting. Its interesting because I was trying to work out how to start a portrait…

Glazing skin tones like Caravaggio

I don’t want to seem like I’m making any grand claims but I hope to show in a new video what for me is something like the process of glazing that Caravaggio used. I’m coming to this based on trial and error. How nice it would be to travel back in time to watch him at work! But from looking carefully at his paintings…