GLINTING LIGHT OVER WINDERMERE -WATERCOLOUR SKETCH

This was an image I was playing with sometime ago from a distant trip to the English Lake District. At present, my time is taken up with commissions.

Before Christmas I had a small exhibition at my framers and I sold three paintings prior to the holiday. Since Christmas the paintings have been locked in his shop window. Latterly, non essential shops, like picture framers, were allowed to open again and a couple more paintings sold before we ended the exhibition on Monday. However, from the exhibition I have acquired three commissions and so I am working my way through those. The first one was of someone’s house and cat which I thought inappropriate to show, but the other two might make the blog – when I complete them. For me, commissions take longer than a normal painting because you need to be sure of details personal to the recipient and I also allow the recipient to be part of the planning which doesnt speed things up.

So for now, here is a view over Lake Windermere, before the next shower of rain comes in to dampen the walker. Hopefully we will be getting back there soon.

Other landscapes and views of the Lake District are available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

A PLACE OF CONSTANT CHANGE – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

Tide in, tide out, angry waves, still water, blue azure, leaded grey – always change and none more so than at the high water line.

Other seaside and beach paintings are available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

THE HOUSES ON GREGORY LANE – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

This is the approach to a village close to where I live. I wanted to paint it in situ last summer but to get this view I had to stand on one leg with a hedge pressed into my back. So I took a few photos and looked for somewhere more comfortable to paint – perhaps it’s an age thing. The low morning sun coming in over the unkempt field and the row of half illuminated houses appealed to me. So many times have I found the best views are in the most inaccessible of places.

Other landscapes are available on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

EMPTY GLASS, HALF FULL – ACRYLIC INK AND WASH, SKETCHES.

I have been continuing to play with acrylic inks. I completed a painting on canvas using inks and acrylic paint which I was pleased with. It had a floral connotations so have I have been searching for other themes for a new painting.

So I started to look at dance and movement which the ink lines can evoke. So this was the idea behind the top two – though the top one did take on a life of it’s own.

Continuing the movement theme, above, I tried to run the watercolour washes counter to the movements of the acrylic inks.

Another potential theme was the urban environment. The straight lines that the droppers of ink can easily produce convey man made objects.

And of course, I looked at the landscape, but this time I added the ink to watercolour washes rather than the other way around as I had done on the first four above.

Finally another landscape theme on a preprepared watercolour wash, but along with the acrylic inks I added some pastel as well.

Still playing. It keeps me off the streets.

Paintings for sale are available on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

MORE SUNNY DAYS – WATERCOLOUR SKETCHES

I wasnt prepared for Thursday dawning without a cloud in the sky and by lunchtime it was still cloudless so I decided to get out and do some painting. Unfortunately I hadnt made any plans, so I headed off on a well worn route, hoping to spot something new of interest. This, above, was a view across to farms on the moss with the remains of last year`s bramble and undergrowth in the foreground.

I continued up Clieves`s Hills – the only bump in the Lancahire Plain around here and close to the top, I took the opportunity to get off the bike and sit down to paint this house. I liked theinterchange of light and shade on the walls and the tree just coming into leaf, all set off against the recently tilled soil.

And finally another drainage ditch. Again I liked the light and shade and the way the banks zig-zagged like teeth of interlocking cogs. In hindsight, there is room to play more on the light and shade of banks and I think the water close to the bottom of the painting was wider then I have it which would add to the contrasts. But by then I had cycled twenty miles and was on my third painting – concentration was beginning to sag – but a great afternoon, nevertheless.

Other landscapes are available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

EVENING ON THE DOCK – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

Having had to rebook a holiday for the second time this week I thought that I would recall one from a more carefree time. This is on the Italian Lake Garda, a little hamlet near Salo. It was out of the way and frequented, it seemed, by locals. I saw quite a few small gatherings passing away the evening around the quay and a small promenade, putting the world to rights and greeting friends. Some even brought their own chair and when done would fold it up and carry it back to their house.

Other seaside paintings are available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

TEAS FOR TWOS – ACRYLIC PAINTING

I suppose this could be worked on a little more, but I took a photo of it to see how it was looking and decided to post it. Apposite as they are opening up shops and other non essential outlets tomorrow in our neck of the woods. However, cafes and pubs can only serve customers outside – so those inside on this painting are mere reflections., and with our weather, those on the outside will soon be wrapping their coats around them – but for now it’s sunny – it could be France – but it’s Parbold.

Other café scenes are available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

APRIL’S OUTDOOR PAINTING – WATERCOLOUR SKETCHES

We have been getting some decent weather of late, even though it has got colder. On Saturday it was still warm enough to get on the bike and do some more outdoor painting. My plan was to attempt more complex subjects – subjects I would normally attempt in the studio. The one above is of a small bridge over a drainage ditch. I liked the counterchanges from light to dark and back again. In the end I had to to the railings in gouache when I got home – as I didnt take any with me. Whilst the gouache was out I added some stalks and grasses on the near bank. Despite the austere subject it made an interesting painting and might be worth doing bigger.

The next subject was daffodils in a small coppice. The flowers were away from the trees, but I wanted to use the darker trunks as a foil for the flowers. Normally I would use masking fluid, but outside, without any, I had to work around the flowerheads. I find daffodils difficult at the best of times because the yellow isnt a very imposing colour. In hindsight I should have pushed the flowers back further against the trees and used the contrast for all it was worth and, at the same time, reduced the complexity of the background – but that is what sketching is about – working out the best options.

Whilst I sat working on this picture, at the edge of the wood, a hare came slowly towards me. It got to within about 5 feet. I wanted to photograph it, but reaching for the camera would have disturbed it. In the end it realised I was there and bolted off into the woods.

Landscape paintings are available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

CENTRE OF ATTENTION – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

This is a scene from my hometown of Hastings, on the south coast of England. Here the fishing boats are hauled up the shingle beach and then launched into the sea by tractors. Even the local Lifeboat is treated similarly. There is a harbour arm, but I dont think it would afford much protection. So you can walk amongst the beached boats with all the paraphernalia of a fishing port strewn across the shingle. I saw this fellow sitting out of the wind behind two boats eating his lunch and there was one gull jealously eyeing his fish dinner.

So I added a few more – to up the tension – for as you know, there aren`t many things hungrier than a gull, unless, that is, it`s a man who has just lost his lunch.

Other seaside paintings are available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

OUTDOOR PAINTING- WATERCOLOUR SKETCHES

A few fellow bloggers have shamed me by getting out and doing some plein air painting, even in the chill depths of February. So, this week, when the sun shone and the temperatures rose I got on my bike and tried to find some suitable subjects.

So here they are; the first of this year, from around the lanes close to where I live – even managing to get a March date on my sketchbook page. Above is one of the many drainage ditches which run along the lanes and keep this old marsh area suitable for agriculture. This one might be worth working up into a painting.

This second one I have done before, but with the trees in full leaf. The shape of the trees reveal the prevailing winds.

As I work fairly fast I need sun and warmth to get the washes to dry, otherwise shapes just become amorphous and the paint too thick as you put one wet wash on top of another – even tricks like painting the sky, then the foreground and dodging from one dry area to the next waiting for the first wash to dry dont work – and then there was the day that the washes froze on the palette; that`s when I took a vow to stay indoors on cold days. But Wednesday was a very pleasant day to be out in the open.

Other landscapes are available for sale on my website: https://grahammcquadefineart.com