CAFE LIFE ON LORD STREET, SOUTHPORT – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

I joined in a group exhibition in Southport where I live, and have been manning the gallery for a couple of days this week, as I am going on holiday the week after next. The shop is in a beautiful Victorian arcade, but unfortunately most of the shops are empty and footfall is low. To occupy my time between visitors, I painted this scene which is about 200 yards from the exhibition intending to put it in the exhibition. I have done quite a few of this street, called Lord Street, in the past and they have sold. The exhibition is on for six weeks and I have done quite well at this venue previously, though this time I am not holding my breath. I may try and get this painting in next week as there is still a bit of wall space available.

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I put up a couple of Liverpool Street scenes, shown on the right, and the Southport street scene may fit in amongst them.

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

AROUND LYDIATE – WATERCOLOUR SKETCHES

Last week I managed to get out for a sunny early morning session in Lydiate, close to Maghull, a suburb of North Liverpool. From the roadside I spotted this wheat field with lovely tractor tracks disappearing into the distance towards some houses. I found a good spot beside the quiet lane and started my task. Later, a woman who lived in a nearby house came out to see what I was up to. She told me the houses were gamekeeper’s cottages, four in all. This one might make a nice pastel painting- perhaps one for the winter months.

The canal runs through Lydiate, and this bridge – Pilling Lane Bridge – is just around the corner from where I sat doing the previous painting. Perhaps a little too much green – it might be worth coming back in the autumn when the leaves start changing. Still, it was a pleasant hour painting in the morning sunshine.

Cycling back to the car I spotted the ruins of St Catherine’s Chapel set in a copse back from the road. It was built at the end of the 15th century for the Lord of the Manor. A pleasant place to paint in the dappled sunlight serenaded by birdsong. I find painting crumbling ruins difficult at the best of times, and beginning to tire on the third sketch of the day, my mettle was tested and similarly turned into a crumbling ruin. Anyway, it is an approximation of what was there. It might be worth exaggerating the colours of the stones if I were to have another go one winter’s evening.

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

OVER THE FIELDS TO ST MARY’S (LITTLE CROSBY) – ACRYLIC PAINTING

Nothing for a month and then two commissions turn up in quick succession. So I’m a bit busy at present. This is the first one which I am handing over today. It is of a local church close to where the customer lives. He had seen something like this view as he travelled home and asked me to look at it. I’ve painted this church a few times, but not from this angle and distance.

Last week I went over to reacquaint myself with the view. Sitting down the bank by the roadside, with passing cars whizzing past my head, I produced this watercolour.

This is a fairly faithful version of the view. The trouble is the hedge from the road runs right across the base of the church and there were no decent trees or hedges to break the vertical plane. The customer specifically didnt want a watercolour, so I then produced two acrylic sketches which introduced some hedges and created zig-zags to inject energy. The customer had seen another painting of mine and wanted the stylised wheatfield in the foreground, which I had used.

I did one version in a landscape format.

And another in portrait format. The customer originally wanted it in landscape, but I managed to persuade him into a portrait format, which allowed for a greater depth of field and allowed me to increase the size of the church without losing the context.

I must admit that I am pleased with the final piece, as is the customer, and the series of sketches helped in getting to this resolution.

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

LIFE ROOM – PASTEL AND GRAPHITE

The life session at the weekend brought back the memories of poor lighting and stiff poses though I was glad of the practise.

I should actively seek other venues, but working in confined spaces for long periods with lots of people doesnt fill me with a great deal of joy at present. Our model was Eve who last time I saw her did a more interesting set of poses. The quick sketch of one of them, below, I converted into a pastel study during lockdown, though I think the pastel lost a bit of vitality in translation. Maybe one to try again as it has some interesting angles.

Other life painting is available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

MORNING ON CLIEVES’ HILLS – WATERCOLOUR SKETCHES.

It has been a busy weekend, a life session and the weather was good enough to get out painting. With the plein air painting, I had decided on the canal, but despite it being bright where I live by the sea, there was thick fog at the canal. So, I headed for the hills, but even up here the fog was clinging on. I was deciding to head back to the coast when I spotted this view and decided to stay on the hill and persevere. I loved the way the layers of background were being revealed as I painted. Maybe one to work up as a larger piece.

As you can see the mist cleared as I worked and was pretty much gone on this second piece. This is an old favourite subject – Aughton church – seen from a different angle as I explored a new path, down between some farmhouses.

Just turning on my stool from the last sketch I saw this intriguing view of a farmhouse obscured by foliage and barley. I was taken by the tonal interchange.

So despite the the shaky start chasing around, avoiding the fog, I got some pleasing sketches. I’ll show the life painting on my next post – bet you cant wait. Anyway, the fine weather’s set for a few days so I might get out some more.

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

DEE ESTUARY – WATERCOLOUR SKETCHES

Yesterday we took a walk along the Dee Estuary from West Kirby to Neston. The forecast was promising, but the early part was overcast, as you can see from this sketch – at least it wasnt raining. Here we sat down at the foot of cliffs facing out over the estuary to Wales. As I painted this I noticed that the sandbar I had sketched, just behind the boats, had disappeared. That caused me to accelerate my painting. Not knowing the area, I didnt want to be caught between the rising tide and the cliffs.

I needn’t have worried – maybe I’ve watched too many lifeboat programmes of late. We continued on along the beach, but later picked up the Wirral way – the route of a long defunct railway track. The trouble with this track was that for the most part it ran between hedges and was set back from the estuary, so the views of the river and the low hills of Wales beyond – the reason for coming on the walk – were lost. Also, without sunshine, you didnt have the dappled effects you get from treelined walks.

Later, the day did get brighter, as you can see in the sketch above, and here was a glimpse of the Dee, peeping from behind someone’s sheds. I was able to worm my way between a couple of oak trees to get this view, with again, Wales in the distance.

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

RUSH HOUR, BEXHILL – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

At present I am playing around with some ideas and havent a new painting to post. The one above is an old painting, done before I started this blog, but never shown here. I thought it’d be worth an outing, particularly as some of the stuff I am working on are beach scenes.

I sold this to a lady, who painted herself, and who later became a friend. Her husband came from the area depicted, which is on the south coast of England, close to where I was born and, also, she liked the title. Unfortunately the lady, Mo, died from cancer, as did her husband – she died about a year after her husband.

When she was in treatment she asked me to carve a wooden head so she could store her wig properly. At that point she left it on a stair post and her sons ( she had three } had taken to playing football with it, kicking it around the house. She offered to pay me, but I asked for one of her paintings. Later I got a watercolour. She had a difficult time with watercolour and mainly painted in acrylics. The watercolour I was given was originally in an exhibition we were both in. I remarked to her how well executed it was and why was she so afraid of the medium. It was a nice piece, well presented, but in the end it didnt sell and so she gave it to me. It still hangs in our kitchen.

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

MOORINGS AT CRABTREE LANE – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

Another view of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal near Burscough in Lancashire. It’s a place that I’ve painted before but here I dwelt on the cluster of shapes created by the narrowboats and houses and in doing so made it a portrait format. This format also allowed the full reflections of trees and posts. The bankside vegetation also added interesting detail.

At this point on the canal is a narrow swing bridge – partially visible on the left which allows traffic to cross the canal.

Other canal scenes are available on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

RIVINGTON PIKE – WATERCOLOUR SKETCHES

On Monday we decided to visit a hill called Rivington Pike. It is on the western edge of the Pennines and is visible from where I live in Southport. I’ve never been there before because, even though it is fairly close, the roads to it aren’t direct. So here is a sketch from the top which will save you the effort of scaling it yourself, even though it is only 1200 ft high. This view points to the direction of Southport, but with the clouds on Monday, you couldnt see too far.

Above is the Pike viewed from Southport on a sunny morning from a painting I posted in January. In the first painting we are sat on the purple point at the top on this view.

The strange building you can see on the first painting is part of Lord Leverhulme’s ( Billy Lever of yore – founder of what is now, Unilever) country getaway, built on the side of the hill in the early twentieth century with ornamental lakes, gardens, bridges and a bungalow; somewhere the poor man could wander around and think undisturbed. This strange, incongruous tower was built for ornamental pigeons and doves that roosted on the first two floors and as a sewing and music room, for his wife, on the top floor. Whether he locked her in there wasn’t revealed. That may have been what he was thinking about – where he had left the key.

When you descend from the pike you go through Lord Leverhulme’s Folly and into a country park. In this park I was taken by the lush, verdant greenness enhanced by the sunshine. I thought that I would pause and paint the path leading down to the carpark. However, once I got started the clouds came over and ruined the dappled effects created by the sun and foliage and trunks of the oak trees which lined the path. I managed to get some of the shadows in on this one.

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

EVENING WALK DOWN GORSEY LANE, CROSBY – ACRYLIC PAINTING

I took the opportunity to play around with colour on this painting of a country lane close to Little Crosby. Blocks of discrete colour arranged according to tone. In the shadows it allowed some quite diverse and strange selections which added punch and when completed, surprisingly, looked quite natural.

I was also pleased with the feeling of light I achieved which reflected the the bright summer’s evening with the wheat ripening in the field beyond.

The process is quite time consuming. Normally I can cover big areas with quick brushstokes – but not on this one. The methodology slowed me down and made me consider the placement of colour more analytically.

I added the dogwalker at the end as an afterthought, subsuming them into the landscape as I had been that day, painting in the evening light.

Other landscapes are available on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com