HOLE IN ONE – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

I have just completed this small commission for someone who has bought paintings from me before. His sister hit a hole in one and he wanted a momento of it for her birthday. He supplied me with some dark and very green photos of the hole in question.

I had the idea of her walking to the green to see her good fortune and asked for a photo of her after explaining my thoughts. I got a family photo with her looking directly at the camera. Also, the mass of greens filled me with apprehension. Fortunately the photo showed her in a red top and I thought that if I made the figure bigger it might pacify all the raging greens. So I decided to have her right in the foreground, teeing off.

Another slight problem was that I was asked to put more in detail of the putting green and show the otherwise concealed bunkers, but as if the viewer was stood at the tee. This put some strain on the depth of field, but in the end it seems ok – I was told it was a short hole.

So here it is: my client is happy with it ( after asking me to change her driver for an iron) and he even thinks it looks like her – a good estimation of her side profile from the photo. Now we can only hope his sister likes it too – if it goes over the mantlepiece we know it’s a winner.

Other landscapes are available for sale or golfing commissions undertaken. See my website for details: grahammcquadefineart.com

SUMMER IN AINSDALE WOODS – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

I continued my search for a woodland scene for an upcoming exhibition and painted this yesterday. I will probably submit this painting rather than the one I posted on my last post. Both are from the same woods.

You can see the path disappearing right, down what becomes a sharp hill, which quickly bottoms out and then rises sharply again. Great for cycling down until you meet another cyclist coming the other way doing the same thing – trying to get enough speed to get up the hill in front.

Fortunately on that day I didnt meet anyone coming the other way.

Anyway, I have now submitted my exhibition entry form, so that’s one less job. We start another exhibition in town on Sunday, so I need to label up another set of paintings.

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

FRESHFIELD BEACH – PASTEL PAINTING

A friend was trying to contact me and went to my website to get my phone number and saw an image of the beach where she walks regularly. I had sold the one she spotted and she asked me to do another for her and this is the version I painted. Perhaps long time viewers recognise the view as I posted the first one a while ago.

I went down to the beach last week to see what the scene looks like now, but they have put a bigger fence on the left, so with her agreement I left it out. I like the spikey, old broken-down fence, particularly where it stands out against the sand below.

Anyway, whilst I was on the beach I took a few photos, so brace yourself for a set of beach scenes. I need some views for upcoming exhibitions that start to blossom prior Christmas and the beach at Formby is always popular.

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

HALSALL SKETCHES – WATERCOLOUR

Warm autumn sunshine is too good to waste and yesterday morning I got up, rather later than normal, and went to a place I had spotted when returning from my last local plein air trip. It is of a cluster of farmhouses I have passed many times, but the newly mown field and an opening onto it gave me a different view and the crows also thought the same, between eating what the mowers had missed.

And then turning around, and looking in the opposite direction. I got a contre jour view of some cottages I have painted before, though, this time, with the hedge obscuring most of the view. There was still a slight mistiness which, earlier, may have completely obscured both views, this being a low lying marshy area. So it was a productive lie-in – As I’ve heard say, it’s not the done thing to arrive too early.

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

MORNING SKETCHES – WATERCOLOUR

We are having a spell of good weather, which for August in the UK is unusual. Unfortunately, with a few commitments, I havent been able to take advantage. One exception was last Wednesday when I dawn broke without a cloud and I was awake enough to get out. These scenes are from the village of Halsall, close to where I live. I have seen this view many times as I cycled to work, but I noticed a gate had been cut into a field which allowed me space to sit away from the road. This was the first view I painted and the dampness and coolness prevented the paint from drying quickly and there is a softness in the image which I quite like.

The next painting was done as the morning started to warm and the edges are much sharper due to the quicker drying. I only had to move a few feet from where I painted the first painting to get this view. I had just set up when two tractors and a wagon waited to go through the gate. The driver who unlocked the gate wanted me to paint him, though his enthusiasm seemed to drain when I told him he needed to take off his clothes.

With the rush hour over and the vehicles away and out of sight down the track you can see, I did this final painting – about 180 degrees from my first painting. Again the edges are much harsher and I can detect a tiredness creeping in.

It was a great way to spend the early morning, sitting contemplating the views, meditating and painting in the quietness of a still, sunny dawn ( well, apart from the brief disturbance of the tractors ) made better by the fact that I had only to move a few feet to get three good views. Then, as an added bonus, I saw a potential scene for another painting on my way home. Hopefully, some good weather will allow me to explore that one fairly soon..

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

IT’S DOG EAT DOG OUT HERE – ACRYLIC PAINTING

I used to run almost everyday – for 53 years – until the surgeon who replaced my right hip socket advised me against doing any more. I miss it, and the feeling of well being I felt afterwards – maybe a result of the adrenalin. So these days I get up early and walk the course of my shortest run around the neighbourhood. And my mind starts to wander at this slower pace. A version of this vision above, popped into my head the other day on my walk. Well, some of it anyway. Then as I started painting, more got added. It kept me occupied for a morning.

When I completed it, I googled ‘dog eats dog’ and unsurprisingly, it’s been painted before – but not in red stilettos (the dog’s not mine – mine are blue) Just dont ask questions it’s solely here for your amusement.

Other, less quirky, paintings are available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

SUNSHINE IN KING’S GARDENS, SOUTHPORT – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

I hate sitting doing nothing, so as I manned our exhibition the other day, I started this painting. I got all the drawing completed and put in the initial washes and background details in, between greeting the 30 or so visitors who dropped by. Some of the visitors are interested to see someone painting and it can be an ice-breaker. For this reason I left the wall until I had a quiet moment at home, as it took a bit of concentration to paint.

The park is quite near to where we are holding the exhibition and the painting also features some of the town’s buildings. There is a tower behind the couple, that I painted in an earlier session at the exhibition, I posted the result a couple of weeks ago. That painting is now hanging in the gallery.

Other townscapes and scenes of Southport are available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

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 HASKAYNE – WATERCOLOUR SKETCHES

With a fine morning forecast for Tuesday I checked the maps and headed for some lanes I had not visited before. They were behind the small village of Haskayne around six miles from where I live in Southport. I had no idea what I was going to find to sketch. The first subject was a rickety footbridge over a drainage ditch. I liked the way it was partially in shadow and the intriguing view between the branches into another field. Nothing much, but it was a pleasant way to sit on a sunny morning, listening to birdsong between the silence – this time without the passing crowds.

I eventually found a second subject – a magnificent tree standing serenely alone in a wheat field with the morning sun illuminating its trunk and leaves. It had the shape of an oak, but the leaves seemed to be fine like an ash, I couldnt get near as the foreground grass and plants covered a deep ditch.

I had to get back early as the plumber was coming to sort my boiler out – but it was pleasant few hours on a sunny June morning.

Landscapes area available for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com

BIRKDALE VILLAGE – WATERCOLOUR PAINTING

I posted a sunlit painting of a snicket along the railway track a few days ago. If you continue down that snicket, it comes out on the right, in what they call Birkdale Village – part of Southport, where I live. Here you are actually standing on the rail track with part of the station, the building on the far right.

I think it was the old phone box, lit by the early morning sun that caught my eye and the fact that the sixties carbuncle, on the left – the Spar supermarket – is mellowed and put in the shade by the light coming in over it. Colours are subdued with hints of spring leaves in the background.

A quiet scene of morning stirrings in the suburbs.

Other townscapes are avaiable for sale on my website: grahammcquadefineart.com