Camusfearna

Camusfearna 9"x11" Acrylic on Board

Camusfearna is Gavin Maxwell's name for Sandaig on the mainland just across the water from Skye. It is where he wrote 'Ring of Bright Water' and it is an atmospheric place. It was a perfect Highland Autumn day - warm, dry and calm - even the midges were taking a break. I did a quick watercolour sketch and took some photos but it was too nice to work so I ate my lunch and lay on the rocks and looked at the side of Kate's face as the sunlight came streaming across the water and thought would'nt it be great if it could be like this all of the time.

Dusk

Dusk  36cm x 55cm  Watercolour

 I went to Amsterdam on a whim. Kate and I were staying in Belgium, where I was one of the invited artists at the 2012 International Watercolour Biennial, and had a few days to spare before the return crossing to Dover. I wanted to see the Jan Vermeer painting 'Het Melkmeisje' in the Rijksmuseum, which I did. Afterwards we wandered around the canals looking for a restaurant and found this. I had to go back in daylight to look at it properly. I probably left out more than I put in.

Night

Night - 14 x 20 - Watercolour

I think of this as my Atkinson Grimshaw Rheinhart Payne painting. I was very young when I discovered John Atkinson Grimshaw (1836-1893). He was famous for his townscapes and night scenes and these stayed with me as I grew up. I have been planning to do a night painting for a long time but to get really dark darks with watercolour is difficult so I kept putting it off. Ad Reinhardt (1913-1967) was an abstract painter who was known for some 'black paintings' he did near the end of his life. I first saw these while at school preparing for 'A' Level art. I was very impressed especially by his slightly immodest claim that they were the end of painting. At first sight they just look like plain black canvasses but after a while the viewer can see that they are made up of geometric shapes in slightly different hues and shades of black. For this painting, which is probably an anti-Reinhardt painting, I didn't use black but variations on Paynes Grey, a mixture of indigo, sienna and crimson lake developed by William Payne (1760-1830). I also used another innovation credited to Payne which was to create highlights by taking out areas of paint by wetting the surface and rubbing it with bread or rag (or, in my case, with a brush).  

Apple

Apple 16" x 12" Watercolour

This is the small painting I did as a demonstration in the Mall Galleries during the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours 201st exhibition which is on until 18 April 2013. I say 'demonstration' but my kind of painting is not entertaining in the way that most demonstrations are. I just sit there and paint and as I am a slow painter most of the audiences' time is spent watching the paint dry while I try to decide what to do next. Even so there were some brave souls who stayed to the end. Eventually, when everyone had gone home, I ate the apple.

Ivan Karp (1926-2012)

Footsball Palace - 21" x 29" - Watercolour

 

I heard, just the other day, that Ivan Karp had died. No big surprise, he was 86, even so, a spark has gone. Karp was the often outspoken owner of OK Harris in New York City. He represented some of the artists that inspired me during my student years, including: Claes Oldenburg, Robert Cottingham and Roy Lichtenstein. He was very helpful to young, emerging artists - giving advice and encouragement and suggesting other galleries if the work didn't suit him. I met him in 1984. I was living in the USA and had gone to New York to find a gallery to represent me. He wanted to show my work. He introduced me to Malcolm Morley, who had just won the inaugural Turner Prize. I think he was intrigued to find another realist British painter but one who worked in watercolours. I thought I'd arrived. In the end I chose not to show with OK Harris - I didn't like the terms or conditions and I knew I didn't have the confidence or stamina to be part of the New York art scene. This painting 'Footsball Palace' was one of the ones Ivan liked. The Footsball Palace, in Nags Head NC, with its foosball games, roller rink and bar which only served beer, has also gone. It really is the end of an era.

Auto Ecole

Auto Ecole - 10"x14" - Watercolour

This driving school shop front was in Cherbourg. It had everything that interested me: reflections, reflected light, a glimpsed interior, surface textures, geometry. At the time I was interested in the story of the Lamed Vavniks - thirty six people who, unknowingly, hold the world in balance. Maybe this is one of them.

Beach Huts

Sand - 14" x 21" - Watercolour

  

I like these municipal beach huts on the Cherbourg peninsula. They remind me of the Atlantic Wall - Hitler's WWII coastal defences. Not pretty, not even in keeping with seaside ambiance, but they will outlast most other beach huts (probably not one of the main things in their favour), and give a nice, solid surface to lean on while dusting the sand off your feet.