looking back at April’s big painting

somehow I have been too preoccupied and more than a month has gone by … so now I need to catch up

the April landscape looks so bare

and even now at the end of May this field is not covered by growth.

so this painting – the huge canvas I was talking about at the end of the last blog – reflects the bright skies and the bare land of April. here it is outside on a hot day, having paint thrown at it from the brush and paint pot. first of all Bimba christened it by walking about on the back of it, and the wind blew it over a couple of times, so it gained some soil texture – perhaps a worm cast or two

the hedge still has blue paint on it, and so do my old Whitestuff linen long-shorts

after that I took it back up to the pottery workshop and my studio easel.

Bimba got some blue paint on her too.

I had a fair old tussle with this over a few days. true to form I had the horizon too high and too dark.

so whatever I did it just wasn’t right

and I didn’t want it quite that realistic

so I started putting white back onto the horizon

and scribbling – sorry, mark-making – back into the sky with the water soluble graphite crayon

covering, or veiling the electricity poles and wires with runny grey paint, getting the right flavour and colour of italic scrawl

introducing lighter colours, and covering up the text I was unhappy with

so “touching” and “distance” are separated

the cloudy bits have scratches through them as well as the poured paint

and at this point I knew if I did any more I would mess it up, so I stopped. you can see this at Cley18, the exhibition that’s in Cley church and surroundings, on the beach and at the Norfolk Wildlife trust study centre from 5th July to 5th August. my painting will be in the south aisle of the church.

you can see the pots that need finishing on the bench at the end – that’s another story.

but I didn’t stop painting – this photo inspired a small square board

just a small part of the large one

40 x 40 cm. quite pleased with this one.

and here’s my studio assistant, between bouts of sunbathing

and wildlife spotting …

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