Tag: sky

Get out there and do it

Get out there and do it: when the weather looks unkind – too dull, too dark, too cold –
go anyway, something invariably turns up that you would otherwise miss.

In a quiet country lane nearby I parked up and strolled a few yards along the road looking this way and that for a nice composition to reveal itself, and stopped just past a tree lined bend. The sky was clear, the sun had gone down leaving a cool transition between coral red, orange, gold and duck egg green, turning imperceptibly to cobalt and then indigo blue above my head. A hunting barn owl coursed up and down a metre or so above the long grass meadow, then up over the willows and on to the next patch, minutes later appearing again to try it’s luck one more time. I made a rapid pencil sketch on the spot, and tried to do something with it back indoors.Bumfords Lane dusk

I started out thinking I would produce a coloured ink drawing but almost from the start it was not going well. Persevering, I ended up working over the whole thing in oil pastel and although I like the result insofar as it conveys my excitement at the colour, the feeling of cold air on my face and the fast approaching darkness (and seeing the owl of course), it wasn’t the picture I had in my mind’s eye…a situation I’m sure many artists find themselves in from time to time!Bumfords lane with barn owl

There’s weather coming

Soon be time to get those oil paints out and try some autumn landscapes, with those wild skies and mix of colours. Meantime I’m still battling with line and wash, trying to say the most with the least.

These straw bales caught my eye as they stood in an animated fashion across the slope, framing the village church spire in the distance. The foreground shadows are cast by tall trees just to my left on the edge of the field. What makes it for me is that one bale stands out by being in the shade.


In this sketch, the reflected colour of the blue sky in the tarmac seemed to be exaggerated
by the vegetation. I accentuated the colour slightly, the actual sky seemed unimportant
in comparison.


In this drawing, one single cloud arrived and gathered itself from a relatively clear sky and dominated the scene. The telegraph poles stride across the stubble field and past the maize crop on the horizon, where rooks perch on the wires. A shower of rain followed shortly afterwards.