There is a local spot where a country lane passes through a shallow ford and
winds its way on up through arable fields. The small river is lined with large
willows and the odd poplar, and dog walkers and joggers use the riverside
path daily. There is an expanse of sky where, as the lane reaches the top of
the slope, cyclists, runners and walkers can be silhouetted against the
sunset sky as they disappear over the crest of the hill.

The first painting in this set is of willow trees at the edge of the stubble field,
at a bend in the small river. The sun was setting behind cloud and I had a
limited amount of time to finish, but I was aware that the sun may drop below
the cloud as it set, any time now. Everything was going well and then suddenly,
the whole scene in front of me lit up bright orange. In my concentration I had
forgotten the sun would drop below the cloud and I wasn’t expecting the bright
wash of orange light that changed all the colour values, even the shadow lines
of the stubble became a vivid blue.

I quickly made some adjustments and tried to place these colours, glancing
across to my right as the blinding low sun shone golden yellow in my face.
Then it dipped below the skyline and the scene reverted to how it was before,
although this time I had only minutes before it came too dark to see what
I was doing! I carried on until I couldn’t see anymore. The sienna ground
on the canvas has helped a great deal here in showing the brief overall
glow of the setting sun as the orange light washed over the whole scene.

The following evening I added a few touches here and there, and turned
to look at the riverside trees behind me. Getting dark in about forty five
minutes I looked and looked, assessing whether I had time or not, and
decided “yes I have”. This is a bad habit to get into, looking at the subject
from all angles for twenty minutes, then decide “Meh…” and walk away.
Procrastination never got anything done.

I mixed up the three basic colours of the sky, trees and field and applied
the paint very rapidly, working the brush in all directions at first, adding
touches of varying tone as I went.  The result is a lively sketch of the sunlit
sky disappearing behind the trees. Stood in one field, looking across to the
edge of another, with the lane sunken slightly in between (represented by
an untouched streak of the blue ground in this picture.

The peachy colour was all I could muster in the fading light and doesn’t do
justice to the vibrance of the actual scene, but what I do like is the honesty
of it, the “there it was and now it’s gone” feeling from quick sketches.

A couple of days later I returned to the same spot and waited until only
about 35 minutes  of painting time was available before it got too dark
and produced another canvas. This one shows a much gloomier clouded
sky loaded with rain with just a glimmer of light showing at the very
end of the day.

There are also roadsigns here which are a looking little tired and may
make an interesting counterpoint to the natural elements. I’ve omitted
them in this picture, but produced a couple of quick charcoal notes to
remind me to go back and look again, one with roadsign, one with jogger.

This is the sketch looking up the lane from the ford, which may be the
next paining in this series, using the battered old signs to contrast with
the natural elements in the landscape.