This is another painting completed at the recent Noordwijk Painting festival. This is a view of the tower looking from the carpark behind it. The sea is beyond the tower as we look at it. I am quite happy with this result, especially the colours and colour temperatures on the tower itself. I chose this particular view because it enabled me to get some more colour into the picture than most of the seascapes were affording, even if it did get me lots of rather strange looks from shoppers parking their cars.
Again, I have included a snap of Sothebys auctioning it just for fun.
Each year in the seaside resort of Noordwijk, they hold a Painting Festival (Schilderfest).
This year, yours truly was honored to be invited to participate, and spent a interesting and enjoyable time painting alongside artists from Germany, Spain, France, Russia, the Netherlands and other parts of the world. I didn’t get a chance to meet them all!
The festival runs for a week, and we paint scenes of our own choice around the area. The work goes up in the pavilion as they are painted, and the venue is open to the public who can buy the works if so desired.
At the end of the festival, there is a large auction of unsold work. The auction is run by Sothebeys, and I have included a picture of this particular streescape being auctioned. I literally only painted this one 24 hours previously. Lucky the guy holding up the painting was wearing the traditional white gloves, or he would have gotten wet oil paint on his hands!
Occasionally when I take digital photos of my work, I have to admit that the photographed image may sometime look better than the original. This normally happens because of the brightness of the outdoors light. (I never do any enhancements apart from cropping the image and straightening it up to compensate for my lack of skill as a photographer!)
In this case, the opposite is true. The photo I have taken of the painting does not capture the hues of the paint, in particular the blues which run through it and hold the whole thing together, and create what I think is a very pleasing painting. I am going to hold onto this one for the gallery opening next year.
This is a small painting which I painted recently. I took quite a bit longer over this one than I normally would for a canvas this size. Reason was, I had an enormous amount of difficulty in deciding the best position for the arms, as you will be able to see if you click on the Utube link below. However, I eventually decided on what is below as it suggests movement more successfully.
It’s only a small painting, but one of the things that I am pleased about it is that it is able to convey a sense of space within the picture.
There are no rules for good photographs, there are only good photographs. Ansel Adams
The same is true of paintings. There are dozens (hundreds, even) of ‘rules’ of composition, ie don’t place objects of interest in the centre of the picture, use complimentary colours, landscapes should be 2/3rd’s sky (that’s quite a good one actually), etc etc. In fact, there were, and probably still are classes taught on composition or design, eg ‘golden mean’ of proportion, lines of interest etc. All of them have their moments, but there is no formula for success.
This is a view across the water in the Amsterdam Bose, and the picture was painted on site over two sessions on two different days. I was scouting for views for future paintings on my bicycle when I came around the corner and ran into this. I knew it was definatley going to be painted, and I even knew roughly how I was going to handle it - which was more realistically than abstracted. It actually goes against many rules of composition, especially with the ‘barrier’ across the lower part of the painting which apparently prevents the viewer from entering the picture, but I like it anyway.
I did this painting in one session on site over the period of about three hours. It is a scene I go past most mornings on my bike on the way to my studio.
It was the first of the good days of spring, and there were dozens of people in the cafes behind me having their friday lunch, and getting an early start for the weekend.
Gustave Flaubert tells us that ‘Of all lies, art is the least untrue.’ This is true in that Art is not reality, it is our personal or subjective perception of reality.
One of the issues paining Plein Air is that you have to simplify significantly (as is the case in all painting), and dash off the effect of being there, which is why when you forget the detail, and simply ‘go for it’, the result is often pleasing.
The Roman patrician came up with this observation before the intellectualisation (?) of art. That is, before it was taken from the academies (a good thing), and eventually handed over to the Universities (!?), who proceeded to classify it and grade it and give the students marks out of ten for their work. As those of you who have been there know, you don’t necessarily have to do a lot at Uni to succeed, espaecially at Art School! Basically, the ability to sound convincing is enough (especially at Art School!), and much time is spent discussing what art is, and precious little of any good is done or taught.
I don’t know if I agree with Seneca completely, but I do know that most good work starts with direct observation of nature. Once you have the key elements observed, then you can push it and pull it around a bit. Like most artists, I do tend to put emphasis or overdo the things which attracted me or drew my attention to them in the first place. If this wasn’t the case, I might as well take a photo and be done with it! (Nothing wrong with that, a lot of people do, but I prefer to paint or draw).
This little piece was painted on site at the scene. This canal is right next to the art gallery area and cultural scene, and the Rijksmuseum, which contains some wonderful historical paintings, including Rembrandt’s ‘The Night Watch’ is about 100 meters to the right on the other side of the canal.
We haven’t had much sunshine here over the last couple of weeks, but fortunately the afternoon was quite bright and able to provide some nice colours which I managed to put down quickly.
I painted this watercolour on site from exactly the same position as the much larger oil painting ‘The Westdienderplassen’ which I posted before Christmas.
It certainly shows how the differences between the two media tend to influence (dictate?) the feel of the painting. Today’s quote on this blog is by John Cheever ( I haven’t heard of him either) and it says ‘Art is the triumph over chaos’, which is reflected here where a simple and elegant little watercolour can capture some of the essence of a fairly complicated and cluttered scene.
Barry Humphreys (when he’s not Dame Edna) is a very serious painter too, and he once remarked that a painter does exactly the opposite of that which a lead guitarist in a rock band does, ie he makes something very difficult look rather simple (when he is on target, that is)
‘Ice breaking up over the Amsterdamse Bos Waterway’
Oil on Canvas, 30 x 20 cm
Status: For sale, €225, unframed
This little picture was painted on location quite early in the morning in the Amsterdamse Bos (forrest) as the light was just starting to break through the clouds, giving the whole scene a soft and harmonious colour. The ice on the water had been thawing and freezing during the course of the day for a few weeks, and it was finally starting to break up completely, much to the relief of the birds I imagine. I watched them walking around on the ice, trying to peck through it into the water! It’s all thawed now, and they are swimming, not walking.
