Wall Of The Citadel and Give Me Shelter sold

Give Me Shelter

Luckily whilst I made a monetary loss on going to Illuxcon two paintings were sold on Artfinder, "Wall Of The Citadel" and "Give Me Shelter".

"Give Me Shelter" was painted a few years ago as part of my series of nocturne paintings of Hove seafront near where I live.
The shelter in "Give Me Shelter" was used for dalliances with usually married women by the future King Edward the Seventh when he was still the Prince of Wales when he stayed at a nearby seafront house in the late 1890s. It now has a very different class of occupants, homeless people.
Oil on board 36" x 18".
"Wall Of The Citadel" was painted last year as a kind of homage to the Orientalist postcards of the early 20th Century. I tried to paint it in virtually two colours, red and yellow.
Oil on linen 22" x 16". 

Wall Of The Citadel

 

Siren's Dawn

The final painting that I have been just able to finish in time to take to Illuxcon.
A mermaid combs her hair as she lies on a rock on a deserted shore line in the soft early morning light. She has suddenly turned around as she notices a distant ship on the horizon, the next victims for the red-haired femme fatale?
This painting is really all about the sky. I always saw her in my mind's eye as semi-silhouetted against the sky looking towards the distant ship. The model as usual is the lovely Naomi Wood.
I wanted to avoid a corny sunrise/set painting so I set the time as dawn is breaking, the first rays of the morning sun yet to shine on the mermaid and the foreground landscape.
It was painted on a stretched Winsor & Newton "Maritime" canvas but I added two more layers of oil primer sanding between coats to fill in the weave a bit to get it nearer to my preferred surface, linen.
I used mainly transparent colours for the sky so as to help it recede into the background, painting it in layers so as to build them up until I had the right balance of transparency and opacity.
Oil on canvas 39 1/2" x 15 1/2".
There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in previous posts on this blog

Siren's Dawn - stage 13

Over yesterday and this morning I am hoping that I have done enough so that on my return to the studio on Thursday it will just be a matter of a couple of hours work to finish the painting.
I really want to take this to Illuxcon but it will be tight if it is to be dry on Friday for me to scan it and then pack into a box to send to America.