Siren of the Evening Star - stage 11

I only had barely an hour and a half to get any painting done today, but continued to work on the beach, put in the star and rough in the mermaid.

Siren of the Evening Star - stage 10

God, progress is so slow! So much of my time is being taken up helping out my elderly parents and am only really getting in about an hour and a half's worth of work a day at the moment.
I have been sorting out the foreground beach area today including the design and placement of the dryer darker sand which compositionally leads the eye towards the figure and then on towards the boat on the horizon and the Evening Star (not put in yet).

Siren of the Evening Star - stage 9

Very slow progress as a lot of my time is being spent on looking after my elderly parents. Have made a start on the water lapping onto the beach and have roughly painted in the foreground dryer sand shapes that lead the eye towards the figure.

Siren of the Evening Star - stage 8

Not really a stage but just to show the progress, or lack of it, on the beach and shore which is due to my Father going into hospital etc etc and my time being taken up dealing with the consequences.
Had a bit of a problem at first deciding on how I would paint the beach and after a few trial runs that got scrubbed off I am going to do it in a more painterly way by using thicker paint dabs and dragging a brush across them, this should make the water nice and wet-looking...

Siren of the Evening Star - stage 7

Progress is slow again due to family obligations but I have now washed in some colour on the beach and sea for reflections placement and it finally shows how I intend the painting to look as imagined in my mind's eye. The wash was a mix of Indanthrene Blue and a dash of Phthalocyanine Green thinned with Liquin and turpentine applied with a rag and then some areas removed with a clean rag where the bright cloud reflections are to go.

Siren of the Evening Star - stage 6

Pretty much finished the sky, just need to sort out the horizon clouds and tweak the rest before putting in the evening star. The sky has to be on the dark side nearer the horizon so that the evening star is visible.
The sky hasn't quite come out as I saw in my mind, but then they rarely do...

Siren of the Evening Star - stage 5

Still working on the sky, mainly on the left side. There is a design to the sky that I have in mind with some of the setting sun hitting the nearest clouds and then the rest are mainly in shadow until you get near to the horizon where there is a strip of cloud picking up the sunlight again but with warmer colours. Hoping to be near to finishing the sky tomorrow as long as I have enough time to work in.

Siren of the Evening Star - stage 4

Working on more clouds now but need to have more of the darker clouds to contrast against the line of yellow/orange/pink clouds near the horizon when I put them in.

Siren of the Evening Star - stage 3

Started working on the clouds at the top, the nearest ones, trying to keep lots of soft edges and not make each cloud too distinct from the background sky. It is a certain time of the late afternoon/evening that I am trying get with soft pink clouds and a line more orange/yellow ones near the horizon. I am using a very useful colour made by Old Holland called Naples Yellow - Reddish Extra in the clouds.

Siren of the Evening Star - stage 2

First colour pass on the sky using mixes of King's Blue Light, Indanthrene Blue and  Zinc White knocking back the saturation with Permanent Orange for the sky. The clouds were given a wash of Permanent Orange and Brilliant Pink thinned with lots of Liquin and applied with a rag. I want lots of lost edges in the clouds for a soft look to the sky to get across the atmosphere I want. 

Butte States sold

"Butte States" has just sold to a buyer in the USA but the painting will still be exhibited at IX in October as they will pick it up from there at the end of the show on Sunday. It's just as well as I need paintings to exhibit there and two others that were intended for the show are already sold so won't be going! 
I slightly repainted it after posting it up recently by bulking up the foreground butte as it looked a bit thin and weedy...
Oil on linen 30" x 20".

Siren of the Evening Star - stage 1

Another painting about skies, this one is going to be kept pretty simple after the recent more complicated ones and will be completely about the sky. There is a small figure of a mermaid lying in the shallow water looking out to the distance where there will be a sailing ship on the horizon, very small, positioned a third of the way along the horizon from the left. The mermaid is positioned roughly a third of the way from the right so The Rule Of Thirds is being applied to the composition with the sailing ship just breaking the line of the horizon. The Evening Star (Venus) will be centrally placed about halfway down the picture. The colours will be kept fairly subtle and real but still with plenty of atmosphere and Romance, the mood being quiet with the shallow waves gently lapping the shore reflecting the clouds above.
This stage was "drawn" up first with a small brush using a mix of Burnt Umber and Winsor Violet thinned with Liquin and turpentine and then in the afternoon the sky was washed in with a rag using the same paint mix but with more turpentine.

Butte States

"Butte States" is conceived as a companion piece to "City of the Sky People" in that it's another fantasy landscape painted in relatively real colours although the initial impetus to these paintings is really about the sky. This one is an imagination of a South West American desert landscape such as New Mexico whereby each mesa and butte is an individual city state kind of like there were in Italy in the Middle Ages, each one fortified with towers etc - sort of a futuristic Medieval fantasy landscape/cityscape!
As the painting developed the foreground butte and arch started to look deserted and abandoned which I liked the idea of and kind of gives it a bit more narrative. Maybe this one was abandoned due to water issues and the distant ones that are more modern looking have survived...
I have tried to vary the colour as much as I can to avoid two blocks of colour, blue sky and red landscape although the painting is based on the blue green/ red orange complementary colour axis.
This is a painting I hope to take to IX in October.
Oil on linen 30" x 20".
There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in previous posts on this blog.

Butte States - stage 16

Pretty much finished the foreground bar another suspension bridge and have also finished the mesa/butte at right. I am now working on the distant butte cities starting with the one on the left.

Butte States - stage 15

Working on the background landscape at right and the foreground landscape at left, with another suspension bridge to go in. Trying to get a sense of huge distance using subtle converging rock strata on the plateau at left and right.

The Golden Temple sold

My painting "The Golden Temple" has just sold through Asgard Arts. It was painted after a wonderful trip across India from Kolkata to Amritsar via Bodh Gaya, Varanasi, Agra, Delhi and Shimla by train a couple of years ago. I wanted to position the sun in such a way that what you could call lens flare would illuminate the central temple to make it look like it was made of gold. Of course the building itself is sheathed in gold leaf...
Oil on linen. 20" x 20". There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in earlier posts on this blog.