Ice Planet

 I liked how the light hit the background mountains in an earlier painting "Out In The Cold" and wanted to base a painting around it. After trying out various compositions of an Islamic Summer Palace in the mountains of Central Asia I settled on a Star Wars related piece loosely set on the ice planet Hoth. Kept the colours fairly subtle based around a yellow/violet complementary with a bit of blue at the top to add a bit more variety of colour.

I have painted this early for my slot next month on Every Day Original as I will be away from the studio for the next three weeks.

Oil on linen 12" x 16".

There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in previous posts on this blog.

Ice Planet - stage 5

 It is nearly finished, just need to finish the foreground and maybe a few tweaks on the buildings. I hope to finish it tomorrow and scan and post on Every Day Original before I leave for the USA on Monday. Good to stop here as I need to have a think about the foreground colours over my breakfast coffee.

Ice Planet - stage 4

 Work is s bit slow on this one as I have quite a lot of things to do as I prepare to go to the USA next week so I didn't get as much done as I wanted on the buildings. I stopped here so that I can have a good look at it with a clear head over tomorrow morning's breakfast coffee. I need to decide how dark to make them for instance and I'm too distracted today to make a good decision. It doesn't matter if I don't finish it before I go as I will have time to finish it when I get back and will be easily in time to post it up on Every Day Original.

Ice Planet - stage 3

 Have been away from the studio for a while so good to be back and have got on with the background mountain today. I stopped here so that I can look at it again tomorrow over my breakfast coffee and tweak if necessary before I go on to the buildings.

New colours used: Kings Blue Light, Lavender and Naples Yellow Reddish Extra.

Ice Planet - stage 2

 I finished the brown underpainting and gave it a desaturated violet/blue wash over most of it later on - violet because the painting is based on a yellow/violet colour complementary.

Colours used so far: Indanthrene Blue, Ultramarine Blue, Ultramarine Violet, Dioxazine Purple, Burnt Sienna and Permanent Orange.

Home Land

A Lonesome Road

 My solo show "Home Land" at the Abend Gallery, Denver CO finished a couple of weeks ago and have been informed that four have sold so far which is disappointing but the gallery is not surprised in the current uncertain economic times particularly in the USA.

They were: "A Lonesome Road", "Home And Dry", "Last Light" and "The Outsider".

Home And Dry

Last Light

The Outsider

 

 

Ice Planet - stage 1

 I liked how the light hit the background mountain in an earlier painting "Out In The Cold" and wanted to try it again in a different way. After sketching out various ideas of Islamic summer palaces high in the mountains set against the light hitting a mountain in the background I settled this morning on setting it loosely on the planet Hoth in the Star Wars films. This is two thirds through the initial tonal underpainting which I hope to finish tomorrow and try and get the blue wash over it later in the day as it could well be dry by four in the afternoon in this sunny weather.

This is being painted early for my slot on Every Day Original next month as I will be away from the studio for three weeks 19 May to 10 June in Pennsylvania painting on an historic farm near Amish country as an Artist In Residence.

Oil on linen 12" x 16".

Heliotropolis

 This started out as a different idea but morphed into this, a fusion of my love of Orientalism with Fantasy/Science Fiction. The foreground references my collection of vintage Orientalist postcards of the 1920s/30s and the paintings of Hermann Corrodi and the background is a futuristic city with architecture referencing Ancient Egypt on a hot late evening/dusk. Maybe this is the Heliopolis district of Cairo sometime in the future....

The painting took a bit longer because I changed my mind about the colours and lighting from more of an evening painting with blues and violets and silhouetted buildings to an earlier time in the late afternoon with all the buildings picking up more of the dying light - this meant basically that I had to put a lot more detail into the buildings than originally planned.

Oil on canvas 31 1/2" x 12".

There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in earlier posts on this blog.

Heliotropolis - stage 9

 Managed to paint in both sides of foreground and just need to finish off the date palms and then paint in the water and reflections tomorrow when I hope to finish it. I also looked at it last night and decided to break up the line of light on the shoreline of the city as it is too early in the evening for that burst of light to happen because there is too much light left in the sky at that time. This is a legacy of how I was originally going to paint it when I planned for it to be later in the evening and the sky would be full of blues and darker but of course I changed my mind but still clung on to the idea of the strip of lights until last night.... it's still there a bit...

Heliotropolis - stage 8

 Roughed in some colour into the water to give me an idea of what colours and tone to use on the foreground. Made a start on the foreground at right, more date palms to go in next and finish the ones already there before I move over to the left foreground, I'm leaving the water until last.

Heliotropolis - stage 7

 Still painting the city tentatively but have most of the right hand side finished so tomorrow I should be able to get the city finished including all the lights running along the shoreline. Then onto the foreground and water...

Heliotropolis - stage 6

 Haven't got much done on this until today due to distractions like the great weather.. and also a lot of dithering about what colours to use for the city. I stopped here today as I now need to work out what colours to use on the city at right which is theoretically more in shadow. Do I change the sky colour behind it? All will hopefully be resolved over tomorrow's breakfast coffee...

Heliotropolis - stage 5

 It's all about the lighting at the moment as I struggle a bit with colours to make the idea work of a hot early evening/dusk with light and colour still in the sky but dark enough for all the bright lights of the city to be there too. I stopped here as I want to have a look with fresh eyes at the colours I'm using in the buildings, I feel something needs to be slightly different - hopefully mulling it over tomorrow's breakfast coffee will do the trick. The sky is finished... maybe.

New colours used: Brilliant Pink and Yellow Lake Deep. 

Heliotropolis - stage 4

 First colour pass on the sky and background hills. The finish will be richer in colour with some glazing. I chose a sky colour like my collection of vintage Orientalist postcards which seems more appropriate as I go along and will be a nice counterpoint to having the Sci Fi city in it.

Colours used so far: Ultramarine Blue, Dioxazine Purple, Lavender, Burnt Sienna, Permanent Orange, Naples Yellow Reddish Extra, Lead Tin Yellow Lemon and Warm White.

Heliotropolis - stage 3

 Tonal underpainting now finished. Late last night I was looking at it before going to bed and realised that the way the painting looked at that time suggested going for a more Orientalist colouring than the one that I had originally intended. In the morning over coffee I looked at Orientalist painters like Hermann Corrodi and even Orientalist postcards from that period in my collection and decided on a warmer, hotter even, late sunset/dusk light based around yellows, oranges, pinks and violets. You will see this start to take effect tomorrow when I start to paint the sky...

Heliotropolis - stage 2

 Oooppsss... just noticed I misspelt the title in the last post...

 Spending longer than normal on this tonal underpainting as all the architecture has to be right from the outset otherwise it looks.... wrong and difficult to fix later on. I was originally going to have the city stretching across the canvas but I decided to make it look like it's following the curve in the river away from us - good 'ol breakfast coffee...

About two thirds of the way to finishing the tonal underpainting.

Heliopolis - stage 1

 

To misquote Rolf Harris you can't see what it is yet.... I have gone ahead and done a partial tonal underpainting of the foreground as I need to establish that first before I begin to compose the background which will be a futuristic city in the style of Ancient Egyptian architecture so that the point of the painting is a fusion of my interest in Orientalism which is the foreground combined with a Fantasy/Sci Fi background. I am going to set it at late evening with the last light in the sky on the buildings and all the city lights on and probably a spaceship going across the sky.... I am painting this to take to IX later in the year unless a buyer comes along beforehand...

Colours used so far: Dioxazine Purple and Burnt Sienna.

Oil on canvas 31 1/2" x 12".

The Vampire Of Rialto

 Another in my "Vampires Of Venice" series this one has been painted for my upcoming slot on 23 April on Every Day Original. This one is related to the previous vampire (Nosferatu) painting in that I have come closer to the vampire than I normally do with this one the closest so far. I have distorted the angles on the background to have a bit of the feel of the early Dr Caligari and Nosferatu movies from the 1920s. If you have ever walked around Venice at night you might be able to entertain the possibility of a vampire or two lurking in the shadows of the dimly lit alleyways and campos of this mysterious city....

Oil on fine cotton 16" x 12".

There is a short step-by-step progress through this painting in earlier posts on this blog.

The Vampire Of Rialto - stage 2

 First colour pass on the sky, buildings at left and right and part of the bridge plus I added a gondola and a few poles at the bottom to add interest to that area. Might have a couple of poles nearer...

Colours used: Phthalocyanine Blue, Phthalocyanine Green, Dioxazine Purple, Burnt Sienna, Permanent Orange, Lemon Yellow and Warm White.

The Vampire Of San Marco sold

 "The Vampire Of San Marco" has just sold to friend that has a number of moonlight paintings of mine already although this one has a definitely more sinister air to it than the others! I must ask him if he's been to Venice...

This is good news on another level too in that this is the first sale I've made since my near sellout at IX last October, strange how things can be so up and down in this business!

Oil on linen 22" x 16".

The Vampire Of Rialto - stage 1

 Seeing as I have an upcoming slot on the 23rd of April on Every Day Original I thought that I would paint another "Vampire Of Venice" for it as I enjoyed painting the last one. This time I have chosen the well-known Rialto Bridge as the location although quite when is more vague as I am going to have it dark with no lights on so that must make this painting set in a time before electric lights... not a good time to encounter a vampire when it's a moonlit night but otherwise dark and mysterious. Like the last one I have come in closer to the face which makes them different to all the previous vampire (Nosferatu) paintings.

This is the tonal underpainting stage using a mix of Burnt Sienna and Dioxazine Purple thinned with Liquin and applied with a brush and rag with a wash of desaturated blue/green over it.

Oil on fine cotton 16" x 12".

The Vampire Of San Marco

 So there you are walking around Venice at night as I have done so many times along the dark alleys and squares slightly inebriated from a few glasses of vino rosso and you find yourself walking alongside the Grand Canal. It's a dark night foggy and mysterious, just how I like Venice when all of a sudden a ghostly figure emerges from a narrow alley and turns round to look at you with his burning eyes....

Another in my occasional series of "Vampires Of Venice" I have come in a bit closer this time to the Nosferatu and wanted a creepy atmosphere to this one with just his burning eyes and gaunt face emerging from the darkness. People associate Venice with Romance but I find it a mysterious place particularly at night when it is so quiet and dimly lit and my mind wanders to the idea of the whole city being inhabited by Vampires that each have their own square or canal etc that they prowl under the cover of darkness waiting for an unsuspecting tourist to empty of blood....

 This particular location is impossible by the way as there are no walkways along the Grand Canal in this part of the Sestiere of San Marco....

Oil on linen 22" x 16".

There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in previous posts on this blog.

The Vampire Of San Marco - stage 7

 I have pretty much finished the first colour pass on the buildings in the foreground and left it to dry so that I can go all over it tomorrow. I have always seen this area as fairly dark so that the lights in the vampire's eyes really come through so I need a good think about it over tomorrow's breakfast coffee to make final decisions.... planning on having the vampire's face fairly dark too....

The Vampire Of San Marco - stage 6

 Painted in the fog this morning which I am basically happy with barring a few possible tweaks later on. I have made a start on the foreground buildings and stopped here so that I review how it's going over breakfast coffee. I am planning on the foreground being quite dark as I originally intended and have resisted the temptation to make the details more distinct - I want the lights in his eyes to emerge from the darkness for maximum creepiness....

New colours used: Yellow Lake Deep and Naples Yellow.

The Vampire Of San Marco - stage 5

 I realised that I couldn't put the fog in until the water was painted in and in fact I really needed to work on the buildings a bit more so.... the fog goes in tomorrow.

The Vampire Of San Marco - stage 4

 I have kind of overpainted the buildings across the water as I want them to be dark and semi-silhouetted but will have a lot of fog/mist over them soon but I still want some of this detail to be there. Bear with me...

Solo Show

 My solo show "Home Land" opens today at the Abend Gallery, Denver CO comprising 15 symbolic landscape paintings in panoramic format all oil on canvas. All can be seen on previous posts over the past year in this blog.

The Vampire Of San Marco -stage 3

 After giving most of the painting a desaturated blue/green wash I painted the first colour pass on the sky. As the painting is based around a blue/green - red/orange colour complementary I might put in a touch of lemon into the lighter area of the sky - decision will be made over tomorrow's breakfast coffee.

Colours used so far: Phthalocyanine Blue, Phthalocyanine Green, Dioxazine Purple, Burnt Sienna, Permanent Orange and Warm White.

The Vampire Of San Marco - stage 2

 Finished the tonal underpainting ready for a desaturated blue/green wash tomorrow and make a start on the sky. The plan is that the brightest parts of the painting are the moon and the lights in his eyes with everything else fairly dark and foggy so that it looks like as the viewer walks along the canalside pathway a Nosferatu vampire suddenly emerges from a narrow alleyway. I want it be fairly scary... and kind of beautiful as after all it is Venice....

The Vampire Of San Marco - stage 1

 I now have a chance to get some paintings done to take to IX later in the year (if I am able to get them to the USA now tariffs are complicating things) and thought I would paint another in my occasional series of "Vampires Of Venice". I must explain that I find Venice quite a mysterious place particularly at night and on foggy days and do not associate it with romance! I love walking around it at night and due to the age of the city it occurred to me some years ago that the whole place could be inhabited by vampires who each have a certain campo or canal etc that they haunt looking for unsuspecting tourists like me to empty of blood...

This is set in the sestiere of San Marco on the side of the Grand Canal looking towards the Salute - in fact this is impossible as there are no walkways on the side of the Grand Canal in this section of San Marco but hey it's Fantasy right?!

This is halfway through the initial tonal underpainting and didn't have time today to get it all in so I will finish it tomorrow. It uses my usual mix of Burnt Sienna and Dioxazine Purple thinned with Liquin and applied with a rag and brush.

Oil on linen 22" x 16".

Lunar Triad

 Now that I have finished the series for my upcoming solo show at the Abend Gallery I thought that I would get on with some paintings to take to IX in October and fancied doing another Star Wars Tatooine panorama. Luckily I was doing some research and discovered that it it has three moons in addition to the two suns so that was a perfect theme for this painting. It is quite evident here that it is not much of a jump for me to go from an Orientalist desert scene with a mosque and minarets to a Tatooine Science Fiction landscape - the building style is Futuristic Mosque just as the architecture in the movies is a version of Islamic North Africa where they were filmed. The deceptively simple sky took a long while to paint as it is made up of glazes which I kept adding to until I was happy with the light.

Oil on canvas 31 1/2' x 12".

There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in previous posts on this blog.

 

Lunar Triad - stage 9

 Painted in the foreground rocks at left and made a start on the buildings/space port ready to hopefully finish tomorrow. Glad I've managed to get some variation of colour in the landscape.

Lunar Triad - stage 8

 Managed to paint in the landscape at right with some variation in colour that I wanted and will now move on to the landscape in the left corner before I finish with the buildings/space port. I guess the sky is finished.... maybe.

Lunar Triad - stage 7

 Just had a couple of days away from painting so glad to get back to it today. I decided to work on the central section of the landscape first whereby I worked out the colours to use which I will now continue with for the rest of the painting - basically bringing in a kind of blue into the highlights that aren't picking up the sunlight. This gave me the variation in colour that I was looking for...

New colours used: Pale Violet and Naples Yellow.

Lunar Triad - stage 6

 I may well tweak the sky as I go along but it's good enough for me to be able to start on the landscape now so today I managed to paint in the background. Good to stop here so that I can evaluate the colours I'm using etc as I will be away from the studio tomorrow and will get back to it on Wednesday.

New colours used: Manganese Violet, Brilliant Pink and Yellow Lake Deep.

Lunar Triad - stage 5

 Still faffing around with the sky after I realised that the area near the horizon was too dark for when it came to painting the landscape so changed it today. Nearly there, should be able to make a start on the distant mesas even if the sky is still maybe not quite finished.

Lunar Triad - stage 4

 God glazes are slow going! I gave the sky a second pass of yellow and gave the landscape a blue/violet wash but unfortunately the yellow wasn't dry enough to start on the orange/pink washes later in the afternoon. It will be worth it in the end because only glazes can give you one colour shining through another which is what I want but unfortunately I can't get on with the landscape until the sky is finished...

Lunar Triad - stage 3

 I worked up the tonal underpainting a bit more and painted in the base colours of the sky with the first glaze of yellow going on late this afternoon over the blue. Hopefully I can get the first pink glaze in tomorrow...

New colour used: Lemon Yellow

Lunar Triad - stage 2

 I gave the tonal underpainting a second pass to strengthen the contrast and then once it had dried in the late afternoon gave the sky a preliminary pass of some base colours ready for tomorrow. The sky will take a few more passes as it will be made up mainly of glazes and at this point gives no indication of what it is finally going to look like!

My transition from Orientalist mosques and minarets to Star Wars Tatooine architecture is actually not much of a stretch as you can see here where that could quite easily be a mosque on a desert hilltop and not a space station....

Colours used so far: Kings Blue Light, Manganese Blue Hue, Dioxazine Purple, Lavender, Burnt Sienna, Permanent Orange, Lead Tin Yellow Lemon and Warm White.

Lunar Triad - stage 1

 It seems time to start painting some stock to take to IX in October and I fancied painting another Star Wars inspired landscape of dusty Tatooine. I have been reading up on it and happily found out that in addition to the two suns it also has three moons so this one will be about that but not a nocturne as such as it is set at dusk when there is still some residual sunlight near the horizon but the sky is dark enough to see the three moons... well that's the plan any way.

This is kind of halfway through the initial tonal underpainting and plan on getting in the sky with moons and finishing the landscape underpainting tomorrow.

Oil on canvas 31 1/2" x 12".

Working Late

 I won a chance to exhibit in a group show at the Rehs Contemporary Gallery in NewYork in last year's Art Renewal Center's International Salon competition. I spoke to the Gallery Director and he suggested a loose theme of "isolation" for the show which is fine with me! The exhibition will be held in Spring 2026 and he is hoping for 5-6 pieces from each of the ten artists chosen.

This idea (Working Late) came to mind pretty quickly and I thought that I would get on with it so that I would have at least one painting under my belt for the show. I had an idea of a lonely office worker working into the night while everybody else has long gone home and wanted something Hopper-influenced which is appropriate as his paintings are often about the isolation of people in a city environment. I tried a few compositional ideas out and ended up with coming close to the building as the further back I went the idea became weaker with less obvious connection to the title.

Oil on linen 22" x 16".

There is a step-by-step progress through this painting in previous posts on this blog.

Working Late - stage 6

 I worked on the building in the right bottom corner and then made a start on the street below, I need to tidivate some things on that building and finish the street so hoping to get all the background finished tomorrow ready to make a start on the foreground building at right. Glad I got rid of the water tower and prefer just the distant skyscraper in the mist.

Working Late - stage 5

 

Worked more on the buildings in the middle distance and then left them and roughed in some colour on the nearest buildings at left as I hope to get all the city buildings done tomorrow but need to work on them together hence getting everything ready.

Working Late - stage 4

 Worked some more on the background but can't really finish it until the nearer buildings are in so I stopped here and roughed in some colour on the nearer buildings ready for tomorrow - ditched the water tower at right as it was bugging me....

Hard to get a decent photo of this one so only the final scan will show the correct colours and contrast.

Working Late - stage 3

 First colour pass on the background. Not a great pic of it and looks a bit harsh here and not quite the colours I intended but I will have a look at it tomorrow morning and decide how to finish the background. I have also gave the rest of the painting a couple of desaturated blue washes to get it ready for the colour to go on.

Colours used so far: Phthalocyanine Green, Indanthrene Blue, Dioxazine Purple, Manganese Violet, Burnt Sienna, Permanent Orange, Lead Tin Yellow Lemon, Warm Light Yellow and Warm White.