The Sea Wraith - stage 3

 After I had given it a wash of desaturated blue/green late yesterday afternoon I went on to paint the sky today. This is the first colour pass over which I had changed my mind about the colours I was going to use over this morning's breakfast coffee as originally I was going to paint it nearer to Atkinson Grimshaw in more yellow/greens...

Colours used so far; Phthalocyanine Blue, Phthalocyanine Green, Dioxazine Purple, Burnt Sienna, Permanent Orange, Lead Tin Yellow Lemon, Zinc White and Warm White.

The Sea Wraith - stage 2

 Finished the initial tonal underpainting over which I will give it a glaze of thin desaturated blue/green later today so that it's dry for tomorrow's session when I will make a start on the sky.

The Sea Wraith - stage 1

 A bit of an homage to all those galleons on the high seas paintings from the Golden Age of Illustration like NC Wyeth etc etc

This one will actually be more about the sky but that is not apparent at this stage as I am leaving this to dry before I finish the tonal underpainting with the sky tomorrow morning. I want it to look like it's crashing through huge waves with perhaps no crew as such but more like a conscious boat prowling the sea with probably malevolent tendencies...

This is the first part of the tonal underpainting using my usual mix of Burnt Sienna and Dioxazine Purple thinned with Liquin and applied with a brush and rag.

Oil on linen 22" x 16".

Out Of The Blue

 Another painting for my solo show next year at the Abend Gallery, Denver CO for which they suggested varying the size a bit of the canvasses so this one is smaller. It's actually based on a memory from a while ago when I was with a few friends drinking wine on the beach at Hove late at night and watching the waves come in as they hit the beach. The horizon was invisible and the waves looked like they were coming from an infinite space which gave the experience a surreal power... or was that just the wine?.... So out there in an infinite ocean maybe it's a small fishing boat making it's  way back to port, there are a number of possible interpretations... In a way the whole point of this painting is the tiny dot of light out to sea.

It has been very difficult to get a decent scan of this painting so this a photo of it taken on my iPhone which will have to do.

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

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