Chêne d’hiver / Winter hedgerow oak

(I have written in English further below … I never really know which language will reach people the best! At least visual imagery is universal!)

Voici mon dernier tableau que je viens de terminer. (Acrylique sur toile 50 x 70cm). Les arbres sont l’un de mes thèmes préférés. J’aime explorer leurs personnalités! Toutes différentes comme sont les nôtres! Pour moi celui-ci a l’air un peu plus mouvementé que le précédent que je trouve plus calme. Qu’en pensez-vous? Et quand je peins, chaque petit trait change l’équilibre du tableau, jusqu’au point où c’est parfois difficile de décider si je l’ai vraiment fini!

Here is my latest painting that I have just finished. Trees are one of my favourite subjects. I like exploring their personalities! All different just as ours are. For me this one seems a bit more lively than the one before which I find calmer. What do you think? And when I’m painting, each little line changes the balance of the painting to the point at which sometimes it’s difficult to decide whether I’ve really finished it!

Winter Hedgerow / Haie en Hiver

Acrylic on canvas / Acrylique sur toile 50 x 70cm

My most recent painting … finished today. I enjoyed getting lost in creating the shapes inspired by the tangle of brambles. More meditative than being caught up in real brambles, which has also been my experience at times!

View of the Pyrennes / Vue sur les Pyrenées

The previous little painting is based on the left hand side of this drawing.. I think I need some different format canvases if I am going to pursue this subject!

View of the Pyrenees / Vue sur les Pyrenées

Acrylic on canvas/ Acrylique sur toile 30 x 40cm

Something a bit smaller than my usual canvas format & a bit freer than sometimes. Perhaps I’ll try another larger version sometime.

After the Rain /Après la Pluie

Acrylic on canvas 50 x 70cm

I meant to have posted this here ages ago as I completed it by the end of October 2020, but what with one thing & another ….! I was wanting to do a series of sunflowers, but I think now I am going to move onto something else as they are perhaps further off in my memory; It usually feels more right to paint from recent experiences & immerse myself in the present season I suppose. Best wishes & good health for 2021 … let’s hope things improve for everyone.

Sunflowers at Mondilhan

Acrylic on Canvas 50 x 70cm

After so many years of having posted nothing here, I have just about forgotten how this blog works! It feels good to be painting again…………finally! After so many years of teaching art in a school & trying to paint as well, the second of these activities finally gave way & I had no energy or inclination left over for my own art.

But since September I have taken a sabbatical & hope to get things back into a bit more balance. I even surprised myself really, by suddenly having the urge to paint again after all this time. I hope I won’t lose it again too soon!

Perhaps it seems strange to some of you for me to be painting something as joyful as sunflowers in the present gloom of our Covid 19 world! And perhaps I even wonder that myself. But it just came to me that that’s what I had to do. There is always so much that is depressing in the world anyway & it can really bring us down. This is maybe my way of remembering that if we are privileged enough to be able to, we can also appreciate what is amazing & life enhancing. I suppose it’s a way to try to combat negativity with positivity (without meaning to sound clichéd!)

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Screen printing Experiment

I’m sure a print maker would throw their hands up in horror, but anyway, here is my first attempt with screen printing! I hope I’m going to improve when I find the time to do some more! Still, at least I feel like I’ve already learnt something in the process. I quite like the fact that each one ends up slightly different. Hopefully though, some of the surprises in  future will be more along the lines of happy accidents rather than total disasters.

As you can see, I’ve cut up quite a few of the prints as they were really not worth keeping as they were!

Below is the finished thing in its entirety. I based it on a part of one of my paintings.

 

The Presence of the trees

Acrylic on canvas 116cm x 89cm

I just turned on the computer after getting back from school & found a message to tell me that this painting, which I finished quite recently, has been selected for the Adour  – Bidasoa competition/exhibition, so that’s a good start to the week-end anyway!

Having just started a new school year meant I hadn’t even got round to posting it here till now; It’s the only large painting I managed to do in the holidays (see previous post!) I wanted to explore by doing a bigger & slightly different version of something I did  several months back.

 

Concurso de pintura Adour Bidasoa

Acabo de volver del colegio y al encender el ordenador he aprendido que este cuadro ha sido seleccionado para el concurso Adour Bidasoa. Quería explorar un tema que he hecho hace unos meses y esta versión es mas grande y algo distinto  que aquello.

La inauguración sera el día 20 de septiembre a las 19.30 en la Sala de Exposiciónes del centro Amaia de Irun c/ A. Lopez Becerre.

Concours de peinture Adour Bidasoa

Je reviens de l’école et je viens d’apprendre que ce tableau ha été selectioné pour le concours Adour – Bidasoa.

Le vernissage aura  vendredi 20 septembre à 19.h30, au Centre Amaia d’Irun.

 

A few very quick drawings

It’s ages since I’ve posted anything here!  The main reason being that I haven’t been doing much in the way of serious painting during the summer as our house has been quite busy. Which is very nice as well, but not so good for creative space!

In the meantime, here are a few quick drawings done on holiday in Spain.  They’re not supposed to be anything amazing – it’s just something I tend to do when we’re driving (in case you were worried, it’s my partner doing the driving, not me!) I have loads of these drawings, but I won’t bore everybody with too many! It’s mostly a bit of a visual diary & a good exercise in trying to capture the basics really rapidly.

Below are a few drawings from when I went to England. They were done in the airport, from the plane  & from the train. I hadn’t been in England in the summer for years & it was quite strange to go from the intense light in Spain to the soft, gentle, English light & subdued colours. It all made me feel like I’d been catapaulted into the end of summer when in reality it was still peak summer!

And finally a few quick watercolours from a bit closer to home.

In the green forest

June 2013 Acrylic on canvas 50 x 70cm

The vibrancy of the greens in the Basque Country seems to be even stronger than usual this year. A visual & emotional counter balance to the grey skies & quite simply a result of the enormous quantity of rain that’s fallen!