Tuesday 28 May 2013

April Sketching Trip

Right, where was I?

Ah yes, I remember - Arran, in April, just after the terrible snows that brought the island to a standstill.
But by the time we went over for one week the snow had mostly melted away although it was still bitterly cold. Not ideal for an outdoor sketching trip you might think, and you would be right and wrong all at the same time for it was as beautiful a week as we have ever had with bright blue skies and no rain. There I've said it: NO RAIN!

First day out sketching we went over to the other side of the island to Blackwaterfoot to Drumadoon Bay and this great lump of a hill which I have sketched many times before:

"The Doon", Mixed Media in Sketchbook, 2x19x25cm.

My intention was to continue with this style of sketching which I have become very comfortable with - starting with felt-tip pens to immediatley establish a strong colour, then working up with Neocolour II's to provide local colour notes. Hopefully this will be enough for me to develop a larger painting back home in the studio when the weather is dreich.

My second sketch of that day was this double-spread overlooking the small but perfectly formed harbour at Blackwaterfoot, just fifty metres from the Kinloch Hotel where a nice hot meal awaited me at the end of a very pleasurable day:

"The Harbour", Mixed Media in Sketchbook, 2x19x25cm.


I can see both these sketches being developed into larger paintings sometime in the future once I get some time off from all the other things in my life that demands my attention like a programme of major house refurbishment just completed and pram-pushing my new little grand-daughter, Amy.

More from Arran soon.




2 comments:

Sheila Vaughan said...

Anybody reading this who has not clicked on these 2 sketches, then click now. David, pls try to make your images a bit BIGGER man. Or at least encourage people to do the clicking. What are you like? That pen work is superb - fresh, alive, vital. Yep, I can feel the cold coming through the marks, and those sheep! They are fantastic.

daviddrawsandpaints said...

Well, that made me laugh, Sheila, and I don't often get that on my wanderings on the web!
Glad you like the sketches and,just to show that I can listen as well as talk, I have uploaded full res pics for todays' post.

The reason I always upload email-sized pics was two-fold:
i) My old machine takes forever to upload full res pics.

ii) Fear of some scurrilous persons out there pinching my pics, printing them out, framing them and hanging on their wall, all free gratis. Don't laugh - it could happen!
I should be so lucky :o)