Mark Harrison's Art Blog

Experiments - For the RA and beyond...

2012-03-06T08:45:00.000-08:00

As I prepare my entry for the Summer Exhibition I seem to be taking some time out from getting paintings together for the June exhibition to try out new working methods which may address some long-term concerns I have about all of my work. I find that I have a tendency to work up to the lines of the preparatory drawing and start filling them in to an extent. This produces a certain rigidity to my paintings which has always bugged me. Whilst I have been doing the early reductive paintings i.e. laying down areas of tone and then wiping away with a rag to produce the highlights etc I have started to do something that I have been thinking about for a while, painting without an under-drawing. I am now no longer interested in finding an image from abstract shapes brought about by random application of a monochrome oil wash and have moved on to developing a new way of working (hopefully!) for all my future paintings.

I am trying out in the painting above just putting in a rudimentary "drawing" in thinned oil paint to indicate the basic design and content and then blocking in a tonal underpainting. Any necessary adjustments can be made by rubbing out the lines etc. with turpentine and re-"drawing" the correction. When dry for tomorrow morning I will then paint over it and finish in my normal manner. I am also going to try taking a painting a lot further in acrylic first as an underpainting before going on to finishing in oil as a lot of textural surfaces can be achieved quickly in acrylic which would take so much longer in slow-drying oils. I am hoping that by starting with a more hand "drawn" and simpler under-"drawing" the resultant shapes will be more idiosyncratic and less photographic on completion of the painting. Success will hinge on having the confidence that I can bring out all the required structure and detail from a much less organised and tight matrix of shapes than I have been previously used to. I have always loved the image quality of etchings and indeed tried a short course a few years ago but could'nt get on with the processes that are involved but as an adjunct to the earlier reductive experiments I have happened upon a painted "look" that kind of mimics an etching. Although the painting below has a slightly dodgy composition, there is something about it that I like and over time I will try more of these.

Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition

2012-03-02T04:10:00.000-08:00

After my little rant about the RA Summer Exhibition in my last post, I have decided to leave the first two trial paintings as monochromes. I will prepare some some more boards and then take a break for a couple of days to have a good think about what I want to do next. I could introduce a second analogous colour for instance such as yellow or orange, I could apply layers of transparent colour next, maybe try one in blues......

Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition

2012-03-01T10:04:00.000-08:00

Well it has come around again to that annual black hole of pointless expense and endeavour, yes the Summer Exhibition. It could be argued that I should just make a cheque out to Tracey Emin or Jeff Koons directly instead of going to the trouble of going through with painting, framing, transporting and then bringing back my rejected entry. But here we go again and my current strategy is to try and get a small painting into the little room at the back where "traditional" work is consigned as a magnanimous gesture on their part on behalf of us dinosaurs that still paint representational pictures with some degree of skill. They have to be small as they are all crammed in together, anything larger not standing a chance of being hung in the large crony-curated galleries of the main exhibition.....Bitter moi? I have in my minds-eye the notion of smearing some turpsy red/brown oil paint around and then see what suggests itself to resolve out of the ensuing shapes. I will then develop it in colour although I intend to keep the design simple and strong probably with a strong light source and rich tonal colour. The two pictures below are possible contenders for developing further:

I Collect My Prize

2012-02-29T03:04:00.000-08:00

I went into the W.H. Patterson gallery in London last week to pick up the prize from the Venice In Peril exhibition. The John White Memorial Prize now has my name engraved on the silver plate and is in my safekeeping until the end of the year when I have to return it back to the gallery in time for it to be awarded to the next winner in the 2013 exhibition. Thank God I did'nt lose it on the way home!

The Lost Garden - Finished

2012-02-26T13:19:00.000-08:00

Finished it today as planned. It has'nt come out exactly as I envisioned but they never do, do they? I was going to have a lot of broken colour but I painted it in the way that was natural to me which I guess is the right way to do it. By all means absorb influences but you have to paint the way that it seems like your subconscious wants to express itself and I suppose that you have to get out the way and let it get on with it! There will be a companion picture to this but not sure what yet; I am thinking of a snow scene very near to where I live but I will sit on it for a couple of days and see what I want to do then.

The Lost Garden - Fifth day

2012-02-25T08:47:00.000-08:00

Put in most of the basic snow underpainting today which now gives me an idea of how the lighting is working. I need the snow to be on the dark side but still looking bright in relation to the light at this time of day. The sun has to be the lightest element of a picture that otherwise should have an atmosphere of palpable freezing cold! Hoping to finish the painting tomorrow.......

Pratiques des Arts - Upcoming feature on my work

2012-02-25T08:27:00.000-08:00


Current issue

I have now had confirmation that the feature on my work will be published in issue no. 103 which will come out in late March 2012. I am pleased that they have decided to go with a different step-by-step section to the one that was originally planned and will now be of the painting "Cuckmere Meanders to Seaford Head".

The Lost Garden - Fourth day

2012-02-21T08:42:00.000-08:00

I have decided to retain the Caspar David Friedrich feel to the ruins and trees which apart from a little more work on the trees are ready for the blue/violet snow and mist to be added on top. I need to get the foreground ready tomorrow which I have already made a start on; all the pinky grey areas will be overpainted with the blue/violet snow which I will keep on the darkish side as I want the lightest part of the picture to be the sun. The eventual overall colours of the painting will be around the yellow/blue-violet complementary axis.

The Lost Garden - Second day

2012-02-19T09:48:00.000-08:00

After my little hiatus away from the studio I have finally been able to get on with the new picture. You will notice first of all that I am not having a sunburst as originally envisioned but I have changed my mind over the intervening days and decided instead to opt for a wan sun low in the Winter sky. The important thing about this picture is to get across the muffled atmosphere of the snow-covered landscape, it has to look quiet, icy cold and somehow suspended in time. There will be no footprints in the snow for instance, it has to look deserted, forgotten. All today's work has been the acrylic underpainting, putting down colours that will sit under the snow so at the moment it looks a bit messy! The composition should start to come through when the snow is painted in. It reminds me of Caspar David Friedrich at the moment...no bad thing!

The Lost Garden - First day

2012-02-15T02:53:00.000-08:00

After a four day hiatus (see previous post) I am up and running again on a new painting. It is set in the grounds of Sudely Castle which I am going make into a cold winter snow scene. There will be a low sunburst on the horizon a third in from the left which will set off some nice yellows, oranges and sienna's on the nearest ruins in an otherwise cold picture made up of blues, blue/greens and violets. I intend to introduce some touches of sienna's and dull oranges into the foreground to give the painting more unity of colour and I see the whole picture being quite dabby in that I want broken lines and broken colour. The strong design will be offset by subdued light (apart from the sunburst) and broken line and colour so that it is more like a pattern. I want to try and evoke that muffled sound that the landscape has when covered in snow. Unfortunately I now have to be away until Saturday so I am unable to get on with it until effectively Sunday - kind of regretting that four day hiatus but I needed it to recharge batteries.

Quantity Control - A musing

2012-02-13T09:07:00.000-08:00

It is now time to move on to the next painting and I seem to have come up against one of my "Oh-what's-the-point?" frames of mind. Just because you can does'nt mean that you should just bang out yet another painting. In these uncertain times when paintings that should normally sell are not, is there any point in banging out another unless it has something to say? The world seems stuffed to the gills with paintings to me, sometimes they are just paintings by artists that seem to just churn them out - for instance landscapes painted quickly in a loose "painterly" fashion of which there now seems to be zillions, one artists' work being indistinguishable from another because that literally is the "fashion" of what much landscape art should look like these days. Well OK you can say that Art is therapy, particularly as far as the artist is concerned as in my case when I realised a year ago that I need to paint pictures to keep myself feeling positive and alive.....but should that be enough of a reason to foist yet more of them onto an unconcerned world? I think we need to exert Quantity control as well as well Quality control on what we produce. For example I could have started a painting straight after completion of the last one, it would have turned out alright but essentially it just would have been more "stock" that would lie around in my studio and remain unsold, assuming that is that it had even made it as far as a gallery wall in the first place - I have a lot of them already! A painting has to stand out from the crowd these days, it needs to be considered, have something to say and dare I say it, be beautiful in some way. By just standing back for a while and not jumping straight in to another painting willy nilly surely then there is the time to hone the elements of composition, colour, subject and concept into the painting that will then have real quality and power that will lift it above the ordinary so that it it is what it is meant to be, Art not Product......or is it a case of "Shut up Mark and get on with painting!"?

International Artist Magazine

2012-02-08T16:19:00.000-08:00

My painting "From The White Horse" has been selected for their "International Artist Challenge No: 68 Landscapes" competition and will be published in the April/May 2012 issue no: 84. This was a painting started on location in acrylic and finished in the studio in oil.

Full Moon High and Over - Finished

2012-02-07T07:18:00.000-08:00

Finished the painting this morning, hopefully another one for the Medici Gallery show in June. It has come out fairly near to how I intended, I did'nt want it to be too dark and I wanted it to be subtly colourful and I seem to have avoided it being too much influenced by Atkinson Grimshaw. On to the next painting - not sure what the subject will be yet!

Full Moon High and Over - Fourth day

2012-02-03T09:34:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow I will paint in the water and the reflections of the moon and then I can get on with the foreground and start to work on getting the feeling of distance it needs. I want it to have more colour in it, all the darks should be blues and I am going to have some orange/yellow lights on in the windows of a few houses - after all the painting is based on a blue/orange complementary axis.

Pratiques des Arts

2012-02-03T09:14:00.000-08:00


Current Issue

I suddenly noticed a few days ago that I was getting a lot of hits on my website from France and realised that the issue with my painting in it must be out so I emailed them for a copy as I am unable to buy it in England. They run a feature in each issue on a specific subject, this issue being about snow. I am not sure how they came across my work but it is nice to have it seen in France and indeed the other parts of Europe where the magazine is available.

Fair Oak Art and Craft Society - All was well

2012-02-02T07:42:00.000-08:00

My first painting demonstration seemed to go pretty well, I had a nice email from Linda Butcher of the Society thanking me for my "passion for the subject and the media" and "my laid back manner" and said that they would like me to come back perhaps next year. It was a friendly and attentive audience and I can only hope that I did'nt confuse them too much! The Society has a busy programme throughout the year, they look very well organised and I guess that there must be many more around the UK just like them that rely on the enthusiasm of people like Chris Moore and Linda Butcher etc who are prepared to put the unselfish effort in to keep things going.

Thank you to Cliff Wright for driving me there and taking the photo's; we had a fun day taking photographs in the New Forest earlier in the day - I will post a few later on Facebook.

Full Moon High and Over - First day

2012-01-30T14:25:00.000-08:00

As a companion picture to "Cuckmere Meanders to Seaford Head" I have chosen a view of the same valley but a mile inland at another favourite location, "High and Over", a National Trust site midway between Cuckmere Haven and Alfriston in East Sussex. I intend this one to be under the light of a full moon and want a magical feel to it without being a Fantasy painting as such. Atkinson Grimshaw is my starting point on this one, my main concern being that I don't want the painting to be too dark and I am looking at a blue/orange complementary axis again but this time much less saturated colour using Yellow Ochre, Prussian Blue and Permanent Orange as the root colours.

Cuckmere Meanders to Seaford Head - Finished

2012-01-30T08:59:00.000-08:00

I tried as near as I could to get across how it looks like when the low Autumn sun is shining into your eyes reflecting off the water as opposed to how a photograph taken in the same situation would expose for the reflection and everything else would be dark and underexposed. I have subtly distorted the shapes and perspective to give it more of a birds-eye-view of the landscape than you would see if you actually stood on this spot; it is very near to the the same spot where the famous painting by Eric Ravilious must have been located. On to it's companion picture now.....

Brown Trousers Day - My first painting demonstration

2012-01-23T13:51:00.000-08:00

I had a message arrive last night on my answerphone reminding me of my forthcoming art demonstration at the Fair Oak Art Society on the first of February. Needless to say that I had completely forgotten about this, so after a panic-stricken five minutes of feverish, sphincter-tightening confusion I rang the person who was the organiser desperately hoping I could wing it to sound like a professional artist enquiring about a few last minute details that I was'nt sure about. Fortunately it turned out that it was being held near Eastleigh not far from Southampton which I reckoned I could get to by train as I have no car and indeed can't drive. I had agreed to do it when I was demonstrating at Art in Action last year in a moment of possible hubris on my part as I have never done this before as a solo performer as it were.

So I have agreed to do an oil painting demonstration in front of about 35 people; they have an easel, all I need is paints, brushes etc.....and to bring some paintings to show what I do. Luckily I have arranged instead to go there in Cliff Wright's van who has kindly offered to drive over so I will be able to take everything I need and then some. We have decided to make it (weather permitting) a Grand Day Out, taking in a bit of The New Forest and a hopefully luxurious cream tea in a cottage tea house of choice - I will pay for the petrol....and the cream tea of course!

Now I have had a chance to think about it for the demonstration I have decided to take over another landscape painting of Cuckmere Haven that I have pre-painted in acrylic as far as the underpainting in Van Dyke Red stage. This means that I can start straight away in oils and get as much done as I can in the two hours and have a print to show (like cookery programmes that show "something I did earlier") of the finished painting of the earlier Cuckmere Haven picture which it should closely resemble. By painting a scene that I have done several times before I can hopefully give myself a chance of being able to paint in front of all those people without making a complete fool of myself as at least it should be familiar to me, including what colours to use etc.

I'm still going to wear brown trousers though........

Cuckmere Meanders to Seaford Head - Third day

2012-01-23T08:29:00.000-08:00

After painting in the background hill I decided to make a start on the "dazzle" of the sun reflecting off the water as I will key the landscape around it to that brightness. I don't want to make the rest of the valley too dark so I need to pretty much finish this area first and then paint in everything else relative to the "dazzle". As ever in my landscapes I am mixing a lot of Ultramarine Violet into Viridian and Hookers Green to get the desired mixes for the greens, particularly for the distant trees. I am also adding tints of Ultramarine Blue into the greens for the distant hill and valley greens.

Cuckmere Meanders to Seaford Head - First day

2012-01-21T13:23:00.000-08:00

After the disappointment of not getting any of the pre-selected paintings into the Royal Society of British Artists exhibition I decided to get on with a new painting. I wanted a change from the previous two pictures and fancied some nice flowing shapes after the rigidity of the verticals and horizontals of the seafront paintings and chose to revisit a favourite Sussex landscape, the Cuckmere Valley as it approaches Cuckmere Haven. I intend to have the lighting like my previous Cuckmere Haven painting with the low afternoon sun (not quite in the picture) reflecting on the river meanders in a vertical line but with more of a dazzle than the earlier painting. The picture below shows it with the initial layer of acrylic colour on top of my usual tonal underpainting in Liquitex Van Dyke Red.

I Win a Prize! - The Venice in Peril Exhibition

2012-01-18T09:24:00.000-08:00

I went to the private view last night of the Venice in Peril exhibition at the W.H. Patterson gallery in Albemarle Street, London and was delighted to find out that I had won a prize for one of my paintings "Fondamenta de la Preson".

Fondamenta de la Preson

The prize was The John White Memorial Prize for the best picture in the show and took the form of a silver plate which is having my name engraved on it before I pick it up in a couple of weeks time - I have to give it back next January though for the next winner! While I was there I met Elly Evans, the lady that had bought one of my paintings at the previous year's show. After talking with her for a while I was called away to receive the prize during which time she made a snap decision on the spot and promptly bought this one too - good for her!

Elly Evans and the painting

Receiving the prize

Give Me Shelter - finished

2012-01-16T09:41:00.000-08:00

I finished the painting today and am now moving on to do a couple of landscapes in the same format as I am finding the double-square shape a nice change from the past ten years working in a square format. I am still having problems with photographing it with a digital camera, the way they are set up seems to bring out contrast particularly when it comes to blues and oranges which is probably why they take great pictures in low/artificial light. Despite some use of Photoshop to try and remedy the contrast the shelter still does not stand out against the background quite as it appears in the image above!

Painter in Paradise - Walter Spies

2012-01-15T08:04:00.000-08:00

Die Landschaft und Ihre Kinder

Walter Spies was born in Moscow in 1895, the son of a diplomatic family. His colourful life would make a great film but until then a very good fictionalised book about his life in Bali, Indonesia called "Island of Demons" by Nigel Barley will have to suffice. Although a work of fiction it has been very well researched and as there has been no proper artist biography yet published (that I know of) this book gives you an insight into his life and indeed how life was for the small group of Western artists that settled on the island in the 1930's. If one has past lives I can only hope that I was there at this time, certainly my Paradise!

Island of Demons

After an association with F.W. Murnau in Berlin when he helped the film director on "Nosferatu" he left for the Dutch East Indies in 1923 going first to Java and then settling in Bali in 1927. Spies immediately immersed himself in the fabulous culture of the island every aspect of which fascinated him. He learnt to speak Balinese and became an expert (and innovator) on Balinese culture, so much so that during the 1930's when the island was visited by the rich and famous such as Noel Coward, Charlie Chaplin and the heiress Barbara Hutton, it was he that was called upon to be their guide to all that the island had to offer.

Iseh in Morgenlicht

In addition to composing music, studying the flora and fauna, photographing and filming ceremonies and adapting ancient dances into new forms, he was a painter. Due to the constant distraction he did not produce a huge body of work, most of the paintings being sold to Western visitors which means that they are spread all over the world and is difficult to mount a proper exhibition.

Leyak-Legong

I came across his work on my first visit to Bali in 1986 when I was an illustrator specialising in fantasy and Science Fiction and was immediately struck by it's strong use of design and contrast whilst still retaining a soft fantasy element. I started to adopt the way he used a layering of planes of distance in my own illustration work and in 1994 I went there with the specific intent of setting up a model in full dance costume for a picture painted purely for myself, the above "Leyak-Legong".

Jungle Scene

River Landscape

After what must have been an idyllic life from 1927 to 1939 life began to get difficult. As he was German and Germany had invaded Holland of which Bali was a colony, the Dutch authorities arrested him as a potential spy (like any other German national in the Indies) and he was sent to an internment camp in Sumatra. Although it was difficult he managed to keep on painting and composing music while he was there ("Sumatran Landschaft" below was painted there in 1941) but eventually due to the threat of the Japanese invading the Dutch East Indies all the inmates including Spies were put on board a ship bound for Ceylon in 1942. Tragically the ship was bombed one day out of port by a Japanese plane and started to sink. The Dutch crew abandoned the ship but failed to allow the prisoners out of their cabins so most of them including Spies died drowning in a slowly sinking ship. Can you see now why his life would make a great movie?!

Sumatran Landschaft

A Nice Review!

2012-01-10T08:35:00.000-08:00

Click here to see review

I have had a very nice review of my work currently on exhibition at the Medici gallery in London on a blog called Inscape. It is a review of art that can be seen for free in London that has to be in walking distance of the flat where the blogger lives who obviously has a wide-ranging breadth of taste in the art that they appreciate as can be seen from the esteemed company that I am keeping! You should be able to view the blog by clicking on the image, otherwise it is:
www.walktofreeartlondon.blogspot.com/2012/01/140-midnight-promenade-by-mark-harrison.html

Give Me Shelter - Sixth Day

2012-01-09T08:39:00.000-08:00

I've painted a few layers of blue glaze on the sky but it still has a lot more needed before I get to the depth of colour I am looking for. The sky is actually already darker than it appears in this photo but the digital camera keeps trying to put more contrast in! The roof of the shelter is meant to be a similar tone to the sky above so as you can see there is a way to go yet. The emphasis of the painting will be the looming shape of the shelter in front of an horizon of warm, glowing artificial lights.

Artists & Illustrators magazine - February 2012 issue

2012-01-07T13:47:00.000-08:00

Current issue

I was delighted to see that "San Marco Snow" has been chosen as the "Picture of the Month" in the "Portfolio" feature in the current issue. It is great that they have given it a whole page and also that it has reproduced well as I often find that the files that I supply to magazines etc come out on the dark side and despite my screen being calibrated I have to darken it further to attain a more accurate reproduction - the iMac's screen is set way too bright for professional use! .....and I have just noted in the small print that I've won a Da Vinci watercolour brush box set and a Winsor & Newton half-pan metal sketchers box!

Give Me Shelter - Second day

2012-01-05T10:05:00.000-08:00

Painted in the first layer of colours and made a start on the clouds today. The sky will be much darker when it's finished and hopefully the lights will have a strong glow emanating from them. I plan to have the horizon areas dominating the painting with the shelter quite dark and not too silhouetted against the sky - it's all about the glow from the artificial lights against the natural light of the sky.

Give Me Shelter - First Day

2012-01-04T13:46:00.000-08:00

This is the start of a companion painting to "Here Comes The Night" the location being on virtually the same spot on Hove seafront. Incidentally I must mention here that a gallery owner said that it is always a good idea to think of paintings in pairs as in his experience a potential buyer will often buy both paintings if they have sufficiently fell in love with one of them and have seen them hanging together. Also it means, as has happened to me, that when one sells a painting it is typical that somebody else comes along who also wanted to buy it; well this time you already have a similar painting that may well suit them available for sale.

This will be another intensely coloured painting with a brooding dark blue sky with some dramatic dark clouds on the right of the picture. I bought myself James Gurney's book "Color and Light" for Christmas and was particularly struck with his system of combining colours he calls "Gamut Mapping" but due to my choice of high saturation on this painting I'm not sure if I can apply it in this case. The colours will be based on a blue/orange complementary axis bringing in reds and yellows with some sort of green in the seafront shelter paintwork. The plan is to be pin sharp for the foreground shelter and then the background recedes into a softer and more painterly resolution, much the same way that "Depth of Field" works in photography.
I'm slightly panicking about the distortion of perspective on the shelter but seems neccessary due to the viewpoint (and vanishing points) being so near to the ground. Still, should have some fun tomorrow when it comes to laying in some colour....

Cuckmere Haven Giclée Prints For Sale

2012-01-01T06:23:00.000-08:00

Cuckmere Haven

I now have available a signed limited edition (75) giclée print of "Cuckmere Haven" for sale at £75.00 plus postage. The image area is 14" x 14" (36 cm x 36 cm) and is a high quality print using archival inks on archival paper, the printer having had access to the original oil painting to ensure colour accuracy.

There are also mounted prints available at £85.00 measuring 21" x 22" (53 cm x 56 cm) available for sending only to the UK or EU otherwise they will be rolled up in a tube unmounted. Postage and packing will cost £3.00 for unmounted and £10.00 for mounted prints.

"Cuckmere Haven" was painted on location in acrylic and finished in the studio in oil and was selected for exhibition at the Royal Institute of Oil Painters annual exhibition at the Mall Galleries, London in 2010. The original painting has now been sold.

The Brushwork of Scott Burdick

2011-12-22T12:23:00.000-08:00

Born 1967 in Chicago, Illinois Scott Burdick credits Bill Parks at the American Academy of Art for his knowledge and enthusiasm and by the looks of it, a lot of things that I would love to know about colour! He then went on to study at the Palette and Chisel Art Club where he met his wife Susan Lyon, another very good artist; they share a website (a very large and compehensive one!) where there is a large painting archive of both of their work as well as details of books, videos etc.

Of particular interest to me are the paintings where he shows the brushwork by photographs that progressively approach nearer and nearer to the picture surface to a point where they become lovely abstract pieces in their own right. I love the rich, creamy colour and the way that it has been applied to the canvas. Personally I have'nt been able so far to deal with thick paint application and always end up applying it in a way that is more natural for me, thin and a bit smeary! I guess that this may be an interesting point, one should by all means try different approaches but in the end one hopefully arrives at something that is natural to oneself but informed by the different roads taken along the way!

African Colours

For a closer look at Scott Burdick and Susan Lyons work visit their website:

Korinne

www.scottburdick.com

Venice in Peril - 2012 Exhibition

2011-12-22T03:48:00.000-08:00

I have two paintings in the upcoming annual Venice in Peril exhibition at W.H. Patterson, 19 Albemarle Street, London, 18 January to 17 February 2012. They are "Bridge of Sighs" and "Fondamenta de la Preson". Both the gallery and the artist donate 10% of their sales to the fund that fights for the restoration and indeed the survival of the most beautiful city in the world, La Serenissima.

Fondamenta de la Preson

Bridge of Sighs

Royal Society of British Artists - Pre selection

2011-12-21T08:36:00.000-08:00

I have had three paintings accepted for the pre-selection phase for their annual exhibition at the Mall Galleries, London 29 February to 10 March 2012. Here's hoping that even one gets finally accepted of the following paintings!: "Street Corner Blues", "Morning Mist, High and Over" and "At The End Of The Day".

Street Corner Blues

Morning Mist, High and Over

At The End Of The Day

Artists & Illustrators magazine

2011-12-21T07:50:00.000-08:00

Current Issue

One of my snow paintings "San Marco Snow" has been selected for inclusion in the Portfolio Plus feature on winter snow paintings in the upcoming January 2012 issue.

San Marco Snow

Here Comes The Night - finished

2011-12-19T08:21:00.000-08:00

I put the finishing touches down yesterday and I am now looking for a suitable subject for the next painting required for exhibition at the Medici Gallery in June 2012. As this is a series of intensely coloured land/city scenes I have decided to set a lot of them at dusk when I get the mix of natural and artificial light that I require for the effect that I am looking for. I might even set the next one in Venice even though the city has been painted ad ifinitum as my painting's subject will be colour, mood and texture not Venice per se and I will probably not include any landmark buildings for that reason.

Here Comes The Night - Third day

2011-12-12T08:15:00.000-08:00

I have put on the first glaze of the sky now, it will eventually be a pretty intense orange/pink to contrast against the green/blues in the bathing hut and the scumble that will go over the foreground shadow areas, everywhere else will be warm oranges/yellows. Please note that nowhere is finished yet!

Here Comes The Night - early days

2011-12-10T09:59:00.000-08:00

After the debacle of "The Big Sky" it feels good to be getting on with a painting that seems to be going well (so far!). This is a painting size that I used to feel was quite large (18" x 36") but after trying to deal with the metre-square area of "The Big Sky" it seems quite small and unintimidating. It came out of a request from the Medici Gallery for some intensely coloured land/cityscapes for the June exhibition. I suddenly recalled a location very near to where I live that looks great at dusk when the artificial street lighting comes on. I went down to the seafront in the daytime to quickly sketch what I had in mind (seen in the sketchbook above the painting in the first photo) but had to return at dusk as I needed to see what the colours were in the shadow areas of the foreground beach hut and brickwork. It turns out that the beach hut, pale green in the daytime, needs quite a tricky combination of glazing/scumbling a palish grey/green/blue over a muted purple/green underpainting. The sky will be rosy pink/orange so green/blue in the shadows will be a logical complementary; a mix of Prussian Blue and Red/Orange (with a tint of white) is providing a pleasing colour for the shadow colours everywhere else.

I just hope that I don't have to report later in the blog that it's all gone pear-shaped again!

Pratiques des Arts

2011-12-08T13:45:00.000-08:00

Current Issue

I had some good news yesterday when I received an email from a French art magazine called "Pratiques des Arts" asking me to send them some jpeg's of paintings for inclusion in a feature on snow scenes in the February 2012 issue. I was due to have my work featured in the November 2011 issue after being interviewed and photographed earlier this year but it was postponed for a later issue and was disappointed to hear this thinking that my chance for exposure of my work in France had passed by. It is a very good French language magazine that has elements of our "The Artist" magazine with many artists demonstrating their working methods with step-by-step sequences and also the kind of articles that our "Artists and Illustrators" magazine features.

The Big Sky - ninth day

2011-12-08T13:23:00.000-08:00

Oh dear....I have decided to knock this one on the head and move on. Paintings seem to have a mind of their own, sometimes they almost seem to paint themselves and other times it is like walking through treacle. At least I have learnt things from this, as indeed one seems to learn something from every painting. I think the size proved to be one factor; because it was a large (to me) painting I felt pressured to make it work somehow to justify the scale and time spent on it and was'nt able to relax and enjoy it. I have also realised that you still need big shapes just as in small paintings to give it a dynamic composition. I somehow got bogged down in too many small shapes and consequently the sky looks too bitty. I also really don't like the composition as to the relationship of the landscape to the sky either so all in all, leave it be. Maybe one day I can come back and rescue it......

So it's on to the next one - "Here Comes The Night".

The Big Sky - Seventh and eighth days

2011-12-05T14:22:00.000-08:00

By the seventh day I had pretty much finished the sky and decided to quickly paint in the Sussex landscape that I had chosen to use.

I always had in mind that the sky would be warm (no blues) and not too dark and then the landscape would be painted in dark, rich colours mainly reds and greens with a small figure picked out against the sky. But once I had roughed it in I really did'nt like it! Compositionally it was boring and due to a lot of the landscape being in the distance, I was'nt able to introduce the rich and textured colours that I intended. Over this morning's breakfast coffee which I find is the best time to evaluate the day's work ahead I started to consider giving the picture up as an heroic failure and use the lessons I had learnt on the next one. Fortunately I began to nail down what was'nt working and began to see how I could rescue the painting. The big sweep of the sky needed to be interrupted with a series of verticals on the horizon and began to see how something like cypress trees could be introduced. A Tuscan landscape seemed a nice way forward (although nowhere specific as the picture is about a state of mind not a particular landscape) and with the inroduction of a farmhouse with nice potential for rich reds and textures against the greens, I decided to block in the new landscape. I will move the small figure more to the left so it is nearer to a third of the width (Golden Section) and will break up the far left of the hill with an umbrella pine (not put in yet). There will be an open door in the farmhouse with a warm light inside, an implication that the figure has gone out to stand on the hill contemplating whatever us, the viewer thinks. I just hope I am able to get the foreground working the way that I always intended and keep the colours rich but not too dark.

The Big Sky - The fifth day

2011-12-01T14:34:00.000-08:00

I now have most of the cloud shapes sorted out but worried about the three-dimensionality of it. The nearest level of clouds need to have more volume painted into them for the sky to start working. Tomorrow I make the choice between applying the thin red ochre wash and then carrying on with sorting out the clouds as I will have a better idea how the "glow" is working or
holding back on the wash until I am happy with what I have so far. I have at least realised that to give a sky air and volume, you have to think of it in layers one in front of the other and then try and differentiate one layer from another by using colour and tone in what is known as Aerial Perspective, which is quite apt really!

I want the whole painting to have a very warm feeling to it with dark, rich colours in the landscape - this also undecided at the moment! It was going to be a tiny figure on a seashore but I am tempted to have the figure walking along a path along an escarpment similar to my local landscape The South Downs in the UK.

[re]VIEW - A new book about my work

2011-12-01T08:34:00.000-08:00

I have recently produced a new book about my work, designed and written by myself. It covers my work as an illustrator, through the transition years to my current work as an artist.

It consists of eighty pages with twelve chapters that include an overview of my early work as an illustrator, my fascination with South East Asia, the period of experimentation with gold and metallic surfaces and a breakdown of my current work such as landscapes and cityscapes. It has an hundred and eleven full colour illustrations, softbound A4 size.

They are available at £15.00 each plus postage - currently £2.00 for the UK and the EU, the rest of the world £3.50. If you wish to purchase one please contact me through this blog, Facebook, or email me at: msj.harrison@tiscali.co.uk

Jeremy Lipking ...and the Colour Green

2011-11-28T14:52:00.000-08:00

Nymphe du Bocage

At The Door

Porcelain

Diaphanous Gown

Reflection

Reclining Nude Figure

Flor de Muertos

Born in 1975, Jeremy Lipking has quickly gained a reputation as one of America's foremost Realist painters, being compared to John Singer Sargent and Joaquin Sorolla - well I would'nt go that far but I do love his controlled use of colour and tone. He has a great way of using green for example, with his compositions sometimes seeming to be just about placement of areas of colour around a figure, also beautifully painted of course. There are many videos of him demonstrating his painting methods on Youtube as well as a dvd and book which can be purchased from his website: www.lipking.com. Check out his blog at www.jeremylipking.blogspot.com

The Big Sky - the third day

2011-11-27T13:35:00.000-08:00

By now I have sorted out most of the cloud shapes, bear in mind that the sky is imaginary and am making it up as I go along. The apparent hole in the middle of the sky above the horizon is planned to be very bright as if looking into the sun and at this stage I have only started to work on the general golden light which will be achieved (hopefully) with a scumble of yellow/white. I want the greenish blue to show through the semi-opaque scumble so that the sky colour has more interest and luminosity. The next stage would be a wash of thin red/ochre to unify the colours; this layer will hopefully sit over areas of stronger colour and produce some interesting combinations...but that is in a few days time!

The Strange World of Franz von Stuck

2011-11-26T14:01:00.000-08:00

Wild Chase

Salome

Autumn Evening

The Sphinx

The Kiss of The Sphinx


Franz von Stuck 1863 - 1928

Sensuality

Seaside Sunset

Born in Bavaria, Germany, Franz Stuck was made a peer of the Bavarian Crown in 1905 and entered the art establishment after an early career as a co-founder of the Munich Secession, related to it's contemporary in Vienna but instead of being centred on decorative Symbolism the Munich branch was more intense, incorporating Symbolism and Expressionism. Influenced by Bocklin, von Stuck delighted in images of eroticism and femmes fatales, his most famous images being of women and snakes - surely the precursor to the work of Frank Frazetta many years later. He also painted some very moody and atmospheric landscapes.There is a book of his work published in 1995 by Taschen which is probably out of print now but possibly old copies can be bought on Amazon.

The Medici Gallery, London

2011-11-26T09:50:00.000-08:00

Following a meeting in my studio with the Gallery Director on Wednesday 24 November I am pleased to announce that I will exhibiting my work in The Medici Gallery, Cork Street, London commencing with two paintings in the New Year Exhibition 5 January to 29 February 2012 followed by eight to ten paintings in "People and Places" 7 June to 5 July 2012. The paintings to be exhibited in January are "Midnight Promenade" and "Away From It All".

The Big Sky - first day

2011-11-26T09:26:00.000-08:00

Here is a photo of my new painting "The Big Sky". This is one of the largest paintings I have done and measures a metre square. At this stage I have "banged in" some basic cloud shapes which I will develop in the next session. I intend the final sky to be in glowing yellows and oranges which will be achieved with glazes and scumbles once I am happy with the design of the sky.