Category Archives: oil

View from the Chevin

Posted on by
Reply
View from the Chevin IV, oil painting on paper. The last and favourite of my recent quartet of paintings about the view from the Chevin. This one sums it up best, the way I saw it in my head. I did a drawing with my eyes shut first to help me realise this. The town of Otley is represented by the brown lines, the reservoirs are in the mid disance and the Yorkshire Dales are beyond the horizon.

View from the Chevin IV

View from the Chevin III, watercolour. View of Otley from the Chevin - the hill that hangs over the town on the south side. This one actually shows the houses - as well as trees and moors.

View from the Chevin III

I painted the view a few times.

A pencil drawing with my eyes shut. I could see what I wanted to paint, but only in my mind's eye, not on the paper. This drawing helped.

View from the Chevin, eyes shut

Oil painting on paper of the view from the Chevin, a hill overlooking Otley in Wharfedale, West Yorkshire. Keep going in the direction of the horizon and you get to the Yorkshire Dales.

View from the Chevin I

Clock changing woods

Posted on by
2

woods-23rd-march
woods 28th march
I’m losing sleep tonight. The clocks go forward and in the lost hour it feels like time to stop painting the trees and look for a different horizon.
Here’s a drawing with my eyes shut. It still looks like trees:
eyes shut drawing

Spring sun

Posted on by
10
Sunset woods

Saturday late afternoon

Green sun of Spring, Thursday afternoon

Thursday afternoon


A watercolour and an oil painting. The sun is warming up the woods. In the daytime the sun looks green, like spring.

Winter afternoons

Posted on by
6

Woods in February
Woods and deck
Poetry links:
The wistful whispering of winter woods, Jim Cunningham
There’s a certain slant of light, Emily Dickinson
Woods in Winter, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

And you can see some sketches here.

Like turpentine for water

Posted on by
5
Red Point - Wester Ross, NW Scotland - painted in oils from memory

Red Point, Wester Ross

River Wharfe

River Wharfe, Otley

New year, new technique. This is oil paint and turpentine, using the turps like water. The result is not the same as a painting in watercolour, but the liquid nature of the medium makes the physical act of painting similar.