Landscape – Progression

by Deborah Watkins. Posted on May 21, 2012

21 May

This is a bog landscape I’ve been working on as it has progressed. This is how it looked after the first sitting. The colours were true in the sense that the landscape did seem a lovely pale colour when I squinted my eyes. However, I felt that the overall appearance of the painting at this stage was quite flat. I decided that it needed more contrast and I also needed to dilute the horizontal brown lines on the left which are distracting because they are parallel with the edges of the canvas.

I darkened the middle background of the canvas by adding more gold, orange and some green. Then I brightened up the sky with some blue and added more paint and detail to the foreground.

I’m calling this one finished. The golds and browns here remind me of the raku glazes I used when I made pots. There is a lovely element of surprise with ceramics (especially raku) when the glazed pot is revealed – I will write a post about my work as a potter soon. When I use paint and ink together as I have done here, I get a sense of this as the result is not entirely predictable. I love the way the colours bleed in to each other and this sometimes has a depth about it that is like looking at the fused layers of glass and colour on a glazed pot.

Bog Pool

by Deborah Watkins. Posted on May 14, 2012

14 May

Here is another photograph taken from the Bog Road, between Clifden and Roundstone. The road itself is like a ribbon of tarmac that bumps over the surface of the Bog ( top right of photograph ).
I’ve used the pool in the front of this picture as the inspiration for the painting below.

This piece is similar to one I finished recently but I’ve made the water a stronger feature in this one – I am going to do several more paintings about this area because there is much to work on. I’ve used straight lines to delineate the pool in the foreground where the cut earth has been flooded. I love this play between the uniform lines or human marks left by the bog cutting and the wildness of the place which ultimately takes over.

I worked this in one sitting while paint and ink were wet. I really enjoy the way that these two materials interact with each other and I feel that they lend themselves well to this subject.

Bog Paintings Series

by Deborah Watkins. Posted on May 10, 2012

10 May

I’m working on a series of paintings of the bog at the moment. This is a photograph I took out on the Bog Road, between Clifden and Roundstone. I like the strong direction of the Bog furrows across the land. Also, the combination of the Twelve Bens mountain range in the distance with the water in the middle distance, make for a rich composition.

I’ve used all of these features in the painting below. This one is done on a heavy weight acyrlic paper. I forgot to take a picture at the early stages so this is how it looks after quite a bit of work.

As you can see, I’ve deepened up the colours considerably ( these rusts and reds are truer later in the year ). I’ve also allowed the lake to bleed in to the bog, washing it away visually. I’ll come back to this one when the paint has dried but it doesn’t need too much more work.

New Bog Paintings

by Deborah Watkins. Posted on May 8, 2012

08 May

A supply of paint and canvas arrived in the post last week and so I began some new work enthusiastically with my fresh supplies. I have been thinking about some of my old paintings of the bog which I worked quite heavily with paint, something I haven’t done for a while. I decided therefore to apply as much colour as possible at the first sitting and try to build up several layers.
This piece is on a 5 x 5 inch canvas. The composition is based on a section of road that connects Clifden to the village of Roundstone called the ‘Bog Road’. I applied the paint thickly and loosely once I had sketched in a rough compostion with charcoal.

Once the first layer of paint had dried, I added more colour, especially to the foreground on the right (below). I felt it needed red but less roughly applied. I also added more green and gold here in small strokes to descrice this little gully at the side of the road. Then I altered the line where the land meets the sky slightly and added a touch of colour to the clouds as they seemed a bit flat..

I left the rest of the painting much as it was. I was keen to strike a balance with this one – not to overwork it (as I am inclined to do sometimes) and to use plenty of paint in layers, in sympathy with the subject.

Sketches in paint 2

by Deborah Watkins. Posted on March 28, 2012

28 Mar

These sketches are all based on the same scene, along the coast just outside the village of Claddaghduff, which is about seven or eight miles from Clifden.
In the vein of loose painting, I completed them very quickly (if they can be called complete). One is on a colored paper and the other two are on a heavy acrylic paper.

I enjoy working on a colored ground or paper and it is not quite the same thing as paper that I have colored myself, although I probably need to work on this. Psychologically, one feels more free straight away and I think this usually shows. It has something to do with the daunting hold a blank white sheet of paper has on the mind – it scares us a little. This really should not be the case for someone like myself who has been putting paint on paper since childhood but I do think that it is so.
The other point about these colored papers is that they are very light and not really designed for heavy applications of paint. They tend to buckle especially if larger in size than about A5. This does not bother me especially but may be off putting for a potential buyer/owner of the piece. What is your opinion?

Telegraph poles

by Deborah Watkins. Posted on March 13, 2012

13 Mar

Telegraph poles line the road ways here and are as much a part of the landscape as the scraggy Connemara sheep. There are large areas of protected land on which there is little evidence of any human interference save for the ubiquitous telegraph poles. The harsh winds in Winter bend the poles so that one in five ( or so it seems ) breaks the line and leans over drunkenly. The first two photographs show this and below them a painting of mine.

The telegraph poles and wires bring something to the landscape for me and more often than not I choose to include them in my work. They are after all a lifeline for the communities here. Of course, most people also have mobile phones nowadays but the uneven topography of the land and small population means that there are still pockets of land with no signal and so the telegraph wires are much needed for communication.
I use charcoal over acrylic paint to illustrate the poles and wires and I love the way these lines follow the line of the road and can bring life to a painting.

Too dark?

by Deborah Watkins. Posted on March 7, 2012

07 Mar

I worked on this piece a little more yesterday and then decided to call it a day. I felt it had come to the point where any further tinkering would be counter productive.
My own thoughts on it at this point are, on the negative side that it has become very dark, perhaps too dark. On the positive side, it has taken on a quality which seems vaguely other worldly to me and one which might be called interesting. Perhaps I’m stretching it here!
Anyway, I gave it a couple of coats of varnish and called it a day.

I use an acrylic gloss varnish which protects the surface from dust and dirt over time. It also gives a depth and richness to the colours, especially the darker and metallic shades. For me, its a bit like taking a pot out of the kiln after a glaze firing when the colours that I have applied really come to life. I tend to choose darker colours in my paintings because I’ve always found them more interesting to work with and because facts are facts, the climate here is pretty wet and grey most of the time. (This is a subject which I try not to harp on about too much in general conversation because there is always the risk of it developing in to an extended moan which just puts everyone in a bad mood! )
Can a painting be off-puttingly dark?

Bad day at the office

by Deborah Watkins. Posted on March 6, 2012

06 Mar

I had one of those days yesterday, you know the kind. Apparently, I got out of the wrong side of the bed and things just kept going slightly off. I spilt a couple of things, broke a mug and walked charcoal over three floors after a brief inspection of my work room.
Then I tried to tackle a painting commission with my four year old needing attention in the next room. Not a good idea.
I should have gone for that walk after breakfast – Resolve to go for a walk tomorrow morning regardless of weather!
Anyway, I decided to tackle this painting which has been sitting around my desk for a while. This is what it looked like as I got started. It is based on a scene from one of the islands off the coast here and I had roughed in the composition. I liked the lines going out to sea in the distance with the island shape in the far back ground.

I wanted to work in a sky line that I had seen on another occasion when driving home from Galway – so I was working from memory here. The clouds seemed so dark and heavy on that evening, they appeared suspended like physical objects.
This is how I left the painting yesterday. I’m going to leave it for a day or two before I varnish it as I might tweak it a bit.

The great thing about working with acrylics is that I get lots of chances to go over paintings again. There is no rule of thumb for me with this, sometimes the paintings that I have reworked a lot turn in to good paintings. Other times the ones that have been started and finished in a single sitting work well. It depends on the piece. I think this one needs a little more work, what do you think?

Welcome to my etsy shop!

by Deborah Watkins. Posted on February 29, 2012

29 Feb

Welcome to my brand new online shop with etsy.com!
I am very excited to be part of the etsy community of makers and artists at last and I invite you to browse my paintings and shop at your leisure. Click on the link in the sidebar opposite to go straight there.

I will shortly provide more easy links to etsy from here and visa versa to make it all a bit smoother. I am experiencing a very sharp learning curve here folks so bear with me!!

Here’s a sample below of what you will find in the shop.

This painting is of a scene just outside Clifden. I was standing on a hill near Clifden castle looking down at a little outcrop of trees near the water. The ground in front of the trees was waterlogged and reflected all kinds of shapes and colours which I deepened for effect here. I allowed the paint to bleed which became part of the piece and for me it resembles both the trees and the reflection of the land on the other side of the bay.
I love to receive your comments so don’t be shy and let me know what you think..