The Importance of Photography Even though my main artistic discipline has always been painting, photography has been an essential part of my creative process. For me, drawing and painting on location is a must. The time that it takes to absorb and capture a scene through observational drawing is always time well spent. However, you […]
This post is following on from my recent blog post about the benefits of regular life drawing. I’m aware that it’s not always easy or practical getting along to a life drawing class. However one simple thing that most of us can do is have a go at drawing hands. My “warming up” exercises vary […]
We have just returned from another wonderful week in Umbria where we ran another Painting Holiday. Once again Chiesa del Carmine was the venue. For some of the guests it was their 3rd and 4th Painting Holiday in Italy with us and they have already re-booked for 2018 along with some our new guests this […]
Portrait Drawing There are no short cuts to achieving sound drawing skills. Regular practise at drawing from observation will pay off in most visual disciplines in art, whether it’s painting, sculpture, graphic design or even photography. Before working on a commission or a painting for exhibition I will often warm up for 10 to 20 minutes […]
A few weeks ago I was asked to write an article for the website of a new initiative here in the North East called Drawing. Drawing? is a 6 month long, region wide programme of exhibitions and events. It aims to explore drawing in art and culture and also in other areas such as science, […]
Every so often I like to set some kind of painting/drawing discipline to keep on top of my game. John Singer Sargent is one of the artists whose work I love to study. Good habits are hard to form and easy to break. Sadly the converse of that statement is also true! I tend to […]
I thought I’d begin my first blog post of 2013 featuring Drawing Camels by wishing you all God’s blessings for 2013 and by sharing one of my favourite quotes from the American artist John Singer Sargent: “You can’t do sketches enough. Sketch everything and keep your curiosity fresh”. It’s a statement which every artist will […]
Paintings of Newcastle The popularity of my limited edition prints is partially down to the fact that I usually include figures in the paintings. This helps to bring the painting to life. Over the years I spent considerable time observing people going about their daily business in cities. Some of my favourite cities are Newcastle upon […]
Charcoal I’m currently undertaking a number of portrait commissions at the moment, mostly in oils but some in charcoal. Emanuella was one of the portraits I drew when studying portraiture in Florence in 2011. She was drawn from life. Dominic was commissioned as a present for his 50th birthday in December 2011. I managed only […]
TIP 8 Don’t use too many colours! There are at least 96 colours in Winsor and Newton’s Artists’ watercolour range. I use about a dozen regularly which is enough for me. Spend some time finding out which ones you really like and experiment. The arrangement of different paints you can see on my drawing board […]