Life drawing at the St Ives School of painting

Some life studies from the midweek St Ives session. It's always a pleasure to return here to the drop in classes, up the stairs to the studios, and a challenging set of 10 and 15 minute poses, run by Steve Dove, who always makes for a relaxed and friendly class.

Sky and sea watercolour studies

While the weather remains unsettled, I am looking out of the window and working at the table after breakfast

In St ives for our holidays, and while the weather has closed in with storms whipping up the sea I sit at the breakfast table and make a quick watercolour sketch

A still life

some objects on a table top, the time honoured subject of artists, feels a bit like homework, but becomes interesting when the positive and negative forms are seen and worked, it has also been a while since I worked in pencil, apart from sketching 

View from the studio in watercolour

I keep thinking of a conversation I heard on the radio , discussing creative pursuits ( music, art, writing ) and that the good work is made when there is uncertainty. Making something new takes courage, and the conversation discussed the idea that "writers block", or the inability to work is a failure of this courage; the fear taking over. In order to keep working I have to manage that lack of courage, the fear, and know when to stop and when to keep working regardless of a clear sense of direction. ( Lauren Laverne talking to Ben Folds on 6 Music )

The dead tree and an imagined landscape

At the top is the attempt I made to paint the dead tree outside the house in Guildford,home to a fox which sat in the branches in the morning sun , and below is one of the remembered landscapes, which recall the view from Grovely to Fovant both are in watercolour.  

We are here in Guildford for another few days, and while I am here, I only have watercolours to work in. Using a block of landscape paper I have started to try some generic ideas, I find that I am painting the view from Grovely to Fovant that I know from home, there are some basic components that I am trying to convey, mastering the palette is an important part of this, in order to convey the sense of distance. Also how to make those blobs and dashes into convincing trees and shrubs.
 The block of apartments across the meadows, built in the sixties I am guessing, stand out against the green trees around them. But the rain has set in and I cannot see that I will get a chance to draw the view.