Landscape Watercolour of Lanzarote, 15" x 11".
A sketch of the very edge of the old part of Puerto del Carmen as it meets the side of some volcanic cliffs a very deep brown/red colour. The low rise white homes here create a nice contrast against the darker hill side and streets. Anyway I cheated with the dead-end road sign with a spot of white gouache - too time consuming to paint around it!
| |
|
Landscape Watercolour of Lynmouth, 15" x 11".
The seafront at Lynmouth in North Devon, looking towards the bright red medieval tower on the quayside and the Exmoor hills meeting the sea in the background. There was a lot of architectural details on the facades of the Victorian buildings here and I suppose the decision was whether to put them in or leave them out. Well I put some of them in with a bit of white gouache, so a compromise.
| |
|
Landscape Watercolour of Lanzarote, 15" x 11"
Another sketch of Haria, sitting in a sheltered valley surrounded by extinct volcanoes. I went quite dark with the background hills and of course to make it contrast with the bright white washed town buildings catching the afternoon sun. I think with hindsight I should have put in one or two figures to add interest and maybe not make the tops of the mountains so sharp.
| |
|
Landscape Watercolour of Lynmouth, 15" x 11"
A view of Lynmouth in North Devon, looking towards the Exmoor hills to the South. My painting was based on a black and white 1930's photo I found, so I had to change some details around buildings, people etc. Anyway the steps of this painting were, 1) sky and foreground wash, and then left to dry. 2) Far hills and then going darker for the middle ground hillside and doing some negative painting around the rooftops. 3) People and telegraph pole and 5) smoke rising from far building with some watered down gouache on dry paper.
| |
|
Landscape Watercolour of Cadeques, 15" x 11"
A composition of the church in Cadeques silhouetted by the mountains behind and a bit of sunlight coming in from the left. I set myself a limit of one hour for this painting ( with the aid of a hair dryer) hence a bit loose on the trees on the left and the house on the right. The mist on the mountains was achieved in wetting the lower part of the sky in a few places then leading up the darker mountain to it.
| |
|
Landscape Watercolour of Lanzarote, 15" x 11"
The small town of Haria in northern Lanzarote, is in the centre of the Valley of the Palms - a wide green valley dotted with random Canary Island Date Palms, with extinct volcanoes around the perimeter. A bit of dry brush strokes for the palm trunks is a quick way of understating them against the light.
| |
|
Landscape Watercolour of Mykonos, Greece, 15" x 11"
Mykonos, a small Greek Island and part of the Cyclades group. It's a very popular tourist destination I suppose because it's not too commercialised and has the iconic Aegean scenery of pretty villages and white washed houses. My sketch is of the New Port, a few miles away from the main Mykonos town and an early part of the morning when the air is still.
| |
|
Landscape Watercolour of Lanzarote, 15" x 11" on Saunders Waterford Rough Paper 140 lbs
Even on a dull overcast day, it's still bright on Lanzarote, emphasised I guess by the white-washed buildings. San Bartolome is almost in the centre of the island and has a nice square and church. Very very quiet when I visited there. I took the liberty of introducing a few more palm trees for my sketch than existed in reality, just to try and improve composition and interest.
| |
|
Landscape Watercolour of Lanzarote, 15" x 11" on Saunders Waterford Rough Paper 140 lbs
A quick study of a typical potato field on the Island of Lanzarote. Potatoes are one of the main crops on Lanzarote and they're a great local speciality tapas - Canarian Potatoes or wrinkly potatoes, served with spicy mojo sauce. Because the whole island is a series of dormant volcanoes, lava rock is in plentiful supply as a crushed black mulch for the crops, keeping the moisture in, and a building material for the boundary walls around the fields.
| |
|
Landscape Watercolour of Cadeques, 15" x 11" on Saunders Waterford Rough Paper 140 lbs
Cadeques on the Costa Brava, looking towards the centre of this town and the hills beyond that surround and shelter the location. I think the church tower silhouetted against the darker mountains worked well as do the understated white washed buildings in the middle ground left. Might have controlled the washes or altered the timings on the clouds ad mist coming into the hill tops.
| |
|
