As readers of this blog will know, I quite often use ink in conjunction with watercolour in my paintings. However, ink is a very useful medium in its own right, particularly for quick sketches.
St Clement church Burnham Overy Town. Stabilo 68 pen on Bockingford paper, 10ins x 8insThe work shown here is a sketch of St Clement church, Burnham Overy Town, which near the popular North Norfolk village of Burnham Market, just a mile or so from the coast. I made this sketch using a Stabilo 68 water-soluble pen. This enabled me to work over the sketch with a damp brush, softening the ink and brushing it out into areas of tone. It’s another way of showing tonal value, without using shading or hatching, and I find it has a rather attractive appearance. Although the ink appears black when you draw a line, diluting it with water reveals many subtle colours within it.
The Stabilo pen is very inexpensive and is available from some stationers. The 68 has a bullet tip which makes a fairly bold line that I personally like. There is a version with a finer tip the Stabilo 88, which is also well worth trying. If you can’t find these pens in your local stationers then you can buy them on-line from the SAA, the Society for All Artists.
I will be demonstrating this technique, along with many other uses of ink, at my Think Ink workshop, this weekend at West Norfolk Arts Centre, Castle Rising.
July is the month when the West Norfolk Artists Association hold its annual Summer Exhibition, usually in St Nicholas Chapel, King’s Lynn. This year was no exception and Wednesday 17th saw a team of us start the task of setting up the show. There’s a lot to do, with over 200 works being submitted, of which 155 were selected for exhibition. Nonetheless, we worked hard and by Friday lunchtime the exhibition was up and looking good.
Among the selected artworks were four of my own paintings, all of them in a combination of Indian ink and watercolour. Imagine my surprise when, at the grand opening of the show on the Friday evening, I was presented with the Inga Miller Award for a work selected by the committee of the WNAA. Inga was a dear friend of mine and a great supporter of the arts, who sadly passed away in January 2012, and the award is in her memory.In my studio with the cup that is presented by the WNAA committee in memory of the late Inga Miller, who was a great supporter of the Association and the arts generally
I feel very honoured to receive the award and the silver cup that goes with it, which is mine to keep for one year. Then it will be passed on to the next winner of the award. My thanks to all the committee members who voted for my painting “Three Trees at Sunset” which you can see here. To coin a phrase from Last of the Summer Wine, “your cheques are in the post!”Three Trees at Sunset. Ink & Watercolour 10ins x 10ins
Do call in to the Chapel and look round the exhibition if you have an opportunity. I think it’s one of the Association’s best exhibitions, with a wide variety of colourful and interesting work, plus the Chapel is a beautiful building. The show is open everyday 10am – 4pm from now until Saturday 3rd August. St Nicholas Chapel is in St Annes Street, King’s Lynn, Norfolk, PE30 1NH.
I had intended to post some entries on my blog while we were travelling in California, but pressures of time – so little time, so much to see – and a few wi-fi wobbles mean that it’s only now that I’m back home in Norfolk that I can post a couple of the sketches that I did out there.
Ideally, you need one holiday to explore a destination and then another one to go back and paint it. But, who has the time and resources to do that? So, I only got a few quick sketches done while we were away, and you can see two of them here. On the spot pen and wash on a 12ins x 9ins pad of Langton rough surface paper.Half Dome from Olmsted Point, Tioga Road, Yosemite. Pen and wash, 12ins x 9insMist Falls, King’s Canyon, California. Pen and wash 12ins x 9ins
Both the sketches were done in California’s amazing National Parks. Yosemite Valley has a huge wow factor with it’s gigantic stone monoliths. Half Dome is just that, like a pebble that’s been split in two. Except that it’s not a pebble, the top is nearly 5,000 feet above the floor of the valley. Awesome, as our American cousins would say. In King’s Canyon park the main feature is the King’s River, which was still a raging torrent at the Mist Falls depicted here. Also awesome and very dangerous – a hiker was swept over a few days before we were there.
I’ll probably do some Yosemite paintings before too long, it will be good to be back out in the studio. But it was a great trip!
The time has rushed by and this weekend will be the final one of the 2013 Norfolk Open Studios event. If you haven’t managed to make it along to my studio yet, Margaret and I would be very pleased to see you.
For those who know our village, take Station Road at the Dersingham traffic lights and follow it almost as far as you can go, about half a mile. When you see the old railway station on your left, now a builders yard, you will also see our Open Studio sign on your right! The address is 2 Alexandra close, Dersingham, King’s Lynn, PE31 6YU.Windswept Tree 2. Watercolour and Indian Ink. 8ins x 10ins.
My small ink and watercolour paintings seem as popular as ever, which is great because I really enjoy making them. Here’s one of the latest, which is in a series called Windswept Trees. Very appropriate at the moment as a chilly breeze never seems far away, but hopefully the weather will warm up, after all it is June now!
Speaking of warmer weather, I will be blogging from California for the next few posts, as we explore the landscape of San Francisco, Yosemite and other nearby national parks, so keep an eye out for a few sketches of what is supposed to be one of the most spectacular landscapes in the USA.
The past few days saw the first of the three Norfolk Open Studios weekends, and my studio was open along with three others in Dersingham. There were plenty of visitors too, but there’s still time if you haven’t managed to call in yet.Across Sunlit Fields to the Wash. Watercolour 20 ins x 13ins
I’ve got about ten new paintings on show, plus some old favourites and lots of sketchbooks etc. to look at. I sold loads of cards and prints over the weekend, so I’m busy topping those up too! One of the paintings that seems to be particularly popular is this view over the Wash, from Chalk Pit Road above the village of Ingoldisthorpe. A magical viewpoint really – I could sit there for hours just watching the changing light.
Do call in to the studio if you are in the area. I will be open 10am – 5pm on the next two weekends, 1st – 2nd and 8th – 9th June. The address is on my Contact page – look forward to seeing you!
We’ve been away for the past couple of weeks, hiking part of the Lycian Way, which is a long-distance footpath along the south coast of Turkey. Very hot, even at this time of the year!
I always take a sketchbook and pens with me on these trips, although often there isn’t much opportunity to stop and sketch. We were walking in a group, organised by Ramblers Worldwide Holidays, and with twenty people chatting away it can be difficult for the artist to find a bit of peace and quiet.A doorway in the ruined village of Kayakoy, Turkey. Ink on A5 cartridge paper.
However, the Lycian Way trip was not just walking, there were opportunities to see several historic sites. Roman, Greek and Lycian stonemasons have all left their mark on this landscape. We visited a ruined village, Kayakoy, not far from Fethiye, and while others in the party scrambled over the ruins, I managed to sit down and do this ink sketch in my A5 cartridge paper book.
Once you get a theme running through your paintings it can inspire you to keep producing more work. The painting you’re working on feels like the child of the one you’ve just done, and so on.
Here are some more trees that I’ve painted in the last week or so. Once again using Indian ink on 300lb weight paper, but this time with sunset colours of Ultramarine Blue, Burnt Sienna and Quinacridone Red.Three Trees at Sunset – Ink and Watercolour 10ins x 10ins
Paintings of this style work quite well in a square format I find, this one being around 10 inches square. I float frame the work to leave the edge of the paper showing. This makes the whole thing more interesting and works particularly well with fairly small works.
In my last post I mentioned that, if I’m stuck for inspiration, there are two subjects that I can always rely on – mooring posts and trees.
In that post I showed, well some posts! So, here are some trees that I’ve done recently.Three Trees – Ink and Watercolour 10ins x 10ins
Using a photograph as the initial reference, I lightly sketched the basic shape of the tree trunks onto a piece of 300lb Arches rough paper about ten inches square. This just makes sure that I get the trees in the right place on the paper for the best composition. I don’t make any attempt to draw in branches or detail at this stage, that happens when I get going with the ink. Using a number 4 round sable hair brush I draw directly onto the paper with Indian ink from a bottle. By dragging the loaded brush across the paper it’s possible to get some nice effects of texture, while the number 4 is fine enough to ink in the branches and a few twigs. I take care not to put in too many!
When the ink is dry, I paint the colours on using normal watercolour paint. The ink is water resistant so that it does not dissolve when painted over. Effectively there are only two complimentary colours used, blue and orange. The blues are Prussian Blue and Manganese Blue Hue, while the orange is mixed from Burnt Sienna and Lemon Yellow.
Try using this technique yourself, it makes a very striking image.
I’ve been getting back to traditional drawing skills just lately, and doing some work in pencil and in ink. The West Norfolk Artists Association, of which I am a member, is organising an exhibition of drawings, so I have been working on a few possible subjects.Mooring posts at Thornham Harbour. 4B pencil, 9ins. x 6ins.
When I get stuck for inspiration there are two subjects that never fail to provide some suitable material – trees, and mooring posts! For this pencil sketch I dug out some photos that I took at Thornham Harbour, up on the North Norfolk coast. It would have been nice to go up there and sketch on site, but it’s just too, too cold! This sketch may form the basis of a painting in due course, or it may just remain as a simple statement in 4B pencil.
The West Norfolk Artists Association exhibition is called Drawn to Attention and runs from Saturday 27th April until Saturday 11th May at Greyfriars Art Space, St James St. King’s Lynn. You can find out more about the WNAA at westnorfolkartists.org
Following on from the painting of King’s Lynn Customs House that I recently did with my Thursday afternoon group, I asked the group members to choose a view of another Heritage building of King’s Lynn and have a go at it using the techniques that we had just explored.
Here are a few of their paintings, which show the variety of subjects chosen and the skill with which they were rendered in watercolour. I’m sure that some of these will find their way into a local art club exhibition in due course. Well done everybody!Red Mount Chapel painted by AdieTrues Yard painted by GillLattice House, Chapel Street, King’s Lynn painted by JennyMarriott’s Warehouse, King’s Lynn painted by JoThe Duke’s Head Hotel painted by PaulPilot Street, King’s Lynn painted by LizPilot Street, King’s Lynn painted by TimThe Entrance to Hampton Court, King’s Lynn painted by PatSt Margaret’s Church painted by Mike
