FEBRUARY WRAP-UP

Shown below are a few odd pics completed in February.

I saw this guy fishing off a pier in Chelsea. Great location. I caught him plein air, then worked this pic up in the studio. Don't like it much!

Claire gave me some daffodil bulbs, so I painted them a few times... first in a mirror.

Then without a mirror.

Then a few days later, with good tonal values. I like this one!

An old aluminium jug that hangs around the studio. Don't like.

An old pulley and a glass jug that hang around the studio. Like composition, colours and textures.

Painted from a photo, I've painted an almost identical pic before. Like the subject and tone and colours. 

Stepped outdoors from some plein air, firstly on Barnes Green.

Then Wimbledon common

Then Bishops Palace

And finally Teddington lock. I've been thinking a lot about tonal values and colour recently. I took a look at the marvelous Peter Brown show at Messums. Can't recommend it highly enough. I noticed several wonderful things about his paintings, but the most notable to me was how his pics really use the full tonal range, with LOTS of black paint... or damn near to black. When the colour is not black, but the tone is, he manages to retain some colour, which gives a really rich appearance to his pictures. In this really rough sketch I concentrated on emulating this principle. There's something about the pic I like. Not sure what. Maybe I succeeded.