Sunday 1 February 2009

watercolour landscapes - semi-abstract

here I am again, doing something different. Read an article in a very old art magazine which inspired me to do some semi-abstract watercolours at my art group last week. I chose to work in an atc format for two reasons. 1) I could get more paintings finished in the two hours I had available and 2) I do love this small art format. And I can also get to swap them if anybody is willing. I decided to just use a couple of colours for each painting with a touch of a third.


here are the results:-


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using cadmium yellow and a mix of red and burnt sienna

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using alizarin crimson and ultramarine/burnt umber

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using cadmium red and cadmium yellow/lemon yellow
All the paintings were done wet into wet and the colours were arranged to represent a sky/foreground showing a level horizon. I worked into the nearly dry work with a cocktail stick to add a little extra detail for interest. You can see larger versions of these photos on my flickr photostream http://www.flickr.com/photos/shadfan66/.
Actually I was quite pleased with myself. Not only because I like the paintings but also because it has been so long since I used my watercolours. I think I am ready to try a larger format next week. I will let you know how it goes.
ADDENDUM: the artist concerned who inspired the above paintings with his article in the May 2006 issue of "The Artist" magazine was Justin Cooke. Check out his site there are some great paintings.

13 comments:

Sherry said...

Lovely paintings John, gorgeous colours. I wish I could paint!

I've been photo-tagged by Jan so am passing it on to you - but only if you want to play!

Ranie said...

John these are stunning I love watercolors. Now I'll have to go visit your flickr....

Rosie said...

These are stunning John - I love the last one!! How satisfying it must be to c reate these tiny landscapes... and I wondered how you created the little 'reeds', dancing on the breeze, thanks for sharing!!

John Dyhouse said...

Rosie, I assume that you are reading the marks made by the cocktail stick as "reeds dancing in the wind". You just catch the paint before it is dry and draw the stick quickly thro' to make a mark. As many or as few as you need to achieve the effect, but a warning... too many can look contrived.

Linda said...

John those are all just gorgeous! Great job!

Naj said...

I love them! Absolutely gorgeous!

Ange J Lee said...

VERY NICE JOHN! the first one is my favourite.....I really need to get my watercolours back out too!

My name is Cindy said...

I love them John, have always envied people who can actualy make paint look like aything other than colour. Brill.

Unknown said...

Nice tutorial,good painting.
I like it.
Jean Marie Lemire
http/jeanmarielemire.blogspot.com
Have a nice day.

Jan said...

I have already commented on these beautiful little works of art on your Flickr site John, but would like to reiterate that they are quite equisite in their simplicity.
Thank you for your continued support.

Sian said...

Wow! These are absolutely stunning. I wish I had your talent.

nancy said...

Now, that's what I'm talkin' about.
This is the Dyhouse I really love.
I'm wondering why they didn't show up on my "contacts" listing. I thought I got a notice every time you posted something. Maybe if I do something totally by hand, you'd be willing to trade for one of these. I love the second one best.
Nancy

John Dyhouse said...

My thanks to all you kind people for your encouraging remarks. It really has been a long time since I did any painting and these were just something that I happened to do one evening. It has certainly made me want to start doing some "proper" painting again. Especially with comments like this. - John