Wet in Wet - and then some

 Wet, Wet, Wet - this was February and March 2024 on the South East Coast of the Isle of Wight.  Worrying amount of rain given the cliff on which our house is perched is a mix of shale and mud, held together by trees such as these.  You can't help wondering just how much more climate change we're going to be able to stand.

Don't tell me the climate isn't changing, or "it's just weather" - I've been infesting this earth for 74 years come November, the climate is certainly changing, and governments aren't meeting the challenge.   Not a very cheering message, but then - it's time we ALL faced up to the facts.  

This watercolour is 12cm by 17cm, painted on Hahnemühle Rough Torchon - the technique is known as wet in wet, because it consists of wet washes being allowed to bleed into each other. 

Misty Morning

 Watercolour - in a format which suits the Isle of Wight coast - I ought to make use of it more often!

And a small one:

The Pastel that nearly blew away

 My flat is dark - so I have to take photos of pictures outside.  At the moment, this is a question of dodging the rain, and battling the wind.

This pastel nearly blew away - hence it's skew-wiff.  I rarely use pastel, but apart from the dust, they're a bit of fun now and then.

This is based on a lane near here, and I say based because (as is typical) I've forgotten where I sketched it; I've changed the sketch a bit, to reflect the fact that everything just now is wet, muddy, and generally 'orrible.  It's got to dry up a bit soon, hasn't it.....? 

Whale Chine, Isle of Wight, Winter

 Two paintings, oil, 8" by 10", of the ever-changing Whale Chine, subject to frequent erosion and land movement.  I confess that I used an old sketch for the view from the sea, and an old painting of my own - it's very dangerous to get down to the beach, far too risky for someone of my age - and anyway, the Council warns you not to try.

These are both in oil, colours used Ultramarine, Cerulean Blue, Cadmium Red, Yellow Ochre, Raw Sienna, Burnt Sienna, Chrome Yellow (Hue), Flake White, and Quinacridone Violet - just the Siennas, Ochre, the two blues and white used in the second painting. 

And a very small watercolour of a frequent visitor to this coast, 12cm by 17cm - too small for me to photograph well, so I had to scan it, losing some foreground depth of colour in the process.  But there we are, such is life, and the Shag has a harder life than mine.  (A now deceased colleague and I were visiting St Mary's Hospital on the island, on an inspection: we saw a magnificent specimen of this bird alight on one of the ponds in the grounds - my colleague wanted a closer look, so cautiously moved nearer: "If anyone asks," I wittily remarked, "don't say you're looking for a shag."   My how she laughed .......

Footbridge, from Somewhere in Sussex

 

A rather selective version of a photograph from my brother - so selective that I doubt he'll recognize it.  Showed it on Painters Online, but I think I've managed to take a rather more accurate photo here.  Oil, on birch panel, 42cm x 30cm.

For sale, as is everything on here provided I've not sold it already.....  Inquire within, on anything.  Well, it nearly rhymes.

Chine, Isle of Wight

 We have chines on the Isle of Wight - and doubtless they have them elsewhere.  Areas of eroded land, bordering the sea - sometimes quite a long way back from the coastline - forming a valley.  Some are well-known tourist areas, such as Shanklin Chine.  This isn't Shanklin Chine - its a composite.  Call it Composite Chine....

Watercolour on Hahnemühle Rough Torchon, 12 x 17cm. 

 

Colwell Bay - as it once was, before a "skeletal, stomach-churning stairlift" was installed a good many years ago.  And as I preferred it.  Very small watercolour 12 by 17cm.  

New Year's Greetings to All

 And to kick of 2024, a year that has started - interestingly; i.e. some problems on the horizon, but then, aren't there always? - I have a few drawings to show in some of my favourite media.

If I can find them, that is - with increasing age has come increasing forgetfulness: I once knew where I'd filed things without having to look; now - I save something, file it away neatly, forget where it is in a matter of hours.

Still, never mind eh?  And Happy New Year to my devoted followers and those who visit without following - come on, FOLLOW!

A varied selection, I think you'll agree: from 1) ink and a splash of diluted Chromacolour - from one of my photographs of fields at Perreton, Isle of Wight; 2) a footbridge in Sussex, from a photo by my brother Brian; 3) a little watercolour of the revetment, at Ventnor, IW; 4) Magpie, eyeing up the last of the figs; 5) a visit from an old friend; 6) Wild, forlorn, overgrown - I was in Dickensian mood at the time.  Pen and ink.  

I have paintings to show too - once I can get good photographs of them; dark flat, so need to be photographed outside - when, if, it stops raining/blowing a gale.