The Plein Air Brotherhood 3rd Annual Exhibition

If you are around Harpenden soon, drop by the AK Wilson gallery for the 3rd Plein Air Brotherhood show. The exhibition runs from 27th Oct – 9th Nov 2013 Tuesday & Wednesday 9.15–5.30. Thursday 9.15–2.00, 6.00–8.00 Friday & Saturday 9.15–5.30. Sunday & Monday Closed A selection of paintings from the exhibition can be viewed at www.akwilsongallery.co.uk A & K Wilson Gallery Ltd, 11 Station Approach, Harpenden, Herts. AL5 4SP Tel: 01582 760824 E-mail: drew@akwilsongallery.co.uk There will be plenty of new paintings by the members: Adebanji Alade, Antony Bridge, Roy Connelly, John Dobbs, David Pilgrim and Karl Terry. This year we are also joined by a couple of guest artists - Tony Dakin and Graham Webber.

Geo Centre Day 2

2nd day painting on the hills with the Geo Centre. Only managed to get one piece done as the second painting location I decided to paint on a flying ants nest who were not happy I was painting their view at all and told me to move along. All work on show at the Geo centre cafe.

Artist in Residence at the Malvern Geo Centre and Cafe

Its been a great first day painting around the Geo centre in Malvern for my artist in residence. Painting Malvern most days anyway it doesn't feel to different! The Geo centre is a great place to base yourself for the day to have coffee, go for a walk then a light lunch while reading over how the hills and geo parkway were all formed, along with local fossils to look at.

Painting went well on day one with lots of nice people stopping to chat (Thanks to one for the great photo below). I finally managed to paint the beautiful Rosebay willow herb which is all over the hills at the moment, great magenta colour.

 

Malvern Hills

Its beautiful when the light hits the hills just right and today was one of those days. With the grass glowing gold I decided to paint a large 20x24", see below:

Artist in Residence coming soon...

Painting Gloucester Docks and Painswick Beacon

Spent a great day painting at Gloucester docks during the food festival then venturing up to Painswick Beacon with beautiful views towards the severn estuary and Malverns on the right. Below are 2 of the paintings completed on the day, a small 8x10" and large 20x24"

Cotswolds Lavender

A day in the beautiful Cotswolds. My second year painting at the amazing Cotswold Lavender, amazing fields of purple with distant hills, perfect place to paint, however it was the hottest day of the year so far at 30 degrees, hurt a little but managed to produce the below.

Mathon Hay Stacks

Painting when its 29degrees is a little uncomfortable but managed to get out and do a large 20x24" painting of some beautiful haystacks in Mathon, near Cradley.

Symonds Yat Rock

Its most certainly the summer now with all the hot weather we are having. I managed to find some shade however in one of the most beautiful places in Gloucestershire, Symonds Yat Rock. See below a few shots from the days painting, a 20x24" piece and 8x10 small pochade study.

Artists and illustrators Magazine summer Plein air special

Artists and illustrators Magazine Summer Plein air Special out today and I'm proud to be on the front cover, check out the shops for a copy, great article.

Painting in Swanage

Spent a few days away for a wedding down in Swanage and managed to get out a few times to paint, here are 3 of the pochades.

Malvern Hills in full colour

I popped up the hills at around 7.30pm to do a sketch and the hills were alive with people biking and walking enjoying the beautiful evening colour. See below my sketch.

Malvern in Yellow

I finally had some time to get out and paint the beautiful yellow rape seed fields that surround Malvern at the moment. More to follow on the blog soon and getting the large easel out on location this week also.

Artists & illustrators Magazine - Plein air edition 2013

I've kindly been invited to paint for the new summer edition of the Artists and illustrators UK magazine, a whole article on Plein air. Myself and Valerie Pirlot met the editor and photographer in Bath and spent the day painting. I decided to paint in an unusual palette with 'no blue', a limited palette of viridian, cad red, cad yellow and white. Very hard to paint plein air using no blue but I thought it would be good for the readers to see how you can paint using only 3 colours and get used to mixing colours. Below are a few of the sketches throughout the day. See the summer edition of the magazine for the full article, also with Paul Banning and Roy Connelly. www.artistsandillustrators.co.uk

Self Portrait Sketches

Decided in the studio to do a little 30-40min portrait sketch just using 3 colour limited palette and white. Heres the result in a few steps. I plan to do a small collection of these over the next month if its raining, anyone want to come and sit for me?

Painting at Malvern Offices

I was kindly given permission to paint from Malvern Offices at Acorn Business Centre in Hanley Swan. Offices don't have better views than here, beautiful sweeping views of the Malverns and set among amazing countryside. A very inspiring place if you are looking to rent an office. I spent the day painting the buttercups on one of the first hot days this summer. See below a few of my sketches.

Malvern Blue Bells

Every year the Malverns light up with colour and the blue bells in West Malvern is my favourite place to see them in all their glory. See below set up with the Open Box M and small sketch.

Sugar Loaf Painting - Wales

Sugar Loaf Mountain, just 600m above sea level with the most amazing views. I met my good friend Tom at the top and we decided to walk to the top to check out the view firstly. After a bit of lunch on the summit we had to get back to work and painted till the Sun went down. Half way stopping and having a brilliant coffee at the Sugar Loaf Vineyards, click here to visit their site.

Painting at the Talbot Inn Newnham Bridge

Every week or so my good friend Tom and I choose a place to paint. Today we found a little hidden gem near Tenbury Wells called Newnham Bridge and decided to base ourselves at the beautiful Talbot Inn, an amazing refurbished gothic building offering amazing food and rooms if you want to stay longer. We arrived at 10am to have a initially fresh coffee before painting and were greeted at the door by the staff asking us about our painting which was delightful. We ventured out around the bridleways and footpaths, stunning landscapes, red clay fields, distant hills. We set up firstly looking West, later heading up to the highest point looking down towards the Talbot. After painting we headed back to warm up over a coffee and delicious meal, also having a chat with the owner of the Inn Ian who gave us local information for our next visit, a great day.

On the way home we stopped off to paint Worcester (see below), was a little grey but managed to find a great view next to the river.

Painting with the new Open box m Easel

Tom high up on the Newnham Bridge Hills

Talbot Inn Newham Bridge

Painting Worcester

1st trip out painting the Geopark Way in Gloucester

A great day out in Gloucester painting a section of the GeoPark Way near to point number 83.
It was the very first day it actually felt warm. A great relaxing work from gloucester docks to the path along the river.

Paintings will be on show throughout the year at http://wyche-innovation.com/index.php/cafe-h2o

Geo Park Way Centre Cafe

I'm delighted to have been asked to show a permanent collection of my work at the new Geo Park Way Cafe which will be opening soon in Malvern. The Cafe is going to be the ideal place in Malvern for walkers to have a pit stop and recharge.

I will be painting the Geo Park way this summer and posting to a dedicated blog. Keep posted on this blog for more information. All paintings will be on show in the Cafe over time.

If you are passing please drop in and check out my work thats on display, any questions please ask a member of staff or drop me an email.

Opening up to more people

The web is most certainly changing the way buyers purchase paintings, selling on the web gives you far more viewers for your work.

For this reason I am now listing on the beautifully designed Esty online store.

I'll be just selling my larger paintings in Local galleries or from the Studio along with a few pop up shows around the area.

Please visit the my online shop below and any questions always feel free to ask.

Caught on camera

When painting out and about in the landscape or streets, every now and again a photographer comes up and asks to take a photo of you painting, some of which we never see. Taken as a nice compliment and great to get some good shots of the painter in situ. Here is one of Tom and myself painting in Kings Square in Bristol by Stuart Reading.