Saltwood Oak

Those who follow my blog will remember those chilly photographs of me painting during the afternoon in Saltwood. In fact I posted a small 6" x 8" plein air study of this scene. Well I went to the other extreme for this canvas, 24" x 36" was the order of the day. My gallery wanted a large landscape image from me for their upcoming spring show so I decided 24" x 36" and a 11/2 flat brush would do the trick.

I stood in the cold with Catherine as we watched the clouds form in readiness for a second deluge of snow. Those wonderful colours sang out warm tones to me as they gathered pace. The wind swept the snow over the distant hill top forming deep drifts and the vast expanse in front of me was empty of life except for those early footprints from eager children with their sledges. Bands of sunlight moved rapidly towards me creating wonderful shafts of bright light, radiant warm hues against the coldness of the shadows.

With all this in front of me I had to go back and get my paints, which is exactly what I did, but moreover I knew that I had to do this scene justice and paint it on an altogether larger scale. This is the result, I was worried that I have left too much area to the right with little in it. Part of me wants to put some birds into this area of the canvas. That said, the work is about the vast blanket of undisturbed snow that so transforms the landscape. The emptiness, in my opinion is a ying-yang to the huge and mighty Oak tree to the left, So for now at least I am resisting the temptation of complicating the concept further. I might do a few studies to see what effect it might have to add other elements.

Anyway that is my painting called 'Saltwood Oak' I intend to visit this grand tree and paint it through the seasons.Who knows, I just might add some birds to a second canvas depicting the subject by way of contrast to this version.. Whatever I do I hope that you like this image and feel free to add comments about it.

Best wishes Paul