paintings

Here are a few more of my paintings this one on your right was made during my early years at university i was about 19 when I painted museum and winter gardens its mixed media on cartridge paper its made from oil pastels, acrylic paint pva glue and toilet roll surprisingly.

This painting titled ''Escape From The Witch lol'' was made october 2oo8 while working on paintings based on surrealism and realism while I was writing a book i decided to try to paint the chapters from the story its not illustration however as with illustration you must follow the story with painting you can let your imagination decided what goes into the artwork the story only provided a base for the idea this paintings along with the three paintings below were part of a story book series for my final year degree show exhibition.

This painting titled The Rescue is still quite early on in the story is where the father finds the family so they go on a hunt to witches castle looking for the dead book.







Im not sure where this painting came in relation to the story. Painting is not illustration it doesn't have to follow the story with painting imagination can take take you anywhere the story only provided a simple foundation for ideas to grown but with illustration the story line must be followed that is why i like painting so much.

This painting titled "The Barn" helped me improve my painting style greatly. The idea for this painting came from a very early chapter in the story this is just before the little girls adventure with the horse begins, she is playing in the barn with the animals. The 

painting provides a lovely contrast to the earlier darker paintings because of the rich yellow background. The contrast between them I think made an interesting combination for my degree show. I think I learnt to paint on a much bigger scale using bigger brushes it made the paint look much fresher and more vibrant than my previous paintings. I also 

learnt about the effect light and tone can have on a painting. It was made at first as prep work rather like a collage. I chose two found images and glued them onto a background I thought would be appropriate for the scene in the painting. I then took the idea into paint using a 5ft x 4ft
canvas.

The butterflies came from my interest in the American wildlife while in North Carolina on a business trip I made sketches done in a sketch book of the butterflies. I was missing England so incorporated the two countries into one painting when I returned home with the sketches id done.

I then started to paint all different wildlife which turned into a simple
 wildlifeproject of woods, flowers and the sea taken from found images
of wildlife from all over the globe. This was made using moulding artists clay to create tree like texture again the red squirrel came from the idea from studying endangered British wildlife.











This painting done of a picture of the great barrier reef in Australia I found particularly interesting because i used a type of artists clay i covered the whole canvas with it let it dry then painted over it to create texture it was a great effect the "bumps" made the whole this look as though the painting was rippling like the sea i used
thicker layers of the clay in the foreground and thinner layers in the background mid ground mid layers ans so on.


I then went on to sketch ideas in my sketch book of
endangered animals until i added all the animals id studied together and created a kind of animal wallpaper. the muddy background in this painting was intended to be the bare patches of the Amazon where the trees have been cut down where there are nothing but bare patches of muddy soil left.



Again these two paintings are of America. While I was in North Carolina i took a pay and go phone card with an eagle on it to the print room I blew up a copy and then proceeded to the north Carolina zoo to study the bald eagles I used the phone card and my observational sketches to produce these two paintings when I arrived back to England the painting (right and below)

This painting came from the American pay and go phone card I mentioned earlier in the above text its made with oil colour instead of my usual Acrylic medium.

This one below right is titled "The lonely parrot" was made from cheap poster paint then scraped off to reveal colour underneath it was supposed to be an experimental preparation piece ready for the final moderator. The colours represent the bare Amazon rainforest where there are no trees left with the lonely parrot representing a dying endangered breed sitting on a branch above the bare Amazon forest.