House Painting of the Week!

This was a commissioned painting of a nice Cotswold Cottage. It is very pretty but presented a few problems, firstly of the plain gravel frontage which was saved by the little wall and small tree in the foreground which also gave depth to an otherwise flat frontage. The other tricky aspect was the repeating windows across the facade, which were broken up by emphasising the reflections of trees behind the viewer. Showing the sunshine from the left drew shadows across which helped again give depth, and the flowering shrubs and climbers all softened the edges. By request the neighbouring property was faded out which helped remove the harsh roof ridge to the right. The owner was pleased with the result! But it shows that it can demand interpretation to make a photo of a property into a 'painting.'

Below is the 'rough' compositional sketch that I almost always provide before doing the actual painting. This is to try to sort out all the above points and make my mistakes in the thumbnail sketch, not the finished artwork!

To see more house portraits visit my website via the link below:

 http://fothergillsgallery.co.uk/contents/en-us/d41_House_Portraits.html

Architectural Sketch of the Week

These two ‘cottages’ are not actually within the Cotswolds, so it’s brick and brown tiled roofs, but they’re rather smart, and sit in nice sized plots. The development is still only just past the planning stage, so the building hasn’t yet started, but I’m pretty confident this is what it will look like.

St. Andrew’s Church Chedworth

At last a sunny day that is warm enough to lure me out into the open air with my paints! I don’t mind a bit of outdoor sketching with a pencil when it’s freezing cold in the winter, but sitting on a painting stool for a couple of hours trying to abstract my mind is almost impossible when hypothermia starts to set in.

I wandered lonely as a cloud, floating on high o’er vales and hills, but then stopped the car at Chedworth as the Church in the morning sunlight caught my eye. The Cotswolds are rather brown and grey at the beginning of March, even when it’s sunny, but the churchyard with its grass, and yew trees looked warm and inviting, so I decided to look no further, and set up camp with my paintbox.

It’s quite a complicated architectural subject, but the advantage of painting on the spot is there is no time to fuss with unnecessary detail. In the studio I would have made far more of it, but I rather like it as it is! ...............Summer is on the way.

Architectural Impression of the Week

It’s a row of three cottages in Oxfordshire, being tastefully converted, which presently is a building site.

My job is to paint it for the brochure, so in go the hollyhocks, and spring flowers! Rather cheerful painting this in a cold mid-March.

I hope they like it!