Still life with Robin

Robin on Toast - 24 x 30cms oil on panel

Impossible to photograph this at the moment and it's a little large for the scanner so the scan is a little soft.  But I haven't posted any work for ages.

The robins are constantly in our garden this winter so a lot of time evaporates as I sit at the bedroom window with binoculars.  To date I've had no luck inviting them inside to share my toast!

Robin - watercolour

Watercolour on Bristol Board 24 x 16cms

Anyone wondering when I'm going to get sick of robins?  I'm still experimenting with watercolour on different grounds.  Bristol board loves graphite and pen as I recall but it didn't allow me to achieve the effect I am after with watercolour.  So now I'm painting some acrylic gel on hp watercolour paper.  I might spare you the results.

Robins - watercolour on gold ground

Robins - 18 x 18cms

transparent watercolour on gold acrylic ground

Exploring abstraction and still obsessed with gold grounds.  Finally settled on a combination of abstract and figurative styles for this favourite subject.  The presence of robins in our grey garden at this time of year is such a joy.

I decided to limit myself to transparent watercolour for this painting but I'm really missing a touch of white gouache.  Sometimes just putting a painting up on my blog gives me enough distance to decide if it's working. Perhaps you can help me decide?  The scan doesn't do justice to the richness of the gold shining through the transparent colour.

Sketching Birds in Watercolour

Robin - watercolour & mapping pen

With both Katherine Making a Mark and Toni A Spattering painting and drawing beautiful bird studies from their own photographs, I have been very envious. My friend Catherine in Dorset has a new camera with a very long lens (as well as being taller than I) so I begged her to point it at a few birds. Bless her, she did!

Spotted Woodpecker - watercolour & mapping pen

In an effort to loosen up my watercolours I sketched these birds with a brush and added a few touches of ink at the end. It really does stop me fiddling and I'm quite pleased with the results. I'm going to leave my pencil at home and try this approach with some other subjects.

In Florence in December I stood and froze trying to sketch the Ponte Vecchio amongst a crowd of tourists. I was using my fountain pen and waterbrush loaded with an ink wash. Apart from the humiliation of not being able to draw a straight line in public, I wish I'd tried the watercolour brush painting approach. Maybe next time, when my teeth aren't chattering. I obviously don't have the Right Stuff for sketching outdoors in a northern winter. Probably my thin Australian blood.

Ponte Vecchio - Montblanc fountain pen & Pelikan Brilliant Brown ink

Pen & Ink

The house next door is about as far as I'm now prepared to venture in the cold.