I have been making this Calendar for Christmas.

Click here to see

ok. Here it is. from conception to an hours work. 40x40inch

There is a hawthorne tree at the bottom of our garden . The cats love it because thrushes, sparrows, bullfinches etc like it. it has berries that are very red.

This is very Naive and much more enjoyable to paint than the last one.

At last this picture has submitted. Really pleased. The paint on the canvas is at that wonderful thick glassy sticky stage where it looks like it has really been worked, and it has. The imagery is making sense to me . All it needs now is a couple of days on simmer on one of my walls so I can make final adjustments. Who say`s I should paint in oil... When I paint like this acrylic is a marvelous paint.

Hawthorn tree next.. but I have to go away in a couple of days ..so..

Oh! blaady blaady blah! There is no substitute for getting in the studio and working... period!

Have started my hawthorn tree......

Still reworking this picture from a couple of blogs ago. So nothing really new. Got an idea for another tree bubbling away. Only a Hawthorn tree. Summer is such a funny time. I`m not getting into the studio and having long periods so consequentially the productivity gets compromized. Then again the children are off and the beach is calling and life is so short and precarious. I wonder if instead of trying to get some control of my work I could be letting go of it instead.

I had this one come back from Gallery . It had a table and a still life with some Sunflowers in the foreground which I thought might be the reason it didn`t sell. It did seem a litle odd. So I have been reworking making a sea at the botton and some boats.

Still working on the Morrocan painting. I havn`t needed to tare much of this down as it is going ok.

A walk in Marrakech

Today I have been in the studio building up a new Moroccan painting. This is a big 40x40 inch and has a way to go yet. At the moment it looks too square and contrived. I`ll have to work into it now. Which means diving into it. One technique which I use is to scrub into areas with a mix of ultramarine and brown , bluey burgundy`s or burnt sienna. This will uniform the image so it isn`t all clashing so I can build it up again picking and choosing what areas are important.
It would be very easy to say " well it looks done " .But without the layering,it isn`t done.

I came to another stop last Saturday and dont want to paint . I was even wondering if I am a Naive style painter at all. After all that very Anal attention to endless detail; I find fussy

. Being involved in the Naive Genre has taught me how important detail is but it can in an odd way just be a mask for being lazy. Having plenty of time to fill in all the bits while not doing the really hard work of working up ,destroying and working up untill something is forged.
I want to forge like a blacksmith not paint like an old lady.( no offence to all those wonderfully fussy painters and I can think of at least one Naive painter who does forge and is also attentive to detail) however..

I am re-thinking how to go foreward and be real . I am not going to re invent the wheel. Just a slight rudder adjustment. And maybe a distancing from the constriction of the Naive club.

more to follow....

Me and Lorraine relaxing on Porthcurno Beach .

This is a painting that we have as a family painting. It was very rough ,painted in just a couple of days so I have been reworking it. Paying attention to the detail.This is my 3rd day on it.It is an old theme. Pals in Palafrugel Spain.

When I was going through my little dark period I left a couple of canvases unfinished. Well I finished this one today. Oil . on canvas 18x18 inch and wonderfully moody and simple. It took me back to the time in my life when I had just had my relapse and was very high on steroids and slightly paranoid and jumpy. I hated any colour and thought I was the guy from the Scissor Sisters for a while. It may seem odd but it was a nice distraction from being really rather ill and I was being cured at the same time. All those years of expensive therapy has paid off as I managed to get through it. In a way it has brought together the polar side of me . I now except and love dark paintings.

Well I have settled for a cobalt blue / violet foreground. The sky and the buildings in the centre and around around the edge are complete. The foreground buildings in the middle I may have to change. Still a couple of days work yet to get it perfect.And of course there are no people in there yet.