This weekend I was in Chelsea taking part in ‘Pintar Rapido’. It was an excellent event and great to meet up with friends/fellow artists for some plein air fun. I haven’t painted in London for quite some time and it’s as demanding as I remember….physically challenging with the humidity/heat and all the kit required for the event (I seem to have pulled back muscles from carrying all my clobber), plus the general mayhem of the London streets! Still, you go with it and there is actually quite a buzz to draw from which can feed into the work.
My first effort was done down by the Albert Bridge at Cadogen Pier, looking across the Thames with a nice variety of boats moored up for some sort of event. The light was generally flat with the odd glimpses of brief sunshine but at least that meant the conditions were reasonably steady. Certainly no sign of the torrential thunderstorms that were forecast on Saturday.
I enjoyed painting the reflections and paid particular attention to the tones and how they related to each other. Some nice notes of colour came from the boats with their flags, painted hulls and buoys. I tried to keep the distant trees and towers pushed back to give a bit of depth. This ended up being the painting I put into the exhibition which was held the following day (Sunday) at Chelsea Old Town Hall.
Hi David.
Some lovely work here mate, especially Cadogen Pier. The water is brilliant.
All the best David.
Vic.
Great work and lovely to see you there!
Thanks Valerie. Great you could come along and well done with those paintings of yours. Quality!
Thanks Vic. I can't seem to resist subjects with water :)
Great work! It was good to see you there David. I have just shared this on the Plein Air Brotherhood Facebook page.
Thanks Roy! Glad you could make it too. Let's aim to try and hook up for more painting soon.
Excellent work at Cadogan Pier and an interesting blog article from another Pintar attendee.
Thanks Julian. Well done with your watercolour painting of Sloane Square and securing a sale too!
Sublime work David – real quality!
Cheers Peter! London has great subjects for painting but it's quite intense working on the busy streets. Give me a Cornish/Norfolk beach any day :)
All fantastic pieces, but I absolutely love 'Sunday cricket, Royal Hospital park – Chelsea'.
Thanks Tom and Maria :) The nice thing about painting the cricket is that the players keep returning to the same positions. Ideal (well…except when they knock off for lunch and tea!)
Really enjoying your blog and work!!!
Thanks Mark, much appreciated :)
Really enjoying catching up on your posts David. Hope tomorrow goes well for you. Tim
Thanks Tim. Hope the trip to the Wye was a good one. Traffic was crazy in Oxford (I took a wrong turn somewhere!)
That day was great fun and I love your two paintings. I find it hard to see how you get so much done – you must be made of strong stuff!
Thanks Will. Did you go this year? I took part in 2014 and enjoyed the buzz with all the other artists descending on Chelsea. A focused couple of hours on each piece but after that I'm ready for a lie down!