Every painting has a story: Its source; its process; its
contribution to my style or learning; its history; its life after it is
completed. A few of my clients like me to write down the story for them to keep
with the painting through interest or for provenance. When I am manning my tradestand
or at a gallery showing my work it is often the stories of the paintings that
connect the viewer from simply admiring a painting to remembering it or even wanting to give it a
home. Most artists find the ‘selling’ bit of their work very difficult, myself
included. Maybe one day I will share that story; of why, and how I forced
myself to be able to stand up and speak to people about my work, whether in a
selling/marketing/PR form, or as talks and demonstrations. Suffice to say it
has been a long, arduous, certainly uncomfortable, sometimes painful process
and even, on occasion, physically debilitating, but it is a process that has been
ultimately rewarding in some planned and some surprising ways. The easiest way
for me to talk to people is for me to tell them my working process or to tell
them the story of the painting.
Almost all my paintings start off as sketches and photographs.
If I don’t immediately paint them, the photos will sit on my ideas boards
around my studios and the sketches will sit both in my sketch-book and in my
visual memory (one of the reasons that it is important for me to sketch) until
the right time, if, or when that comes. I am a bit of a butterfly with
sketchbooks, having several on the go at once, often 6 or 7 of different sizes,
plus a small journal for both writing and little ideas drawings. When I sketch
I have learned to leave blank pages around sketch pages for later development,
but sometimes fill these with further sketches if I start to reach the end of
the book without having worked up previous sketches. In this case development
work is done in other sketchbooks, on receipts and cigarette packs, in my
journal or in layout pads. Development work consists of re-drawing to correct
anatomy, thumbnails of composition alternatives, colour notes, overall tonal
notes and associated ideas that sit within the work to help convey narrative or
atmosphere. Therefore my sketchbooks are not chronological – my journal is a
better indicator of timeline.
I am lucky that my painting is character led so the stories
are implicit. The stories of why I painted them or what they meant to me are
usually less straightforward, but I have seen a progression in my ability to
express my thoughts over the years. I have always thought deeply about my work
and what I want to convey, and while once I was once content to simply make
studies to consolidate my ability to render anatomy, texture, to practise
skills within a certain medium, explore a medium and later to handle light-play
or to experiment with technique, I am now wanting to push my boundries to
expand the narrative and atmosphere of a piece. With hindsight I can see how certain
pieces, even from when I first started to work with a painter’s mind-set,
fitted into this progression. With the
benefit of my learning from the studies I am now revisiting sketches, ideas and
even paintings that have been set aside for years as I now have more capacity
to develop them to their potential. This makes the stories even more
interesting to me, and hopefully to my audience, who get to see how much work
and thought goes into a piece and how that piece lives after it leaves my easel.
Both the paintings I have chosen to illustrate the stories behind my work are side saddle paintings. When I first started as an artist I was heavily influenced by Charles Johnson Payne (Snaffles,1884–1967) and we have two of his prints, one of which is a lady jumping aside on a grey horse. Before I officially started my career as a fine artist I made some side saddle studies (right) and once started, I received a couple of commissions from sidesaddlers,
so using these to illustrate seems fitting.
Both the paintings I have chosen to illustrate the stories behind my work are side saddle paintings. When I first started as an artist I was heavily influenced by Charles Johnson Payne (Snaffles,1884–1967) and we have two of his prints, one of which is a lady jumping aside on a grey horse. Before I officially started my career as a fine artist I made some side saddle studies (right) and once started, I received a couple of commissions from sidesaddlers,
so using these to illustrate seems fitting.
Case study one: ‘Chuckle’, watercolour (2013). In 2012 and 13
I was looking at a lot of equestrian art that sat centre within a black, white,
single or duo-colour background, which I found unsatisfying as the background
was just ‘there’ and just a backdrop for, rather than playing a role in, the
image. I was playing with the idea of compositional structures and for this I
needed a strong subject image so I thought of the sketches and photo reference
from a side saddle demonstration that I had seen at Blenheim Horse Trials a few
years before. I wanted to work with an off-centre subject and make sense of
this by an abstract background of colour washes. For the background to play a
part in the painting it needed a structure, so the composition is set up using
the Golden Section (also referred to as the Golden Rule, Golden Mean, Golden
Ratio) and Nautilus Curve constructed from it.
The palette for the background washes are the colours that I use the most, then all the colours within the painting of the horse and rider are mixed from those four wash colours: Rose madder, Ultramarine, Sap Green and Madder Brown. The Abstract colours echo colour and tonal movements through either the horse or rider and the texture / dapple patterns on the horse’s neck were made using a repel effect with salt.
The palette for the background washes are the colours that I use the most, then all the colours within the painting of the horse and rider are mixed from those four wash colours: Rose madder, Ultramarine, Sap Green and Madder Brown. The Abstract colours echo colour and tonal movements through either the horse or rider and the texture / dapple patterns on the horse’s neck were made using a repel effect with salt.
‘Chuckle’ was the first painting that I made using an
abstract background, completed in Summer 2013 and first shown in The Art Show at
the Great Yorkshire Show in July of that year. It was submitted to the Society
of Equestrian Artists’ Horse In Art Exhibition in 2013 but, while being
accepted through digital pre-selection process, was unsuccessful in panel
selection. It was then successfully shortlisted in the Artists &
Illustrators Artist of the Year Award the following year and shown at the Mall
Galleries in London in January 2015 as one of 50 shortlisted paintings from
over 8,000 submitted.
The painting was posted on social media in July 2013 and
seen by Emma Brown, who recognised her horse Pipsqueak (Vintage Port). I had
been told that the horse was called Chuck, and as the rider was looking down
and laughing, had titled the piece ‘Chuckle’. Through this contact Emma invited me to the
opening meet of the Quorn hunt where 44 riders hunted sideways! From the
public’s reception to the painting a Limited Edition of 150 prints were made.
The prints are titled ‘Pip’s Party’ (Emma named them) as Pipsqueak is known to
attend parties that she holds at her converted barn home. She commented that I
had captured not only Pip’s character but also “the whole expression of
happiness, measured as being sat on this horse”.
The original of the painting is now in a private collection,
but prints from the limited edition are available.
Of course when I talk to people about the paintings it is
not as comprehensive as that description, which was a written provenance for
the new owner of the painting. I am driven by my work and my purpose, and to
write such histories and regurgitate them would not allow people access to that
passion.
Case study 2: Buckle Up, Watercolour (2015).
This painting
leads on from the first case study in that it came out of sketches and
reference photos from the Quorn Opening meet that Emma Brown invited me to
attend.
I have always been fascinated by the background story, the preparation,
the communication and reflections between a horse and rider. Ostensibly this is
a hunting picture, but actually it is not about that at all, which is why there
are no hounds and there are only two horses and riders. In fact the painting is
an expression of the feelings and nerves that I had before competing, whether
that was eventing, dressage or any other discipline. Though I have never ridden
side saddle, that rider is representing my emotions. Outwardly pretty calm, her
inner feelings are illustrated by the ominous sky swirled with a sickly yellow.
She wears blue to link her to the sky. Her horse too reflects her inner apprehension
and anticipation, being tense, above the bit and with swirling marks to denote
his restless tail (my horse was particularly sensitive to my feelings and often
showed this frame before, but hopefully not during, a dressage test). The
swirling marks are then also echoed in the not too realistic rendering of the
grass beneath the pair. The composition is left to right depth diagonal, using
the ground perspective and the cloud-line to focus the view onto the second
rider: the professional, to the right of the first pair as per the convention
of western reading from left to right. My hope for my future state of mind, he
wears green to link him to the ground (grounded) where the marks are more
controlled and uniform. The sky is calmer and clearer behind him, though the
cloud line transverses his head so he is not entirely unaffected. His horse is
relaxed and focused, echoing his inner calm. Whilst the foreground horse is
painted in a range of (symbolic to me) colours, the chestnut horse is uses a
more limited palette, emphasising reds for strength and boldness. Both riders
buckle up their girths in readiness and anticipation for the day ahead. You can
view this painting at face value: two riders preparing for a days hunting, or
read deeper. Once my work has left my easel its life and story become its own
and that of its conversation with the viewer, but I noticed at its first
showing that many people returned to this painting to look again. Like a film
that has layers, it stands reviewing even if the ‘true’ meaning is obscure, the
fact that there is underlying meaning does seem to resonate with the viewer.
‘Buckle Up’ was again first exhibited in The Art Show at the Great Yorkshire Show but two years later than ‘Chuckle’ in 2015. It was accepted through the International Watercolour Society for the 2016 Fabriano In Acquarello International Watercolour Exhibition in Fabriano, Italy. The painting was also used in an adapted form for my 2015 Christmas card. The printer digitally cropped the image to the foreground rider only and then added snow!
The original painting is still in Italy as I write. The altered (Winter) image
is planned to be part of a print set of four side saddle paintings set in the
four seasons due to be published before the end of 2016.
One of my sketchbook pages from the Quorn opening meet |
‘Buckle Up’ was again first exhibited in The Art Show at the Great Yorkshire Show but two years later than ‘Chuckle’ in 2015. It was accepted through the International Watercolour Society for the 2016 Fabriano In Acquarello International Watercolour Exhibition in Fabriano, Italy. The painting was also used in an adapted form for my 2015 Christmas card. The printer digitally cropped the image to the foreground rider only and then added snow!
'Buckle Up' and the Christmas card made from it |
The idea of the sky reflecting the rider’s feelings came to
me many years ago. It is only recently that I have felt my control of the
watercolour medium is approaching sufficient to be able to attempt to express
that. My month of painting only skies in 2014 was part of that process. Writing
my thoughts about a painting in my journal before working on it each day was suggested to me
at a workshop with artist Lesley Humprey and is one that I have found very
useful for clarifying those thoughts, inspiration and motivation. Dressage
trainer Shana Ritter quotes the phrase “the horse is the reflection of the
rider” meaning in schooling and dressage that the horse will echo tension or
kinetic poise from the rider’s body, and my experience with my horse in
particular re-enforced that that applies to state of mind as well as state of
body. They are themes that I have only just started to explore and many stories
and paintings are yet to come. I would be pleased to share them with you.
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