No. 42. Green Chilli Pepper

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Click here to buy this study.

I feel like a fraud. Painting chilli peppers as if they're the natural choice for a sun-drenched Dublin studio when I'm bloody freezing. I should be painting moss or lichen -there's plenty of it growing on my legs. It's an occupational hazard of living in Ireland; you sit still for a few hours and somebody from the council has to come along at the end of the day with a scraper to free you.

In fact, I didn't paint this in my studio -I hauled in my tabletop easel into my living room last night and balanced the plate on the arm of the couch [that's the russet colour at the top]. I turned the TV on to something foreign and warm and hey presto! Instant summer.

Pepper has indeed come into the Irish conciousness recently as the police [An Garda Siochána] will now be issued with pepper spray. I think it's used to flavour their bagels.

No. 41. Aubergine

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Click here to buy

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I've been wanting to paint an aubergine for a while now. Such a rich dark colour and a kind of french-polished shine to them, like they've been on another excursion to the fruit valet for a good buffing. It'll end up in one of my wife's delicious ratatouilles. Not the painting; the vegetable. I've stewed over this one enough already.

Incidentally, according to my dictionary, this fruit comes from a plant belonging to the nightshade family [Solanum melongena]. Deadly.

No. 40. Scallions on Deck Chair

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Click here to buy

A couple of summers ago, on that day when it stopped raining for an afternoon, we had friends around for a barbecue [we have barbecues in Ireland to keep warm and as clifftop beacons to warn of impending invasion by the Saxon hordes]. We broke out the deckchairs which we offered to our guests -and one chair, fatigued by constant wetting, promptly collapsed under the weight of its occupant. Fortunately, this guest was a Saxon and he ended up apologising profusely for eight hundred years of imperial oppression. It was a delicate social situation; we weren't sure whether to rush to help or take advantage of England's misfortune...

Anyway, the point is, I broke the chair up for firewood and saved the canvas to make an...erm... canvas, one day. It still lies around accusing me of not being painted upon. So, here it gets a partial second life as the background for these onions. I kept this one loose, like the joints in my garden furniture. I'll stop now -you must be exhausted after reading this. Here; have a seat...

No. 39. Villeroy & Bosch Cream Jug & Grapes

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Click here to buy

I've been quite busy over the last few days -clearing out my garage to make room for another family of destitute bankers, so I've had to post more than once today. I'm sorry if it confuses you; you should see the state I'm in.
Anyway, back to wedding presents. This is another one from my dimly-remembered nuptials all those years ago. I think it was in the year of Our Lord eighteen hundred and six, my wife finally parted me from my communion money and she bought a Villeroy & Bosch dinner service. The grapes came much, much later. We still have the set in it's entirety which is something of an achievement in our house.

No. 38. Crystal Wine Glass & Red Pepper

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Click here to buy

We bought a set of Galway crystal wine glasses when we got married. We also bought the pepper. It's remarkable how long fruit and vegetables last when they've been irradiated. I've had myself irradiated too and people say I'm quite fit-looking for a man of 103.

No. 37. Market Segments

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I started this one late in the day, after a really early morning meeting. By the afternoon, I found it difficult to focus! I always find citrus fruit hard to render, for some reason -it's easy to become embroiled in every little subtle hue of yellow. Anyway, here I used a mixture of cadmium reds and yellows. My favourite bit is the shadow to light area on the segment at the back next to the bottle.


You can see the set up I used on the second pic. Any feedback you give would be welcome.

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5" . Buy this Oils Study

No. 36. Through the Dark Glassy

I took the shapes of little bottles that I've painted before in various studies and drew them from memory in dark lines without reference to the real thing. I then painted in between the lines in cadmium red, leaf green and cadmium yellows and oranges. I also layered a tinted household varnish over the whole composition, pointed in the highlights and once again layered over more of the varnish. More learning while playing!

Acrylics Still Life Study on paper. 7" x 5". Buy this original $90.

No. 35. More Pears

This is a continuation of a process I started today -working with acrylic paint, acrylic varnish and a household tinted varnish. The tinted varnish, when applied over paint and acrylic varnish that's not quite dry, forms fissures and cracking patterns haphazardly around the painting. It was great experimenting with the materials. So much to learn!

Acrylics Still Life Study on paper. 7" x 5"

No. 34a. Techniques all Going Pear-shaped

I might have to change the name of this blog. Acrylics are in!

I was talking with an artist friend about techniques in painting. He paints but is very influenced by his main love which is ceramics -all those glazes and textures that can be fired onto a ceramic item. We got into a long discussion in the pub over a couple of beers, and I was very taken with the notion of this way of working. So, when I got home this evening from a long meeting, seeing there was no time to do a formal set up, I got out the acrylics, a pot of acrylic varnish and a tin of Ronseal 'walnut' tinted quick-drying varnish. What I was aiming for was to keep this as a still life, but work on it in an abstract way. This piece started out very bright, with bold colours but after a couple of applications of the varnish over not-yet-dried clear acrylic varnish, I arrived at this autumnal finish. The craquelure effect which was achieved by experimenting, only adds to the composition, I think, don't you?

Acrylics Still Life Study on paper. 7" x 5". Buy this art.

No. 34. Handling My Own Plums

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There's an upholstery workshop just across the lane from my studio and Alan the merry upholsterer did his bit for the arts by donating this bit of fabric. He doesn't know that he did however as it was in a plastic bag outside. I rescued it from the rain, OK? The plums, on the other hand were plucked, all speckled with dew from the tree at the foot of our timeless garden. This tree is a scientific marvel, as it's a sycamore.

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5"

No. 33 North African Pottery & Apple

The sun is shining this morning, which always assists in my delusions of living la dolce vita, We visited Tunisia a couple of times, years ago when we had some money and I brought back a few of these mugs from one trip. I also tried to bring back some other ceramic items at the time but I arrived home with a bag full of pottery rubble. Anyway, I've had a pleasant morning and just finished my coffee, so I'm a-buzzin'. Incidentally, I used the same set up as yesterday. But you already knew that, didn't you?

SOLD

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Buy this original

No. 32. Mmm, Lemony

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I'm still painting in this dark, shadowy style at the moment. It seems to parallel the general feeling of despondency as the economy slides into depression. My advice is to take a lemon and add it to a glass of gin and...no wait...paint it. Excuse me, I kept making the same mistake when I was in charge of a bank.

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Buy this original

No. 31. Half Lemon

I used a wooden box all covered in old paint for my shadow box on this composition. The lemon resided in our fridge [for some time, by the looks of it!]. The pillbox had featured before. Here's the setup below:


















It took longer than usual to paint this; about three hours, all told -mainly because of the pattern on the pillbox.

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5"

No. 30. Red Onions & Spoon

I emptied an old box full of photographs to make a little shadow box for this composition. Like yesterday's study, I wanted to paint a darker, more atmospheric still life. It took about an hour and a half. I've now got to wipe the tears from my eyes and rush off for a meeting. Cheerio!

SOLD

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5"

No. 29. Green Peppers

I decided to paint this one as quickly as possible -although I didn't time myself. I think it took a little over half an hour. I wanted to do this in order to stop myself from becoming embroiled in the details and becoming overly descriptive. I also wanted to have a more sober feel than I have been getting lately. I like what I've come up with here.


















Here's a pic of the setup. As you can see, I made the background greyer than reality. I did this to try to focus the eye on the peppers themselves.

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Buy this original

No. 28. Garlic

What can I say? Garlic on a plate. One of my darling wife's favourite plates too. I'd better make sure I get it back to her in one piece, or all I'll have to eat will be the garlic!

SOLD

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Buy this original.

No. 27. Aping Grape Shapes

I picked these delicious grapes as I wandered around my private vineyard, on the gentle, verdant slopes just beyond the stables of my stately and gracious chateau. It's harvest time and the fields are busy with my merry peasants who wave a cheery bonjour to me as I canter by on my snow white mare, Fartypants. No. No, really it's as wet as a herring's swimming costume and any grapes grown around here are treatable with a cream available from your local pharmacy.

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5" Buy on Etsy.

No. 26. Red Pepper Peril

Peppers again. What is it with peppers? Perhaps they're a symbol of summer, of good times and Mediterranean cooking. Anyway, you gotta love them.

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Buy on Etsy

No. 25 Hello, Mellow Yellow Fellow

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Another one from the colonies. We can't grow peppers here because in Ireland, we live in a perpetual nuclear winter. So we import peppers with a massive carbon footprint. [You can see the carbon footprint extending off to the right of the pepper]. It's a strange world we live in, where you can be painting such a sunny vegetable whilst having trench foot.

Oils Still Life Study on canvas panel. 7" x 5". Buy on Etsy