Study Plains

Study Plains 3_2, Gouache on Board, 18x12cm

I've been playing with the winter scenes again.

Following the excursion into Nicholas de Stael's work, I wanted to push the airy, flowy scenes of Fields in Winter towards more abstraction. With de Stael, I got really struck by the extent to which he was able to par down the compositions: so simple and yet so strong. One of the reasons he seemed to be able to do that was that there exist strong, almost whirllike focal points in his paintings - certainly in his Agrigente landscapes; and these focal points are almost central to the painting. I need to experiment with Photoshop a bit more to give you a visual sense of what I'm describing here.

In any case, I try to apply that sense of focal point coupled with a really parred down composition to the landscapes scenes from a while back. To do so, I took some small scale (18x12cm) boards, gessoed and with a burnt umber underpainting, and used gouache. I've done a few of them and uploaded them here.

These are just two to start with. I worked again with a limited palette and explored some variations. It's been great fun; I want to write up a bit more about them, but need more time to do so.

In the meantime: Here's another one.

Study Plains 2_4, Gouache on Board, 18x12cm