Some recent artwork

For some reason, as soon as autumn comes I just want to paint. Perhaps it's the colours or the drama of the changing seasons and the progression towards winter, which, weirdly, I find a magical time of year. I find the survival strategies of plants and animals in the face of really tough conditions amazing and wonderful. Some, like the senescence and falling of leaves, can also result in rather beautiful displays.

I thought I'd share a few of my most recent paintings. After a summer of not painting much, I was keen to do lots of practice to try to improve my drawing and watercolour skills. I love leaves, and autumn leaves are the most interesting. For the painting above, I took a walk around the garden and picked up a few leaves, looking for different shapes and colours. I really wanted to try to capture the lovely colours and "zing" of the leaves when the sun shines through them on the trees, so I placed the leaves on my light pad, switched it on and took a photo (with a fair bit of over exposure!). I then used the photo as my reference, together with the actual leaves while they lasted. I think it worked and there is more vibrancy in the painting than there would have been if I'd painted them without the light. The hawthorn leaves were too opaque, so they were painted from life.

Up to recently, I've not been particularly keen on painting garden flowers, preferring wildflowers that I have encountered out in the field. However, being keen to practise as much as I can and not having been out and about much this year, I decided to look through the photos I took in the garden earlier in the year. I just love the colour of this little Aquilegia and these buds seemed like an 'easy' place to start. It always amazes me just how many different colours there are on something that looks like it's one colour! Identifying and recreating the different colours is one of the most enjoyable things about this sort of painting. It's quite a hairy plant and I'm not sure I've found the best way of representing the hairs yet - that's something I need to practise.

The fading beauty of a rose. This is a lovely orange rose from our garden. When in full bloom there are also various pinks and yellows in the petals as well as the orange. I really enjoyed painting this and capturing the little bits of left-over colour and the browns and greys as the pigments deteriorate or are reabsorbed by the plant. The leaves were really interesting, too, with various greens along with some surprising purples and violets!

This was a bit of fun and 'light relief' after the last two, and also because it was just before Remembrance Day. It's the first time I've tried putting a splatter on a painting. I think it works for this one and gives it a sense of movement and the 'lightness' that poppies have.

This is my latest creation. Another garden plant, I know, but I'm getting lots of practice at drawing and painting all sorts of shapes and configurations of flowers! We have this Iris in our driveway, and I took a quick grab shot of it in the spring before the wind blew it over. I love the colours of this Iris. It took me ages to get the drawing right. It looks simple, but getting the proportions of the petals right was tricky - measuring all the different parts and drawing them in a box was the only way I could get it right. I always do the drawing on a rough piece of paper first, and then trace it and transfer it to my watercolour paper once I'm happy with it.

Now I have to decide what to paint next!