Northern Isles Magic and the BBC Holiday

Having been slightly side-tracked from 'art' by commercial illustration projects, I was suddenly snapped back into life by an encounter with a beautiful female :)
Red-backed shrikes are among my favourite birds and an early morning, pre-school birding trip brought me some cracking views of a lovely bird.  This is a watercolour I've just completed of the episode:

Red-backed Shrike, watercolour, 22"x17"

Time is ticking!  The next major event on the calendar in the BBC Wildlife Magazine Readers' Holiday.
With the seabirds back on their breeding cliffs, the skuas cruising the moorlands and the waders all in full nuptual swing, Orkney is a truly special place to spend a week in summer.  The daylight virtually never ends and midnight excursions hunting for the evocative corncrake or even a night-time vigil with storm petrels are magical and unforgettable experiences.
There are still just a couple of places left on our Orkney Islands Art holiday - lead by the grand master of bird art John Busby, the dynamic, extraordinarily talented Darren Woodhead . . . . and me :)
Please click on the link for booking details;
http://www.discoverwildlife.com/reader-holiday/paint-wild-orkney

New Exhibition at the Scottish Ornithologists Club (S O C)

I've been extremely busy making work for a brand new show at Aberlady, Lothian which opens on 13th April. There will be 52 new paintings on show in the excellent Waterston House, headquarters of the Scottish Ornithologists Club.
All the paintings are now finished (phew!) and the ferry booked. Really looking forward to the trip and the opening. See you on the other side . . .

'White Gyr', watercolour, 28"x22"

'Northern Wings', oil, 40"x30"

'Eider Cascade', watercolour, 22"x28"

'Wigeon & Black-headed Gulls', conte & watercolour, 40"x22"

'Winter Sun', Conte & watercolour, 22"x38"

'Manx Shearwaters', charcoal, 40"x22"

Ebay Bargains

Fallow Deer Buck - watercolour and gouache, 16"x12"

 

Here's another large piece currently listed on Ebay - still very low price indeed.  Please follow the link below and take a look at the other items:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/sag63w/m.html?item=290877246965&ssPageName=STRK%3AMESELX%3AIT&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2562

 

Storage space is at a premium, so I'm reluctantly having to part with a number of illustrations and paintings made over the past few years. 
Some of these are listed on Ebay now: http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/sag63w/m.html?item=290877246965&ssPageName=STRK%3AMESELX%3AIT&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2562
Some of these are extremely unusual, such as the Primeaval Hunter gatherer and the Giant Dragonflies:

Slow Start to the Blogging Year

Long-tailed ducks at Yesnaby, charcoal, 40"x22"

 

Things have been fairly quiet on the birdwatching/art front for a while.  My art activities have been constrained to the studio due to the extremely short daylight hours and frenetic preparations for my upcoming show at Waterston House, the home of the Scottish Ornithologists’ Club. http://www.the-soc.org.uk/waterston-house.htm

Here’s a small selection of recent work destined for the show;

 

Desert Wheatear, watercolour, 17"x11"

 

Eiders, watercolour, 22"x17"

Hares and Snipes, Conte and watercolour, 37"x22"

Ringles Tangles, Sharpie and wash, 18"x14"

 

Snow Buntings, Sharpie and wash, 16"x14"

 

However, both my birding and painting had a major boost on February 1^st during the morning school run to Stromness. Whilst making a detour to hopefully catch sight of a family of otters I’d seen the previous morning. There was no sign of the otters, but Edie and I were more than compensated when we spotted a white-phase gyr falcon sitting on a hay-bale. Although it disappeared for the rest of the day, it returned on Saturday, giving terrific views to many local and visiting birders. On occasion it would hop around among the local hares – both species seemingly as bemused by the event as each other. I returned to the studio and made an impression of the event immediately, and subsequently a more considered rendition of the bird a few days later.

The White Gyr, watercolour, 22"x17"

 

Although winter deprives me from fieldwork, it does allow time for a few commissions. One of my favourite views around Orkney is that from Outertown towards Hoy, over Scapa Flow. I’ve painted the Hoy Hills a couple of times, and I really enjoyed making this oil painting for a friend. The seascape at Birsay was a self-initiated piece and I think I learned quite a lot during the making of the piece. 

Scapa Flow and The Kame of Hoy, Oil, 30"x20"

Birsay, Oil, 30"x20"

 

Recent encounters with waxwings have been artistically fruitful, with pages and pages of sketches documenting the winter influx. I have made several pieces of work using these, my winter-muse, culminating in a huge 40”x30” oil painting. This piece is unique for me; being almost exactly the image I had in mind at the offset. Most works end up drifting way off line, but this one behaved itself from start to finish!

 

Wings of the North, oil, 40"x30"

 

 

 

I'm delighted to be joining John Busby and Darren Woodhead as joint-leaders of this summer's BBC Wildlife magazine's Reader's Holiday in glorious, sunny Orkney!!!
Very limited spaces, so please book early to avoid disappointment;
http://www.speysidewildlife.co.uk/Holidays.aspx?location=PAINTING+ORKNEY
Also - in an unusual move, I've just decided to place my latest original Sharpie painting on 'Ebay' for a very limited time.  Just time to get a real bargain before Christmas:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/290833471466?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649

 



Hope you all enjoy the festive season and wishing for peace on our wonderful planet.

S W L A and the Langford Fieldsketch Award

turnstone at Evie Sands - fieldsketch

 

The Society of Wildlife Artists Annual Exhibition;  the premier exhibition of wildlife art in Britain – possibly the world.  The Society’s inaugural exhibition was held in London and opened by James Fisher in August 1964.  I first exhibited with the SWLA in 1986 and, finally this year, have been elected a full member.  They say that good things come to those that wait . . . 

pintails and wigeon - fieldsketch

 

. . . and this year I was astonished but incredibly delighted to receive the inaugural ‘Langford Field Sketch Award’.  The Award is given to “an artist who shows a fundamental understanding of the subject through their work in the field . . . for a body of work that captures the essence of the subject which has been drawn from life”.

goldcrests

 

goldcrests

 

I always joke that Autumn lasts about three hours in Orkney; the first serious blast of breeze strips any trees and shrubs of their leaves and deposits them somewhere due east of Scandinavia, yet this year we have enjoyed beautiful proper autumn days, typified by invasions of warblers – many goldcrests from the near continent and the exquisite yellow-browed from Siberia.  I spent a few sessions with these birds.

yellow-browed warbler in sycamore

 

British butterflies

 

It was also a pleasant diversion to be asked to make a small painting for a couple I know.  Butterflies occasionally feature in my work, but often they are overlooked in favour of the birds – but this was a piece I was keen to do.  As with most of my paintings, I spent a wee bit of time sketching before committing to the finished article and I was lucky to have several pages of butterfly sketches from my trip to Sark with the Artists for Nature Foundation last year.  Some of the quick watercolour sketches had a nice sense of vitality to them and I tried to keep some of that in the finished painting.

painted lady, red admiral and buddleia

 

waxwing - fieldsketch

 

waxwing - fieldsketch

 

I have a favourite bird – it’s the one I am looking at in any given moment.  But, to narrow that field down a little, it is the arctic skua.  Well, it is when they’re here, at any rate.  And when they’ve left for the Southern Hemisphere, I can look forward to greeting my other favourite birds – waxwings!  These little northern birds bring a splash of colour at the time of the year it is most needed.  Their sleek and beautiful plumage resonates against the dank and grey late autumn light; gem-like.  Nothing lifts the soul like seeing waxwings, and hearing their Christmas jingle-bell calls.  This autumn waxwings have arrived in their hundreds and I’ve spent a lot of time enjoying these delightful birds – and drawing them.  

 waxwing - fieldsketch

waxwing - fieldsketch

waxwing - fieldsketch

waxwing - fieldsketch