Retouched with oil pastels [above]
Oil on canvas, 24 x 24″, Dec 20-21 2019
Who looks at this stuff? Who is in the slightest bit interested in looking at paintings of gloomy misty scenes? This painting began life after a photo but then it lost its way a couple of times and it doesn’t seem to have been able to find its way back.
I look at it. I’m interested in it. OA
Thank you OA… I didn’t get any feelings of exhilaration from this piece… you know, kind-of feelings that you have done something with what you saw… made something of it… thus I’m not happy with it… It’s just one of those pieces that kept going wrong for me. So I posted in online anyway rather than continue plastering it with more and more paint! A photograph of the scene would convey it’s mystery much better. Although I feel I caught something of the misery, the cold, the wintry-ness, the damp, the wildness, the gloom, the inhospitableness of it. It was after all a pretty depressing thing to look at in the flesh and my image has maybe caught some of those depressing feelings! Beyond the trees is a valley with steep slopes and trees but the fog blots the view. Maybe the problem is finding trees, groups of trees, mature trees, old twisted trunks, the sort of trees artists of the past, landscape artists, painted… I mean big trees, elms, oaks, beeches… since the 18th century so much has disappeared or been cut down. I have see massive ash trees and other such giants over here in Ireland cut down to make way for new roads and the resultant increased pollution… They call it ‘progress’… and we here in the West quickly find fault with what’s happening in the Amazon… instead of putting our own houses in order…. and setting a good example… in short, where have all the really big trees gone? Apologies for the rant.
Excellent work Peter
Appreciate that Mike. Thanks!