Mountains, in oils

When the assignment to paint a landscape or nature painting arrived, I thought at once of two places - Gotland and Scotland. Therefore, I duly painted both.
The first painting to be started on and finished, is an oil painting on a 38x46 cm (or F8) canvas on a frame. The reference photo was irresistible, providing me with challenges as well as speaking to some of my strengths.
I started out by sketching the outlines, managing reasonably well, and then began by painting the mountains roughly. I couldn't resist spending quite some time on them, before moving on to the grasses. A lot of raw umber and ochre colours were used. The sky was what I painted last, technically at least - I then went back and touched up both here and there, first and foremost in the area of the dark hills that actually had, as I noticed, a few flecks of sunlight in spots I hadn't hitherto noticed. And so it was out with the ochre again, and both working in almost-dried paint, and drybrushing.
I allowed this painting to dry for a few days during one stage, and left it alone for short periods of time too. I do love working wet in wet, but it needed to be left to dry for some details.
I am very pleased with the snow on the mountains, but it was very tricky to get the snow amongst the grass quite right. The photo doesn't do the painting justice, even if it does manage to catche some of the suble colour change in the sky, for example.

The reference photo is of the mountains of An Teallach (meaning, most likely, "Forge" or perhaps "Anvil" in Scots Gaelic), in Dundonell, in Scotland. They are very beautiful.

But this painting does not end there, I'm afraid. As I painted, I knew I wanted to incorporate something of a slightly more fantasy nature, and indeed, it would have felt unfinished had I neglected to do so. So there, in the left side of the painting, there is a someone and a horse, walking along.
Therefore, the painting is called what it is called - "Ered Luin, or An Teallach with a visitor." For what would that pointy-hatted old man do there, in Scotland? Not that I'd mind meeting him, of course.
The Ered Luin are also known as the Blue Mountains, and once stood east of Beleriand, though where that lay is now only the sea. Instead, we must look to the east of the Ered Luin, and notice, perhaps, the river Lhûin which flows into the sea at the Grey Havens, Mithlond.

"Even as the first shadows were felt in the Mirkwood there appeared in the west of Middle-Earth the Istari, whom Men called the Wizards. None knew at that time whence they came, save Círdan of the Havens, and only to Elrond and to Galadriel did he reveal that they came over the Sea." ("The Silmarillion", J.R.R. Tolkien, p 359)

And so, the parallell was an easy one to draw upon. But most of all, I am plain happy with a very good nature painting, which conveys some of the incredible beauty of a land I love.

An oil painting long in the making

This oil painting was long in the making because of that which so often happens - life. It was near finished when something interrupted, and then had to wait for two weeks until I could give it the last few hours it needed. It might have taken anything between fifteen to twenty hours to paint, I am not certain.
For the background, I chose a photo of the Grampian mountains in Aberdeenshire, with a view that, on a clear day, allows you to see as far as out to sea. I thank Yiling Wang, my friend on that particular roadtrip, for her help in taking that photo. From it I used the background colours and the general proportions of the lady, but not the lady herself. She is from my imagination only.
I especially liked painting the dress, and the lower part thereof. I am not entirely happy with the area around her bust, but I had been working on it for too long, and decided I needed to let it be and work on something else. The hair, also, was a joy to paint. I have never tried making hair quite as detailed with oils.

In conclusion, I am happy with the painting and I think it shows that I have progressed in my painting, when I compare it to other paintings. There is still a long way to go to make it as photorealistic as I would like it, but that is what practice is for. I am, however, not entirely happy with the picture you see here - I had to opt for a somewhat reddish-grey tint to the originally white sky, in order for the photo to better reflect the true colour of the dress and the stone wall. I suppose I shall learn how to fix that in Photoshop, but for now, it is not too important.

The painting is called "Grampian Sidhe", after the mountain itself, and after the Gaelic word for Fair Folk (please note that this is what she is - not a fairy, the diminutive), or elf.

What do you like the best with the painting? What do you think could have been done even better?

Two possibly surrealist paintings

The assignment to which these paintings belong was one where we had the choice of four styles: Abstract art, Surrealism, Expressionism and Cubism. Regarding these, I'm only friends with Surrealism, but I tried again my hand at Expressionism. It did, of course, fail, being labelled by my teacher as Surrealism anyway.
The picture to the left is not taken in ideal lighting conditions, and I doubt I'll take another. It was an attempt at Expressionism, and I care not much for it. For certain, it does say a little of what I wanted to express with it - spiralling emotions, hence the name of it. Especially the spiral in the hand, holding your feelings in your hand open for all to see, but ready to be squashed. It is made from acrylics, didn't take too long, and was painted on a rather small canvas.
The other, however, is another story entirely, and one I am very proud of.
It is decidedly Surrealist, and incorporates many things of which I am particularily proud or fond. The stylised bird, the sign for the shapechanging ravens, the Corax, from an old roleplaying game called "Werewolf: the Apocalypse". The lady in her Victorian/Edwardian dress and her rose parasol, with no face. The phoenix sun, which was a stroke of genius in my own mind. The blue to the left of the sky, the yellow below the bridge. The rocks, that actually look quite nice, and the strange, rolling clouds, or sea, or grass, below. The bridge, I might come back to and add a few little shadow touches on.
It is painted in oil colours, took remarkably short time from what I was expecting (that's not to say it was done in an afternoon, however) and it was a joy making it. The smoothness of the lower part of the painting took quite some time and effort, yet I did not overwork it, which was nice. I had to go back and touch up some of the white after I thought I was done and had taken some photos, because I had been sloppy with the brush in the white areas up by the phoenix sun.
It is dreamlike, joyful and a little bit disturbing. The way I like to paint Surrealism.

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