Here, briefly, are a couple of larger studio pieces I recently finished from sketches done in September in Norfolk and Suffolk, England. They’re off to Constantine Lindsay Fine Art.
Boats at Low Tide, Burnham Overy Staithe. 80 x 100 cm, oil on linen.
Pin Mill, Low Tide. 70 x 100 cm, oil on linen.
I’m off to Austria to paint outside in the Alps tomorrow. It will be good to get out of the studio for a bit.
Boats at Low Tide, Burnham Overy Staithe. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
Here are the paintings from last week in Norfolk, England.
One of the best things about painting in the UK, I think, is that there is a large number of excellent plein air painters to work with. This trip was organized by David Bachmann, and we were joined by Roy Connelly, Tony Dakin, Jory Glazener, Tim King, David Pilgrim, Mike Richardson and Karl Terry. (One evening the English artists were insisting that there aren’t really that many plein air painters in the UK, but then the two spots where we painted had large groups of plein air painters from the Norfolk Painting School, run by Martin Kinnear, and David and I saw another group earlier in the week at Pin Mill).
Saturday in Burnham Market. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
While the weather in the UK was beautiful all week, we had a marine layer over northern Norfolk. I enjoyed the grey skies though, after a very hot August in Italy (well, the second half of August at any rate).
Driving inland a bit I was able to find some sun.
Bull in a Norfolk Field. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
Sheep in a Field, Cranworth. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
Teal Cottage Garden. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
Norfolk Sky. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
Norfolk is famous among artists for its skies. The flatness of the land combined with the unstable English weather makes for some great sky paintings. Or so I’ve been told. We only had one day when the clouds were distinct, most of the time it was hazy or a flat grey.
The Church at Burnham Market. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
I spent a lot of time painting the boats at low tide, I guess since I find it such an unusual subject.
Sailboat, Burnham Overy Staithe. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
Boat at Low Tide, Brancaster Staithe. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
Cornfield, Brancaster Staithe. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
Norfolk has a lot to offer for subject matter. It’s also a really nice place to work as the people are friendly, it feels really empty (at least in September), and there are very few fences anywhere.
Norfolk Morning. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
Boat at Low Tide, Pin Mill. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
Pin Mill is a couple of small buildings on the south shore of the the tidal River Orwell, in southern Suffolk, England.
Sailboat at Low Tide, Pin Mill. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.
I recently spent three days painting there with three other plein air painters: David Bachmann, Roy Connelly, and Paul Rafferty.
The English painter Edward Seago did some of his best paintings there of the Thames barges. Since I spend a lot of time talking to other plein air painters, and Seago is seen as one of the best plein air painters of the 20th century, I assumed everyone in England had heard of Pin Mill, and that it was something of an English Giverny. So I was surprised when I called my studio painter friends in England to brag about going to paint at Pin Mill and no one had heard of the place. Then, at the B&B where I stayed up the road, they had never heard of Edward Seago.
Grey Morning, Pin Mill. 30 x 20 cm, oil on panel.
The place should be more well-known. It is one of the more picturesque quarter miles anywhere in the world. The Thames sailing barges that Seago painted are still there, and often have their sails up still.
Unfortunately, when we were there the barges were all up at the nearby town of Woodbridge for a maritime weekend. We drove there to try to paint them on the last day, but they had just left to go back to Pin Mill.
Late Morning, Pin Mill. 25 x 35 cm, oil on panel.
Pin Mill Sunset. 20 x 30 cm, oil on panel.