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Wells Cathedral
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Message
Posted
Working on this at the moment. 20" x 16" in acrylic on canvas board. I feel it might need a little something extra to make it less boring.
Perhaps a figure walking along the path towards the Cathedral? Any thoughts?
Any other comments on the picture generally to make it better (photo not the best as on my old tablet). Any ideas for change gratefully received! Thanks.
Posted
Good start Steve. A few areas that could be looked at came to mind when I first saw this painting.
The pathway leads nicely into the composition, but it needs breaking up a little. It’s so well manicured and stands out far too much.
The group of trees in the centre are all a similar tone. Darken the tallest one as you have done with those on the left, more tone here will help.
The building is flat! Create a light source... get some shadows and cast shadows dropped in. If you’re working from a photo, use it as a reference only, not slavishly copy it (I’m not saying you are doing of course).
The sky is a bit flat, graduate it’s down to the horizon, a deeper blue at the top, adding a touch of alizarin crimson maybe at the bottom.
This is what I would do, but it’s your painting.
Edited
by Alan Bickley
Posted
Get the building right and much else will fall into place: the only problem with it at the moment is that it's not necessarily the first thing you look at, because - as you know - it's still rather flat. A duck or two wouldn't hurt, a figure on the path ditto, but all should serve the building - which needs those tonal variations, the shadows, that Alan and Linda suggested. It needs oomph - not necessarily niggling detail and academic precision, but a sense of its weight, structure - and grace. It's quite clear that you can do this, so I think we're just seeing a painting being built, here - looking forward to seeing where it goes.
Posted
Suggest you take a look at Rupert Cordeux's watercolour collection - he's painted many historic buildings.
What I used to do once - long while ago, but this discussion brings it back - was build model houses/buildings using the old Airfix toy bricks; then light them in various ways. Mind you, that's a hobby in itself, or can turn into one: I never ventured on a model of Wells Cathedral, or any other cathedral - much to much like hard work. But it was quite useful in observing how light can hit a building. As is - I don't know if you live in Wells, but you'll have large buildings and old churches near you, wherever you live: go and take a look on a day with similar weather conditions to your painting, take a sketch pad and a marker pen, or coloured pencils, watercolour, whatever, and sketch what you see. Direct observation always helps.
Posted
Very interesting Robert. I hadn't seen Rupert's gallery before and his paintings are great, although I'll have to be careful not to just start copying his style etc!
I also saw he was showing drawings including detail of windows of Wells Cathedral and this led me on to his comments about making scale models of cathedrals and churches and from there to his own website. And wow, his models are brilliant. I'm particularly interested in such models as more than 20 years ago I used to make dollhouses and having found then that there were no websites dedicated I set some up under the name dollshouse-info and ran them with my wife until about 6 years ago, taking adverts not only from UK but also USA. Sold the site eventually which no longer exists due to the many free advertising sites - I did the right thing!
Rambling a bit here but I've enjoyed doing this Wells painting and thinking of doing other similar in addition to my cars. Also always fancied doing a large model of Blenheim Palace which is near to me and Rupert's models have ignited that thought again but like all these ideas I will never have the time to do all. I suppose I should be grateful that I never have enough time on my hands to get bored - how did I ever find the time to work!!
Posted
Rupert is certainly one of the best watercolour artists on this site, I greatly admire his work.
I wouldn’t worry about copying his style Steve, because you won’t get anywhere near to it! I know that I couldn’t...
For the shadows and cast shadows on the cathedral, I would mix up a darker colour of the building plus a touch of blue and glaze it. Don’t use linseed oil though, you need a glazing medium for it to work.
Posted
I’ve had a look at pictures on the internet of this view, which is quicker than me wading through my own photos. There are quite a few in different seasons and times of day. The bishops palace also has its own website. I was right, there are ducks and swans. Also there are sometimes more colourful flowers in the border on the right. It might be a good idea to have a look for inspiration.
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