CHARCOAL WORK No9

Beautifully drawn, Charles, but I really would like to pick up paints and colour it in!!!

Another lovely charcoal painting Charles, very well painted

Really beautiful Charles, full of atmosphere.

It's really great the way you draw these beauitful, evocative woodland scenes with bits of the trees that make them up (if you see what I mean....)

I really envy your touch with woodland scenes Chas, your trees are really believable In any medium, its .lovely.

This is again a very impressive work, Charles. Can I join you for a picnic, it seems to be a wonderful spot!

Charles, I understand that you have only recently moved into charcoal drawing? Can that really be true? Because these drawings are simply brilliantly done - I don't need colour here: I can infer it and sense it. I don't think you need any sort of tip, but I'll offer one anyway; I've never had this sort of result from charcoal, but I have had a lot of pleasure out of black conté crayon, and spray of fixative, and white conté on top; or a carbon pencil base, with or without conté crayon: the harder degrees of conté crayon and carbon pencil work well with this approach, and can be exploited even with a touch of school-grade white chalk on top. Most of my drawings in these media are on good-quality cartridge (eg, Daler Rowney's red and yellow sketchbooks) and some on watercolour paper. Combining these media with a little water on a brush - both charcoal and carbon pencil work well with water - produces very interesting results. Then you can add ink; watercolour; gouache; pastel; acrylic - it really is a lot of fun! You have a real artist's eye to have produced a drawing like this, with all its contrasts and "lost and found" edges - and I sense that your voyage of exploration of media has only just begun - but is taking off.

Truly magical Charles!

Yet another great study and, yes, I will try charcoal but I am busy working on a few local scenes (in my line drawing style) which have been requested by a local gallery for consideration - so here's hoping !!!

Wow I do like this........makes a very mysterious forest ! Lovely work.

I think this is one of your best charcoal paintings Charles, though they are all really good. You just do enough to suggest - like the flowers and the stream - then leave the rest to the imagination. Works expecially well with foliage and trees - your tones are spot on. I think because this work is somewhat different from the norm, they will be in demand. Hope your gallery work goes well.

Agree with all the other comments but what struck me were the textures that you have produced.

You've really mastered this medium in super quick time, Charles! It's superb! The beautiful tones, the lovely misty effect on the left hand corner and jus the right amount of sparkle. There's so much to appreciate and enjoy!