Creek, Isle of Wight

This is beautiful, Robert. A very succesful way of painting and differentiating all the grasses. Wonderful. I like your other painting in this gallery too.

Easily one of your best Robert. So much to see, such detail, and makes you wonder what's just over the brow of the hill.

I like, I like, I love. Beautiful

Clearly an inspired piece, I should say a masterpiece. Robert, this is brillinat. It just makes me feel good looking at it. Thanks.

A beautiful painting. Love the scene very much.

A painting by a real artist...and a masterpiece... actually Robert this really is one of your best - great water, great sky awesome foliage...particularly like the soft distant grasses on the right and the bare tree on the left. All in all top notch. Well done.

I'm genuinely touched by these replies, thank you all very much - I do think I crossed a line here into something a step above what I've managed to achieve before, and am delighted so many of you think so too. Of course, I can see all that's wrong with it now! But then - that's progress in its own right - a lot of this progress comes from some new brushes from Rosemary & Co, and chromacolour.co.uk, but a lot more is down to just getting on and painting more. Your encouragement means a lot to me.

You really do know how to handle acrylic!. Looks like an oil painting. Masterly! By the way, re your comment on my 'After the Party': I got the suede-effect emulsion from B&Q. Colour 'cashmere'. No big choice. Once on, it feels like fine sandpaper. As I've not been painting very long and especially not in acrylics, I thought it was me, not the paper, so I feel vindicated about that now. Paper is, of course, a lot easier to store. I've tried stretched deep sideed canvases which I much prefer, but they present a storage problem. Canvas on board isn't bad either. Otherwise, I'll use any surface I can lay my hands on, even some discarded table mats, but most things seem to need priming. Acrylic primer is quite expensive, so investing £10 in a large pot of emulsion is not bad. If I can, I like to paint fairly large but only as a treat and at the college where there's space. At home it's a bit tight. I look longingly at a space down the garden imagining a spacious studio materialising down there somehow.

Another stunning painting. Thanks for the comments about 'Brent and Pip', I've left quite a lengthy reply there for you to read. I think you could paint anything.

Ver very nice, this is really lovely, I just love the white on the trees its given them a very soft and mesmerizing look, would love to step in there and check them out :) really lovely painting Robert.

I missed this one Robert - time restraints (and shameless prejudice) limit me to the watercolour pages. But you've cracked the vexed question of lack of transparency and depth in acrylics, and the highlights make it all sparkle. You're right about the secret passageways in old buildings. As a frontier town Chiavenna's seen it all - the plague, the Romans, Spanish, French (Napoleon), Swiss (Grisons), Austrians etc. all swept though in successive waves. But though it has a strong reputaion of religious tolerance, the town was never put to the sword and flame, so the old buildings, many patrician, remain. A place whose formidable civic pride is grotesquely out of proportion to its size and population!

I particularly like your treatment of the water here and the reflections in the foreground. Quite inspired brushwork on the foliage which sends your eye all over the piece, and that is meant as a compliment :)

I'm very impressed with all your paintings Robert. Thank you very much for your comment about my tiger, but would you mind submitting it again as it was accidentally deleted when I was editing my portfolio. Thanks very much

OH MY - I have a long way to go- truly fantastic. I love it.