We’ve had a few more thunder storms today, dark and wet and dramatic, but between them the sun has been beaming down with surprising heat. On days like this our pooch, Flint, loves to take refuge in the puddles that have appeared under the trees, breaking his walk with an occasional dip and then racing around with a new lease of life once his belly is wet.
Mum asked me last week why I wasn’t trying some wet paintings while we’re having all this rain. My first thought was ‘too hard’, probably my second thought too… but I do love reflections of tree trunks, and I’ve always wanted to try my hand at a painting that Mum & Dad have by a family friend, Miss Tuff. Painted in oils, it’s an image of the trunks of several trees standing in puddles. It has gorgeous rich dark colours and sparkling light captured in the wet patches.
Miss Tuff was a lovely lady and had a very interesting past working in British stately homes painting wallpaper, a long time before it came printed on a roll. With a wonderful childlike innocence she was fascinated by absolutely everything. When Dad met her I think she was already in her seventies and she was learning woodwork in the same class as he was.
My attempt is based on some trees in our local park, which often gets flooded. Not so much a close up as hers, stage one was to get the sky and water in and a wash to indicate the ground. The colours here are not as they really appear as I kept painting after it got dark and had to take the photo in artificial light, hopefully tomorrow I’ll get one in daylight.