Back to one of my favourite sketching subjects – the umbrella. This time in watercolour with a pen and ink background drawing.
Umbrella, watercolour, pen and ink, 29 April 2015
Cafe Wednesday
Tag / watercolour
Down by the riverside
Time to post the remaining watercolours and drawings of our houseboat trip. Some of these works were made when we tied up for the afternoon.
Across from our home mooring, scrubby trees, saplings and reeds, watercolour, 14 April 2015
In the evenings and the early mornings, the light on the cliffs was truly magic.
Colour study of the river cliffs, watercolour and graphite, 15 April 2015
As the boat cruised along the river I sat out the front and tried to capture some of the passing scenery.
Images of the river in passing, graphite and watercolour, 14-16 April 2015
Slow days on the river
Australian Pelican (Pelecanus conspicillatus), watercolour and graphite pencil, 14 April 2015
Part of the birthday celebrations, just past, included four days on a house boat on the lower portion of the Murray River, part of the largest river system in the country.
There was lots to draw including a wide range of bird life. The most obvious were the pelicans (Pelecanus conspicillatus), calmly paddling along the river and getting a very good feed, it seemed, at every turn. I made a variety of sketches during our trip trying to capture some of the variety of the bird’s actions I observed.
Pelicans, water soluble graphite, 15 April 2015
Welcome Swallows (Hirundo neoxena) flew around the boat continuously capturing insects disturbed by our passing and cheekily roosting on the rails of the boat. We also saw lots of Australian Darters (Anhinga melanogaster) sitting, drying their wings, on convenient branches on the river margins. The darters lived up to their name with their necks twisting and swiveling to see what was happening in their vicinity.
A pelican, some welcome swallows and some darters, graphite and watercolour, 14 & 15 April 2015
Next post I’ll share with you some of the river scenery.
Farewell to summer
My partner said the other day that we won’t be going swimming down the beach anymore until the summer comes around again. How true. I saw snow on Mt Franklin as I was driving home yesterday. So here is a last hurrah for summer.
I realised that I never posted these drawings from one of our beach trips in late February.
Windswept, watercolour and graphite, 27 February 2015
The local high school was spending the afternoon learning surfing for sport (not in my day, boo hoo).
High school students waiting to start their surfing lesson, watercolour and graphite, 27 February 2015
And last but not least, a screeching gull determined to get some hot chips for lunch.
Screeching gull, watercolour, 27 February 2015
Depot Beach
When my watercolour set started filling with flying sand I realised that today was not going to be one for plein air painting. I got this far when commonsense overtook me.
First try, watercolour, full of sand particles
It wasn’t a pleasant day. The nor’easterly was whipping up the waves as well as the sand. To give you an idea here are some of the waves that were breaking on shallow rocks off the beach.
Offshore waves breaking on rocks off Depot Beach
We were staying at Depot Beach, part of Murramerang National Park, for a few days. Usually the wind doesn’t really get going until the afternoons onshore breeze, but not this trip. My partner retreated to the calm of our cabin while I made a quick graphite sketch of the trees so I could paint them later.
Determined not to leave the beach without taking a short walk, I made my way along the rock platform which was partially sheltered from the wind. Here I found a cluster of Zebra Top Shells (Austrocochlea porcata) clustered around the base of a rock, on the side away from the incoming sea.
A cluster of Zebra Top Shells, 17 March 2015, graphite
The other unusual sight on the beach were myriad pebbles and larger pieces of pumice. These have been washing up on Australia and New Zealand beaches for over a year now.
Pumice pebbles on Depot Beach, March 2015
The Pumice comes from an underwater volcano located on the ocean floor on the Kermadec arc some 1,000 kilometres north of NewZealand.
Later that evening I sat down to try and reconstruct the painting I tried earlier in the day. I was pretty pleased with the result.
Spotted gums at Depot Beach, 17 March 2015, watercolour and graphite
My Spotted Gums (Eucalyptus maculata) retained some of their liveliness as a result of the initial drawing. Although the painting does have a touch of the ‘modernist’ watercolour about it, due no doubt in part to the subject matter, as coastal scenes were very popular in the mid 20th century. By way of comparison here is Kenneth Mcqueen’s Under the Casuarinas, Maroochydore, c. 1938
Kenneth Mcqueen, Under the Casuarinas, Marouchydore, c 1938, Queensland Art Gallery.
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