This month saw the start of my new feature called ‘Paint me a Picture’ in which I ask my friends on social media to choose a colour palette for my art. I then painted a trio of pictures on paper and recorded a time-lapse video to share my creative process.

Following the colour workshop I attended recently (see previous blog), I thought it would be an interesting challenge to paint a monochrome picture - just one main colour. Being such a lover of bold vibrant colour combinations in my art, I realised that this would be an unusual avenue for me to venture down! I offered blues, red/pink or green but the blues won with a landslide victory! Great choice!

I mixed phthalo blue, white, black and allowed myself a bit of raw umber to create a warm grey. No fluorescent pink, no yellow or red, not even some complementary orange!

I’ve affectionately named this trio the Blues Brothers, giving them names from the band: Murphy, Mack & Malone! Here they are:

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These paintings will become available for sale to everyone else from 1st October - when you will able to click on each picture above for further details.

I’ve really enjoyed the nudge to paint with blue - not my normal ‘go to’ colour at all. Whether it’s the intrigue of the deep sea, a sense of soaring the clouds way up high, a fresh mountain spring or a warm bubble bath - blue brings such tranquility and peace with it, such a calming and nourishing colour. What does it make you think of?

I love inviting you into my process and my studio. Use the comments below, I’d love to hear what parts you enjoy most about seeing me work.

I recently had the treat of taking part in the Mark Eanes Colour & Design 3 day Intensive. I learnt so much and know you'd like to hear all about it!
I’ve always been a fan of colour, as you probably know, and I knew the basics of the colour wheel (primary, secondary, tertiary, complements) but this course took me WAY beyond and into a whole new adventure that I realised I was only scratching the surface of! Prismatic hues, chromatic and achromatic greys, analogous hues were all new things to me.

What is a Prismatic Hue?
The purest, most saturated and intense colours. Red, yellow and blue, and the rest of the 12 colours they mix on the colour wheel.

What is a Muted Hue?
These are not as saturated or intense as prismatic as they have another colour, white, black or grey mixed into them.

What is a Chromatic Grey?
These have little saturation or intensity, they can be very dark or very light or middle tones and they aren’t necessarily grey!

Day 2 and 3 we looked at composition and layout of art, looking at artists like Mondrian. We used the colour swatches we’d made to make designs of our own, based around the colour categories and relationships that we were learning about. Obviously it’s only when you try using your new knowledge that you test if you understand it!!

Here are my results

2 pictures per colour group. Both with a wide range of hue (colour) but then 1 had to be with a wide range of value (light & dark) and the other with a narrow range of value. Can you tell which is which? And can you see what difference it makes?
Which colour group and rules are you most drawn to? Does that surprise you?

By the way Mark told us a great tip for checking value, which is viewing through a black and white filter on your phone - narrow range of value should look very similar - see this example.

I think the biggest things to come out of this workshop for me is not that I now know clever colour vocabulary but that I discovered new colours and colour relationships that I love and that really excite me. I’m always on the hunt for vibrancy and have leant towards the more pure colours in the past (the prismatic) as I love their intensity, but actually the muted hues and even some of the more saturated chromatic greys, and how they sit with certain other colours, gave me a whole new avenue to explore!

We have ended the course with a whole load of extra exercises to continue with and things to discover. I actually finished realising that I both needed to harness this new passion but also to put boundaries on it, otherwise I could see myself just colour mixing all my days and never achieving anything else!

Click HERE for a link to Mark Eanes website for future 3 day and 6 weeks courses.
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And I'd love to hear in the comments below which colour combinations you are most drawn to from the ones I've shared!