Portsmouth Exhibition: Still lives

I have decided to include some of the oil paintings I have painted in my Realistic Oil Painting Course in the exhibition.

As I have already written about several times (for example here, here and here), working in a systematic, analytical fashion is a real challenge. It's like learning another language with very different vocabulary and grammar.

I confess that I find it a challenge to stick to the rules and get easily bored - painting the fruit stacks was a way of adding a bit of fun and quirkiness to the subject of still lives.

We started off painting in black and white, and I was longing to work in colour, but discovered that I enjoy the challenge of working with just 4 grey shades. Sometimes less is more - if you know the rules (and resist breaking them... at least for now.)