Little Paintings for my Kickstarter 'The Wind in the Willows' Book Campaign

 I feel like I'm blowng the dust off this blog, polishing my spectacles, and thumbing through its pages to see where I last posted... December 2020?!!! Oh dear. In explanation I use this blog to post my thoughts and process on painting, and Facebook, Instagram and Twitter for promotion. Over the last year and a half I've been so busy, I've barely been able to look around and post something meaningful, until now.

As part of my Kickstarter campaign to gather pre-orders for my fully illustrated edition of 'The Wind in the Willows' (take a look), I have been creating 15 small watercolours for those lucky backers who snapped them up in the first few days of the Kickstarter launch. I also managed to make a time lapse video painting Ratty, start to finish. 

 

Many people ask me about my technique, hopefully this video will give you some pointers. At the beginning I start with my basic linework (which has been slightly erased with a putty rubber). Then I add an underpainting of cobalt blue and cadmium red mixed together. Those colours create a dull violet, perfect for cast shadows on a warm day (complimentary to yellow ochre). Once the underpainting is dry enough, I add local colours and then start to build up deeper tones and details all over. Lots of work is required on the fur to give Ratty a nice texture, but I have to be careful not to overwork his shirt and trousers, which is easy to do with transparent watercolour. The red chequer for the basket liner is left until last, because I want to build up all the tonal values first and then let it influence the layer of red watercolour. I do this with all patterned fabrics.

Here are the other character paintings, all taken from scenes in the book:

'Telling Tales' and other artworks

As the year draws to an end, it's time to post some artwork highlights which I have completed in 2019. I don't post much work on the blog these days, so there is a fair amount to show you.

'Telling Tales' 24 x 31cm watercolour and gouache

'House Sitting' 24 x 31cm watercolour and gouache

'House Sitting' rough drawing

'Hankering For Home' 24 x 31cm watercolour

'The Last Train' 51 x 35cm, watercolour and gouache

'Nice Morning Ma'am' 24 x 31cm watercolour and gouache

'Ratty Writing Poetry' 24 x 31cm watercolour and gouache

Hopefully in 2020 all my 'Wind In The Willows' illustrations will be published in a fully illustrated edition of the classic story.

P.s have you seen my Winter Sale? Please take a look - www.chris-dunn.co.uk/sale . Everything is reduced, including calendars and limited edition prints up to 50% off!

I wish you all a Happy New Year!

Work In Progress

Rough Drawing - I can't think of a suitable title yet!

I've been so busy I have nearly forgotten about my blog! Hopefully this post will kick me into a blogging gear. As I type I am waiting for this painting to dry. I have applied a mixture of prussian blue and payne's grey on saturated paper in the hope of creating an atmospheric late evening background of fields and trees under a light dusting of snow. The finished scene will have Mole sadly recalling his old subterranean home and how he hasn't seen it for so long. The two friends are making their way back to Ratty's house, late on a winter's day, when Mole suddenly catches the scent of his home and becomes distraught. Ratty consoles Mole and quickly decides to find Mole's house in the hope of cheering him up.

I love sloshing watercolour around...

Two Paintings In One

Double Jeopardy

Every now and then I like to create two paintings on the same piece of paper. It saves time, paper and water because I soak my watercolour paper in a water tray before taping it to the board to dry and stretch. It may be a time saver, but working like has risks. I must be very careful to protect the half I am not working on from moisture and paint. Thankfully Scotch Magic Tape is brilliant for masking watercolour paper without overly-damaging the paper underneath. Fortunately the tape also adheres to the plastic sheet I use to mask larger areas, which means I can fix the sheet in place and seal all the edges so there is little chance of water encroaching onto the painting.

This message is not sponsored by Scotch Magic Tape, although I wouldn't mind if it was (they could pay in rolls of tape).

Here are the finished 'The Wind In The Willows' illustrations:

'Walking Through The Village'watercolour and gouache
24 x 31cm

'Heard The News?'
watercolour and gouache
24 x 31cm

My thoughts On 'Supper Arrives'

'Supper Arrives' watercolour and gouache, 31 x 40cm

This is my latest painting for Galerie Daniel Maghen. I finished it last Tuesday, and I'm not sure exactly how long it took to complete other than I felt I spent longer on this piece than anticipated. 

 

The scene is taken from 'The Wind In The Willows', when the carol singing mice are invited into Mole's house for supper. Soon they realise Mole is low on food, so two young mice are sent out with a basket to fetch more vittles for their evening feast. Here you can see the mice have returned and their fellow creatures are excitedly dishing out the basket's contents.

 

Normally I'm very confident when it comes to these cosy interior scenes, however this time I really struggled to keep everything warm and slightly gloomy (if that's the right word), especially when I was painting the blue welsh dresser. If you're not careful, a blue dresser can swiftly turn green when painting in watercolour.

 

The gouache highlights certainly helped to sharpen well lit edges, such as an ear, whisker or ceramic mug. The candlelight was deliberately kept to watercolour and using the white of the paper to create a bright glow. If you try to introduce gouache into something so bright it can look a bit flat and even grey as the opague paint doesn't always reflect natural light as effectively as watercolour paper.

 

Out of interest, most of the items in the kitchen are taken from Avebury Manor in Wiltshire. The kitchen table, dresser and stove are very similar to the ones in this painting. It's always much easier to draw something straight from reality than invent your own objects, and quite often you spot something that you would never have imagined too.

 

 

New Website www.chris-dunn.co.uk

Things are on the move. Please check out my new website. I will be adding more and more artwork and information over the next few weeks, and I'll eventually have a nice little shop for you to take advantage of (if you so wish).  

The Orator

 The Orator

Watercolour / Gouache

24 x 31cm

Hot off the easel, watercolour painting finished and scanned this morning! 

I had a bit of trouble with the values in this painting. I have attempted to increase them on Mr Toad while letting the background level out slightly in the hope that the main character will stand out sufficiently. Now, that's not easy to do when you have an open fireplace crackling merrily in the background as it forces you to develop contrasts so the flame look suitably bright. A lesson learned I think.

In terms of process I did the usual sepia watercolour under-painting, glazed local colour then worked the values in watercolour. Finally I added mostly highlights with gouache but I did darken his velvet lapels with a deep brown umber gouache paint.