peter town

Burnham Stave -North Norfolk

#shiftingtides – flowing lines

The mass of shells on this beach made its own composition [Cat: 9999, Sea Shells, Burnham Stave, 12 x 16” / 30 x 40 cm, Digital Watercolour, 2013]

The North Norfolk coast is a special place, where flat landscapes melt into a vast grey-green sea beneath 180 degrees of sky. The defenceless nature of the landscape and the fertility of the land has invited invaders for millennia and probably will for millennia to come. The shifting coastline throws up new sandbars, land locking ports and drowning villages, all adding to its mystery.

There is so much to attract the artist. For me it is the shifting nature of the place; in the course of a day an ancient church can be bathed in sunlight or lost in a misty rain, an Iceni place of worship can become a thriving community church.

Experimenting with Turner

#learningfromthemasters – exploring techniques

Picasso is reported to have said that good artists borrow from other artists and great artists steal. You can certainly see Picasso putting this into practice in some of his paintings.

Artists throughout history have learnt their trade by meticulously copying the great painters under the critical eye of their masters. This is not something I would have excelled at as I find it very difficult to copy, but I do like to explore techniques based on other artists’ work – this does not make me a great artist.

Experimenting with watercolour [Cat: 9999, Disused Lighthouse, 5 x 7″ / 13 x 18 cm, Watercolour on board, 2008]