Bunbury’s Bridge

It was important to have the colours contrasty and clean, as this is a sunset without the usual dry summer feel. Its a typical sunset in Ireland – we get our fair share of wet weather, even in summer. The advantage is greenness, and clean air. I was trying to convey this here. In the previous painting the trees were blended a little into the sky colour. Here, I wanted no mixing of the ‘trees colour’ with the background ‘sky colour’.

The painting of the sky involves a lot of vigorous brushwork. It would not be possible to create this sky while leaving clear canvas spaces for trees or anything else to be painted cleanly into. Look at the video and you will understand what I mean. When the sky is painted to completion, the only way to have a clean canvas to paint on, is to wipe off the sky paint where the trees will be. I do this with a tissue dampened with White Spirits. By leaving a light stain of the sky colour in the wiped off area, allows trees with sky light coming through.

The colours, materials etc. are listed in the previous post. Here is the video. See you soon.