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January, 2010 | Scottish Landscape Art - Scottish Landscape Paintings

Archive for January, 2010

A week in the life of …

Posted by admin on January 29th, 2010

'From Beinn Inverveigh, October', Acrylic & Pastel, 2010, 60 x 60 cm

'From Beinn Inverveigh, October'

Saturday 23rd January

The main aim of the day was to try and get a painting finished.  I’ve been working on two pieces that I plan to exhibit at the Strathearn Gallery in Creiff as part of the Jolomo Awards 2009 Finalists exhibition.  This opens on Saturday 13th February and the work has to be delivered a week before.  So not long!  I’d completed the first piece the week before but this second piece was causing me a few problems.  However, before I could start painting there was the small matter of meeting the Pest control man who we’d contacted the day before after hearing some ominous scratching and movement in the studio walls and loft spaces.  It appears that while we were away from the building due to the frozen pipes, some furry friends have moved in.  Great!  By the end of the day the painting still wasn’t completed.

Sunday 24th January

So back to it again.  The painting in question is based on the view I had over to the hills of the Blackmount from the relative warmth of Rannoch Moor.  I’d been watching the bad weather through the monocular and it seemed an excellent subject for a painting.  Easier said than done sometimes but by the end of the evening I had the piece finally finished.  In the end, although it had caused me problems, I’m quite pleased with it and am looking forward to seeing it in a frame and on the wall.  Mind you, I was working on this picture for almost ten days!

'Winter, Blackmount', Acrylic & Pastel, 2010, 76 x 23 cm

'Winter, Blackmount', Acrylic & Pastel, 2010, 76 x 23 cm

Monday 25th January

Of course as I’ve said before, being a painter isn’t just about doing paintings …oh if that were only  the case.  We’ve been in the process of up-grading this website … as hopefully you’ve noticed.  Well, that of course means someone else doing the actual work on the site, but I’ve had to do quite a bit of work on the computer for this too.  The new works on the website are now shown much better with larger clearer images and more information about each painting.  So then, Monday morning started with a session on the computer, sorting images and writing details etc.  As anyone who’s visually impaired will know, using a PC can be quite time consuming and frustrating.  I use a screen magnifier mostly but of course I have to have the magnification so high I can only see a very small portion of the screen at any one time.  Suffice to say, I started work at 07.30 and by 11.00 I’d got some things done …but not much.  Added to this, my computer crashed in the middle of everything and I can honestly say it wasn’t the best starts to the day!

It did improve once down the studio and  as well as getting some interesting small drawings done I also got the painting I’d finished the day before, into it’s frame….and it looks great …he said modestly!

Tuesday 26th January

A slightly different day ….I’ve been asked by the Edinburgh based charity Autism Initiatives Scotland to become one of their patrons for a new project they’re starting in the city.   I had arranged to meet three of the people responsible for setting up and running the project, and to learn more of it and about my role as a patron.  More in detail in another blog but suffice to say that the project involves creating a working gallery through which people affected by autism can undertake apprenticeships in both the creative business sides of the gallery.  The meeting went very well and later we were taken to see the building that is to be the gallery.  It’s a wonderful building in a superb location in the heart of the gallery district on the edge of the city centre.  I’m very excited and delighted to have been asked to be involved in it.  Back in Irvine by 17.30 …and back on the computer for several more hours.

Wednesday 27th January

After another lengthy session on the computer, this time working on information requested by the Scottish Arts Circle, I then received an email from Germany informing me that I’d been selected for the 2010 Speyer Artists Scholarship.  Wow!  I’d applied back in January last year and didn’t really hold out much hope …but there you go ..if you don’t apply …etc etc.  More details in another blog …but basically it means I’ll be living and working in a purpose built house and studio in the centre of the historic and beautiful city of Speyer for the four months May – August.  What a great opportunity and chance to export a little bit of contemporary Scottish landscape painting into Europe.   Despite the elation at hearing this news, it was back to the studio and work through to 20.00.

Thursday 28th January

A whole day on the computer …getting images ready and sent to the Strathearn Gallery for their website.  Also a CV and statement. Emails to read, emails to answer.  We’ve just set up a link with Facebook and already have 20 plus fans (are you one?).  I finished my marathon session on the computer (about 10 hours and boggled eyes) by trying to learn my way around the Facebook website … I’m feeling a bit old!

Friday 29th ..today

Well, it’s 09.30 and I’ve been working at this keyboard for the last two hours.  Almost finished here so I plan to get a full days painting in.  Nita will pick me up when she finishes work at 20.00 …and then I think we’ll both deserve a pint!  Signing off … a rather frazzled artist!

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Back in Business!

Posted by admin on January 21st, 2010

'Every one a critic!'

'Every one a critic!'

On Sunday last, the pipes at the Courtyard studios finally thawed out, and surprisingly there were no burst pipes or floods.  It was a great relief and on Monday morning I moved my painting gear back down and got back to normality …whatever that is!

The pipes were frozen for just on two weeks and I found it very strange working away from my studio space.  For this time I was working in a spare corner of the spare room in our house.  It was rather cramped and I didn’t have much space …but, I did have water to make coffee and I didn’t have to wander along the road in order to use the toilets in the Harbour Arts Centre.  So then, it wasn’t too bad, although the room I was working in happens to be the one the cat spends most of his day sleeping in and so we had a few falling outs over the two weeks!  This was due mainly to me keeping him awake with my cursing every time I mixed the wrong colour or lost the particular pastel I was using.

One thing the temporary move did point out though, was just how much I rely on everything being in their places.  At the studio I have a place for everything.  I can’t see things well enough to look for them when I need them …so I have to be able to find them by memory.  Now, as anyone who’s visited my studio will tell you, I certainly don’t keep it tidy.  It’s a bit of a tip to be honest, but, that said, it is usually an organised tip!  I know exactly where amongst the rubble on my desk, to lay my hands on the tape measure or the scissors.  So long as I keep to this routine, I can move about and work quite quickly.  Of course, if someone comes into the studio and distracts me and I put something down in the wrong place, then it’s usually a ten minute job finding again once the visitor has gone.

This then was what I found working from the room in the house …I didn’t have set places for my gear and so I spent all the time I wasn’t arguing with the cat, searching for the right paint or pastel.'December afternoon, Rannoch Moor'

Surprisingly enough then, I managed to get two paintings completed in my spell in the spare room.  Not big paintings, but finished all the same.  The first piece was one of my long thin (76 x 23 cm) paintings.  This is the first of a number of pictures I’m hoping to produce based on the short day we had on Rannoch Moor back just before Christmas.  The second painting was one I’ve wanted to do for a while now.  It is based on a day last year when we were over on the Isle of Arran and got caught in a series of heavy rain showers.  They made the hills look splendid especially in the early morning light and this is one of what I hope to be a number of works on a similar theme.

'Passing shower, Isle of Arran',

In the end, quite a good and productive couple of weeks in my make shift studio.  I was though glad to get back to the proper one on the harbour side …. and I think the cat is glad I’ve gone too!

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Promotion, promotion, promotion…

Posted by admin on January 15th, 2010

In 1983 I completed my degree in Fine Art at Falmouth School of Art and travelled north to set up a studio with fellow Falmouth student Keith Barrett – now a leading name in British environmental sculpture. At the time I was pretty green behind the ears, with great ideas of ‘being an artist’. And I worked hard at my sculpture and drawing but never even considered that I needed to do more than simply make art …even if it wasn’t too bad. Needless to say, three years later and much in debt, I had to leave the p/t MA Fine Art course I was doing in Newcastle in a desperate search for work …and some kind of money. The only mitigating factor was that this was 1986 and Thatcher and her government were ransacking the country and its work force. But I couldn’t blame my failure on that …as much as I would have liked to. It was much more because I really hadn’t got the idea that for people to buy my work …they had to know it existed. It was no good sitting in a studio all day simply making art.

Now, one would have thought that I would have learnt …but no, while I did all sorts of jobs, working in youth hostels, kitchens, cleaning caravans etc, I still carried on with my art …but still hidden away. As my sight started to fail in 1990, I set up another studio, this time with my partner Anita (newly qualified from a two year ceramic design course, but still we put all our efforts into the product and failed to realise we had to promote what we were doing. And again we failed …closing the studio after about three years.

By the late 1990’s after a period where I’d spent all my spare time trying to re-learn how to work with rapidly diminishing sight, we moved to Scotland and I started once again to try and exhibit work. Even so I was still going down the same line, making the work but really not pushing myself. Finally though when I took on a WASPS studio on the harbourside in Irvine I took the first tentative step …I decided right from the start that I’d have my studio door ‘open’, I’d put a sign outside and invite passers by in to see the work. It wasn’t much, but people started to notice my work …and, you never quite know (even on Irvine harbour side) quite who will walk by and see your sign.

In 2004 a local chap wandered into the studio and after looking at the work announced that he was an art promoter living and working in Columbia, and he said to keep in contact. Well, I still hadn’t learnt, and although I kept his card ..I never got back in touch. Thankfully, on his next visit to Scotland in 2008 …he wandered back. After a lengthy talk he suggested we work together, he talked about the need to promote myself as well as my work, a concept that rather sheepishly I was still only just grasping. We talked internet, websites, galleries, press releases …and finally the penny dropped!

I still spend much of my time painting and drawing, but now I spend a lot of time on the computer, writing articles, writing this blog, visiting galleries, getting involved with various projects etc …in short, getting my name and ugly mug out there as much as possible. And it’s starting to work. The website is getting busier, people are starting to contact me; a momentum is starting to build.

The latest little project is to make a short video, a sort of 4 – 5 minute advert about myself, my work and my love of the hills. It’s been fun making it, even sat outside on a snowy hillside sketching while Jim Crossan the film man did his work. The video, partially funded by North Ayrshire Council, is nearly finished. It’s to go on my website as well as being made into quality DVDs to send out to galleries and potential customers. The point is I guess, that it doesn’t matter how good your work is; if the public don’t know it exists and they don’t know anything about the artist, then you’re really going to struggle. It’s been almost 27 years since I left Falmouth School of Art and finally I’m starting to get it right, things are starting to happen. Watch this space!

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Winter Blues …… and purples and yellows and oranges and pinks…

Posted by admin on January 9th, 2010

Like the rest of the country, Irvine has been pretty cold for the last three weeks now, despite the influence of the Gulf Stream!

The studio had been ok until last weekend, it had just been a case of keeping the heater on full blast while I was painting and wearing numerous shirts, jumpers and hats to keep warm. The trouble was that once everyone had left at night, the temperatures plummeted and on Monday I arrived to find the pipes completely frozen. So, no water, no toilets. It was a case of either wandering along the road to the Harbour Arts Centre to use their facilities …or move some of my gear back home and paint in the spare room until the thaw arrives. As I’ve been working on some smaller paintings at the moment I decided to go for the latter option and now have my make shift studio in the house.

But of course, despite these downsides to winter, visually things are looking stunning. We haven’t had all the snow that other parts have but that saying we’ve had a few falls of snow and with the freezing temperatures it’s hanging around. Yesterday myself and a friend decided to make the most of the weather and headed for the low but rough hills that lie just inland from Largs … 15 – 20 miles up the coast from here.

My friends’ wife having pre-booked their car for Friday, we went by train. This meant an early start, catching the 06.30 train from Irvine and arriving in Largs just 50 minutes later …while it was still dark!Not really good for me as the limited bit of sight I have deteriorates very rapidly as the light fades.  In the dark I am almost totally blind ….  but as we had to walk a way through town to get to the start of the path we were taking, it wasn’t too bad.

By the time we got to the path the first light was showing in the sky and as we quickly gained height on a very icy path we were treated to the first days worth of amazing winter colours. …all shades of blues and purples followed by bright yellows and oranges as the sun rising lit up the very summits of the hills around us creating great contrasts between them and the deep shaded glens. The views all around were stunning but those west out over the Firth of Clyde to the Isles of Cumbrae, Arran and Bute, really drew our attention. An amazing location, so close to home.

Once off the path the snow was quite deep and up on the tops … even deeper. Under normal conditions this is very rough ground and this had now filled with snow. If it had been compacted and hard it would have made for great walking but instead the snow had an icy top layer covering in places, two feet or so of loose soft snow. It was hard and very slow work at times trying to force a way through it and we quickly realised our initial plan to walk over several of the hills wouldn’t be possible. Instead we decided just to try and get to the first summit …Brown Hill at 388 m. This sounds a grand place but in reality is no more than a slightly high bump in a huge area of frozen bog and moor. But if really didn’t matter. The views, both distant and close up were amazing. The snow was sculpted into amazing shapes by the wind and was covered by animal tracks.

We returned towards the main track as the sun was setting and were once again treated to a colourful display as the setting sun turned some of the hillside a beautiful shade of pink and purple. The final walk back towards the town was accompanied by the reassuring crunch and clink of our crampons on the thick ice

Needless to say we didn’t get back to the station until it was dark. It only goes to show that you don’t need to go all the way to the big mountains to have a fantastic winter days walking.

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    Contact Details

  • Tel: 07568 380552 or 01294 216427
    E-mail: keith@keithsalmon.org