Category Archives: Erwood Station Craft Centre

DAVID BELLAMY: THE MAGIC OF WINTER TREES

Posted on by
Reply

The sight of a beautiful mature winter tree can bring such joy, and spending a little time ensuring your trees bring out those magical feelings is well worthwhile. When I come across a fine example I sketch and photograph the tree from different angles, and in the studio I keep these in a support file which is a reservoir of landscape features that I can add to a scene I am working on, or substitute for some blasted and tattered beanpole of an excuse for a tree that might be present in a scene.

These trees are part of a composition, and as you can see the supporting tree on the left has been left almost as a monochrome, while fading it out at the bottom, two effective methods of pushing it into the background. More colour has been brought into the trunk of the main tree, and this is something important to observe in a mature winter tree. The green apatite genuine in the middle section of the trunk gives way to light red near the bottom, while higher up against the light background the trunk and branches become silhouettes. The dark background bushes define the lower trunk and some of the thin branches have been created by scratching with a scalpel when the paper had dried. Watch for the character of the branches in your trees, and here you see how they have been drawn with a sinuous downward looping, apart from the topmost branches. The finer ones were achieved with a no. 1 rigger brush. I used Daniel Smith watercolours and Saunders Waterford not high-white paper.

Seek out these lovely examples and study the trunks in particular. I sometimes work more detail into really exciting trunks, and in Radnorshire we have some fabulous trees, so deliciously twisted and gnarled that you expect some witch to fly out of the branches. There are many examples of trees in my books: my Complete Guide to Landscapes is packed with them, and you can easily obtain them from Search Press.

I shall be giving a demonstration of winter trees in watercolour at Erwood Station Craft Centre on Saturday 1st November. This will include showing how to use a tree as a focal point, adding in supporting trees, suggesting distant trees, enhancing trees with colour, avoiding the silhouette effect, and so much more. Tickets are available at www.evenbrite.co.uk and if you need further information Erwood Station can be contacted on 01982 560555 Proceeds from the event will be donated to MidWales Mind charity. Bring a notebook, camera and any questions you may have.

Another demonstration that is open to all will be at the International Watercolour Masters 2026 at Lilleshall Hall in Shropshire on 18th May 2026. You can book my session there now at www.iwm2026.com

David Bellamy : The Value of White Gouache

Featured

Posted on by
Reply

DAVID BELLAMY: THE VALUE OF WHITE GOUACHE

This is the time of year when many get out their sketching gear ready to go on holiday and enjoy some artwork in a new place. I always take my box of watercolour pans along with me, mainly for watercolour sketches, though sometimes I work on a full painting out of doors. For certain subjects it’s actually quicker working in watercolour than trying to render the subject in pencil or pen.

In addition to the half-pan colours I carry a few tubes of watercolours, and these are usually colours that I don’t have in my box but I expect to be useful for a particular trip. A secondary reason is that if I happen to lose my box of paints at least I have the tube colours to fall back on. One tube I always take is that of white gouache, as it is so useful. As well as being essential for tinted papers it is great for little highlights or perhaps rectifying part of the work that has gone astray.

I sketched this stone bridge last week in Cwmorthin, a slate-quarrying area near Blaenau Ffestiniog, and you can see the piles of slate heaped up behind the bridge, as well as mountainous slate slag-heaps in the distance. Those I only indicated vaguely, as the bridge was my main objective. I drew this with a sepia pen and wanted to highlight the foxgloves as they broke up the stonework and added colour to the scene. Alas, I messed this up a bit. One of the difficulties we have as landscape artists is that we don’t have the great range of tones that occur in nature, so we have to modify our tones a little. My foxgloves weren’t too bad, but I felt they could stand out better, so I applied white gouache over them and then when that was dry overlaid alizarin crimson over the gouache. This certainly made them stand out more, and although they are far from perfect I do have a reasonable sketch from which to work up a painting. So it’s always helpful to have a tube of white gouache with you on your travels.

On Saturday I shall be book-signing at Erwood Station Gallery & Craft Centre, about 8 miles south of Builth Wells just off the A470, from 2 to 4 pm. I will also be showing quite a number of the painting from the new book, Watercolour and Beyond, with captions on certain techniques and effects in the painting, and I’ll be happy to answer any queries you may have about painting landscapes, so do come along if you can make it. It’s a lovely spot overlooking the River Wye. Their phone number is 01982 560555. The paintings will be on display throughout July, so if you can’t make it on Saturday they will be around for a while. And incidentally, the book covers quite a bit about working with gouache paints. Enjoy your summer travels and keep safe!

DAVID BELLAMY ADDING SUPER-TEXTURE TO YOUR WATERCOLOURS

Posted on by
2

Next month, my new book, Watercolour and Beyond is published by Search Press. It’s quite different from my earlier books in that although it begins with traditional techniques it is mainly concerned with introducing new methods to watercolour landscape painting. One example shows how to use masking fluid not just for masking out intricate details, but to employ it in a much more creative manner. Or producing delightful effects by stamping with cosmetic sponges and variegated colours. Super-granulating colours can achieve spectacular passages in your work, and by introducing non-art materials into your landscape compositions your can add a new dimension. There are also ideas for various projects, some of which don’t involve creating wall-hung art, but give you alternatives for your work.

The painting I have chosen as an example from the book shows how a foreground can be embellished with Daniel Smith Watercolour Ground, which is rather like gesso in consistency, but it will happily take your watercolour washes. I have cut out a large part of the composition so that it’s easier for you to see the amazing textural effects you can achieve with this method.

To suggest the rough foreground Daniel Smith Watercolour Ground was laid on with a painting knife a couple of days before beginning the painting, and in the final stages I laid washes of Naples yellow, potters pink and pthalo blue over the watercolour ground, merging them all in while they were still wet. The ground is especially effective in rendering rocks, cliffs, rough walls, mountainsides, river banks and many other landscape features.

One of the main aims in writing Watercolour and Beyond was to encourage experimentation and bring a sense of joy into painting. Whether you paint full-time or just now and then you will find the techniques and ideas crammed into its pages will give you plenty of inspiration and a wonderful feeling of trying something new in your painting. We no longer have a mail-order shop, but of course you can get the book direct from www.searchpress.com or from your local bookshop.

On Saturday 3rd May the Erwood Station Landscape Artist of the Year competition gets under way with the first heat. There will be one heat each month throughout the summer, and if you wish to participate you can get information at 01982 560555. It is a great place to spend the day painting with others, and is a great learning experience. I shall be one of the judges during the first heat, so maybe I’ll see you there.

DAVID BELLAMY – PAINTING WITH DANIEL SMITH WATERCOLOUR STICKS

Posted on by
6

For some time now I’ve been using the watercolour sticks produced by Daniel Smith, mainly for sketching out of doors. They make a great addition to my sketching gear, and although I still love using the half-pans in the great outdoors, the sticks provide a rapid method of capturing a colour rendition of a scene. Lovely rich colour peels off the sticks effortlessly with a brush, but you can also use them directly onto the paper. As I use the robust Saunders Waterford watercolour papers they can take quite rough treatment whether you apply the sticks onto wet or dry paper.

This is a rapid sketch of the Edw Gorge done whilst standing beside the river and applying colour direct from the sticks onto Saunders Waterford rough paper, then applying water with a large Pentel Aquash brush. These brushes hold their own water, so there’s no messing about with pots. I laid French ultramarine over the background, mixing in quinacridone Sienna lower down. The foliage was painted with yellow ochre plus Bismuth Vanadate Yellow in places. I then washed over it all with the Aquash brush. While the foliage was still damp I added quinacridone Sienna dirctly with the stick. To achieve sharper and more accurate detail I then picked up colour off the sticks with the brush and painted in the rock detail and trunks and branches, using lunar black for the very dark details, including some mixed into the river with French ultramarine. It was all over in a few minutes.

I shall be demonstrating how to use these sticks at Erwood Station Gallery & Craft Centre on Friday 7th June when I will be signing copies of my new book David Bellamy’s Complete Guide to Landscapes. Action starts at 2pm and I will be there till 4pm so do come along and join in the fun. Erwood Station is a great place to hang out, enjoy a cappuccino and they have the most delicious cakes and pastries! I’ll also have framed and unframed paintings at a discount, but do come and have a look at these magical painting sticks and ask any questions. Erwood Station is about six miles south of Builth Wells, just off the A470 from where it is well signposted. Telephone 01982 560555

David Bellamy – Lighting effects in Landscape Painting

Posted on by
Reply

My exhibition at Erwood Station was a great success with sales, interest and raising money for the Campaign for the Protection of Rural Wales,although the initial part proved a little difficult as I was under the weather for a while. It’s great to have exhibitions in the major galleries, but this time I was really happy to do something locally.


Erwood Station will continue displaying some of my work, and it’s a lovely place to visit.The scene I am showing today is a watercolour of the Brecon Beacons where I have used lighting effects to create interest. Before carrying out a painting it really helps if you consider your ligting arrangement beforehand. This particular composition shows quite complicated lighting areas, and for this I did a preliminary studio sketch with emphasis on the tonal values of the various passages. Normally I prefer to let the main light flood over the focal point – in this case the farmhouse and outbuildings, but I strayed from the norm here by keeping an area of light in the middle distance, beyond the farm, with the farm itself not especially well-lit. Trying new variations from your usual approach can be exciting and lead to interesting effects. The light on the background peaks provides variation, though I did not want this to compete too strongly with the focal point. I love interesting skies and sometimes indulge in cloud-watching for some time, and although this composition could well have been served effectively with a simple sky, I often can’t resist working up a cloud mass that contains a striking patch of light as in this case. Do take time to consider your lighting treatment in your painting as it can make a terrific difference to a work.