This is another oil painting of the stream in Ilston Cwm, in Gower. The stream painted here is sometimes known as the Killy Willy, which runs to sea as Penard Pill, at Three Cliffs Bay.
The Still Killy Willy
Category: Woodland Paintings
Gower woodland walks and streams
Clear Winter Morning Light
A new oil painting as of today – 80 x 60 cm – £395 – “Clear Winter Morning Light”.
Again this is a painting of Ilston Cwm and the woodland there. I rose up early and photographed this early morning scene when the winter light is at it’s most brilliant and clear. I loved the mirror like reflection of the water in the brook also. I found this composition pleasing so I painted it.
You can buy large limited edition mounted prints of this painting here
My Ilston Inspiration
Glorious Gower
My present series of paintings which included the recently sold paintings below are all of and inspired by Ilston Cwm a rural woodland in Gower Pensinsula. Gower was the first designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in the UK in the 1950s and is a major influence on my artwork.
I love visiting this area, every weekend to walk my dogs and take photographs of the area.
I like doing this especially in Winter when the rich Winter light catches the mossy barks of tress and illuminates the background behind the leafless trees with pinky purples and silvery greys.
I find winter with it’s seeming desolation much more colourful than other times of the year. The light is more brilliant, thicker and more concentrated than the light of summer. Less diffused. More clear.
The fact the trees have no leaves allows one to look through and beyond and gives greater depth of perception and a richer array of overlapping colors .
This seems to suit my refractionist style of breaking light down into colour components as these blocks of colour have a greater overlaying depth in winter.
Winter light is also lower in the sky and this helps with a sharper more intense light falling on mossy tree barks.
It is so great to get out of the city to soak up some countryside. It has become a vital part of life, escaping the every day concerns of life and work in Swansea to commune with nature, to get away from it all and to return with a bucket load of inspiration for paintings to be contemplated or painted in the following week or weeks.
It is like getting filled up with inspiration, in fact. Replenished, reinvigorated.
I find Gower a very moving place, inspiring. There is something tangibly uplifting about this peninsula. A special energy, or spirit to the place, a Nature Cathedral. There is a presence that inspires one and lifts the soul towards creativity, towards play. I am blessed to have such an inspiring place only ten-fifteen minutes away.
These painting have been sold but you can buy large limited edition mounted prints here
From Ilston With Love
Delighted to say I have just SOLD this lovely painting “A Tree by Ilston Brook” via Artfinder –
I have painted a series of paintings similar to this painting which are all inspired a rural area close to my home in Swansea, called, Ilston Cwm, in the Gower Peninsula.
I will be blogging later in the week about this lovely area of Outstanding beauty and posting an accompanying video so that you can see it’s beauty and inspiration for yourself.
https://www.artfinder.com/product/a-tree-by-ilston-brook/
This painting is sold but you can buy large limited edition mounted prints here.
Tree by the Brook
Here is my latest oil painting – “Tree by the Brook” – 60 x 80cm – £395.
Email if interested in buying.
This is the latest in a series of oil paintings, based loosely on my refractionist style, of a wood in an area of the Gower Peninsula called Ilston. This painting is of a green moss coated tree, lit by the low lying rich winter light, whose roots plunge into and drink from Ilston Brook.
I love winter light more than any other light and how it’s eye filling light illuminates the barks of trees. How it casts mist greys and pinky, purple pastel hues into the background light.
Not a Bridge Too Far!
Delighted to say I have just SOLD this oil painting “Ilston Brook Bridge via Artfinder a few days after adding it to my collection –
https://www.artfinder.com/product/ilston-brook-bridge/
Large limited edition mounted prints can be bought here
The Singing Ringing Tree
This oil painting, on linen canvas is inspired by a fauvist approach particularly on the vibrant stripes of colour which accentuate the muscular form of this grand, twisted beech tree and it’s grasping feeling limbs. The background rainbow of coloured trees is a representation of the misty hued diversity of autumn coloured trees that line the distance and complement the more bold, clear colours of the tree bark and branches.
This painting is almost a homage to the array of colours that seem to only become apparent when the sudden sun illuminates the silvery mist to reveal a spectrum of colours. This is another use of the spectral effect seem in my other “refractionist” paintings – in this case it is light on the misty moisture on the tree bark and in the distant frail leaves that brings a cacophony of colour to light.
Sapling Wood
This is another refractionist painting – I was drawn to this painting because I love the colours that come alive not only in misty backgrounds but in backgrounds in the sun, viewed from the more darkened interiors of the wood as in this painting. I love the cool blue of the distance trees and the purple mingling with the ground and the purples there sliding across the ground, following the sun’s light into the dark of the wood. I love the spectrum of colours in the light and how the light is refracted by the tips of the trees, the last burnished leaves and the spindly branches. It produces a kaleidoscopic effect of colour.
Buy large limited edition mounted prints here
Inner Light
“This is another ‘refractionist’ painting and is almost an inverse of ‘Up Cwmdonkin’. Instead of the refracted light creating a stain glass effect falling on the outside fringes of a wood, here it illuminates within the hidden chamber of a forest, which gives it a heightened, magical or enchanted feel. It feels like a secret wood of childhood fantasy and imagination. I like how the brilliant rainbow colours contrast with the jet black and how the inner sanctum of light is framed naturally by the surrounding trees, inviting one into the shower of light and colour.
But is this scene too good to be true? Is there a Brothers Grimm malevolence here, in this painting? Do the black trees signal a menace, a foreboding or do these encircling trees call one into a place of wonder and a child-like joy, where the light and colour, silence and peace rain down and let the soul rejoice? Or is it a broody chimera? Depends on your own imagination, I suppose!”
Brandy Cove Stile
This oil painting is of a lovely country walk down Gower Peninsula, outside Swansea. Over the stile and down to Brandy Cove where brandy and other illegal booty was smuggled to shore by the frequently visiting smugglers that dropped their ill gotten gain here and in various other coves littered around the Gower coastline. I like the way the sunlight catches the tips of the tree leaves, like a translucent membrane between the brillant bright summer light beyond the stile and the darkened wood behind it.
