People at an Exhibition

Painting inspired by Penlee House (Penzance); title inspired by Mussorgsky.

I recently visited Penlee House art gallery in Penzance, Cornwall, to see their splendid Model Citzens: Myths and Realities exhibition, which looked at the human subjects of the Newlyn School. While there, I made a couple of quick sketches - including a few of my fellow visitors:

I decided to work this up into a painting. Using a subdued palette (buff titanium, black, ultramarine, yellow ochre, alazarin crimson (hue), hooker's green and - finally - a little titanium white), I hoped to echo the colours of the Newlyn School paintings that were on show. Two of my people were from sketches made in the exhibition. The third is borrowed from one of the paintings.

The three Newlyn paintings are:

William Holt Yates Titcomb, 'Jubilee Day, St Ives, Cornwall (Good News from the Front)'
William John Wainwright, 'Mackerel in the Bay'
Henry Scott Tuke, 'All Hands to the Pumps'

 And finally, here are a few of my in-progress shots:

People at an Exhibition
Acrylic on canvas, 18 x 22 inches