New Website

My web address hasn't changed - it is still www.amandabatesart.co.uk/ and is linked to from the Home button on this blog. However, I have stopped adding new work to this blog. You can subscribe to my new blog at www.amandabatesart.co.uk/blog-grid/.

This blog will be retained as an archive.

Cannon Heath Down revisited

The Vale of Kingsclere, oil on canvas, 60 x 30 cm

I have been neglecting this blog recently in favour of building an all-new Web site on another platform. This site will remain as an archive.

However, it only seemed right to post today's work here.

Hampshire Open Studios

Today was the first day of Hampshire Open Studios! I have lots of new work, especially on paper, so if you are thinking of visiting, don't forget to have a look through the browser and the rack of "4x4"s.

Sunday 19 August:	open 10am - 5pm
Monday 20 August:	open 10am - 5pm
Tuesday 21 August:	closed, but the Artikinesis Exhibition, Traces of Prehistory is still open in Andover (10am to 5pm)
Wednesday 22 August:	closed, but the Artikinesis Exhibition, Traces of Prehistory is still open in Andover in the morning (10 am to 12 noon)
Thursday 23 August:	open 10am - 5pm
Friday 24 August:	closed
Saturday 25 August:	open 10am - 5pm
Sunday 26 August:	open 10am - 5pm
Bank Holiday Monday 27 August:	open 10am - 5pm

Full details on my Open Studios page here.

4 inch squares

Three "Crashing Wave" squares

It all started earlier this year when I got my hands on a supply of square mounts, eight inches square with a four inch square aperture. They were a nice size, but I didn't have very many pieces on paper to suit them. Then I realised that some bigger pieces, which didn't quite work as a whole, would look great if they were cut up and the choicest parts presented in these mounts. It seemed to work especially well with pictures done in acrylic ink, with trees and waves being good subjects.

The boar tree - SOLD

The boar tree, ink on A3 paper

The roots of this roadside beech tree reminded me of a wild boar - I could see its head and one giant piggy trotter. I haven't deliberately enphasised either feature, not least because the tree is a beautiful sight in itself, with the large, sinuous branch to the left curving up like the muscular neck of a herbivorous dinosaur (I'm thinking diplodocus or brontosaurus), set against the sundappled screen of leaves.

Hanger: two drawings

Hanger, ink on A3 paper

Square Hanger, ink on paper, 29 x 29 cm

These two pictures were drawn to investigate the way that the beech roots cling to the steep slope of the hanger (a hillside wood). I had no intention of introducing fantastic beasts, but they crept in, nonetheless...

Downed

Downed, ink on A4 paper

I found this dragon lying between two roadside beech trees on Nuthanger Down, its tattered wings spread on the ground, looking intently up. Was there a squirrel up there? Or was it remembering its days of flight?

Let Sleeping Dragons Lie

Let Sleeping Dragons Lie, ink on paper, 29 x 29 cm

More serpentine beech tree roots, this time on Nuthanger Down, and this time in Noodler's Walnut Brown ink (which I think is based on the colour of walnut ink, but probably isn't made from walnuts).

Re-Henge: Dragon Roots - SOLD

Dragon Roots, ink on paper, 29 x 29 cm

The serpentine roots of the Avebury beeches, last seen in Henge, led me to imagine a mythical creature dozing on the bank. Has it become one with the trees and the earth, or is it just very well camoflaged?

Henge

Henge, oil on canvas, 50 x 50 cm

What is a henge? In short, it is a prehistoric ring bank and ditch, with the ditch on the inside. The word is a backformation from Stonehenge - which doesn't actually have a henge! It's all a bit confusing, but what is certain is that the large earthwork that encircles Avebury (village and stone circles) is called a henge.

Current Exhibition

Andover, 30 June to 8 August 2018

Prussia Cove cliffs

Prussia Cove Cliffs, oil on linen canvas, 46 x 55 cm

Prussia Cove is a secluded part of the south Cornish coast, with a turbulent history of wrecking and smuggling. Now, however, it is known for its natural beauty and an International Music Seminar. When the tide is in, the beach is all rocks, pebbles and rock pools. Here I have focussed on the cliffs, which had some reddish vegetation clinging to them. I don't know what it was, but I do like the extra colour, which drew my attention away from the sea back towards the land.

Prussia Cove Cliffs
oil on linen canvas, 46 x 55 cm

£360

Blue and Gold

Blue and Gold, oil on canvas 46 x 55 cm

A reprise, of sorts, of 2016's Gold and Grey, this is a view from a local footpath. These distinctive trees are visible for miles around and are a welcome landmark as well as a favourite subject.

Blue and Gold

oil on canvas, 46 x 55 cm

£340

Red Wine and Apricots: a series of three oil paintings

These three paintings were made on Saturday, Sunday and Bank Holiday Monday of the long weekend just gone. I had my studio open as part of Open Studios West Berkshire and North Hampshire on all three days, and it seemed like a useful sort of thing to be doing in between visitors.

I was attracted to the glassy reflections and to the subtly varying colours of the bottle and its dark contents. I also enjoyed the contrast with the duller texture of the apricots and the book, which toned so seredipitously with the fruit.

Each painting is 33 x 41 cm and is executed on clear-gessoed natural linen in oil paint with a knife (more accurately, a selection of knives). Together, they tell a sort of story - a very ordinary story, of things being consumed - but they aren't necessarily intended to be a set. Despite that, I can't help but think of them as being the beginning, middle and end...

Read Wine and Apricots 1 (Beginning), oil on linen, 33 x 41 cm, £140

Red Wine and Apricots 2 (Middle), oil on linen, 33 x 41 cm, £140

Red Wine and Apricots (End), oil on linen, 33 x 41 cm, £140

Just in case you were wondering, the wine was a smooth but unremarkable Bordeaux, the book is Leonardo by Martin Kemp, and the apricots were - well, they were apricots, and they were very nice.

Sentinel: Danebury Hillfort

Sentinel, oil on linen, 70 x 50 cm

I've painted this beech tree before, but this time it is in leaf, and more of the lumps and bumps of the hillfort's earthworks are visible.

The tree stands, tall, proud and solitary, by the entrance to the fort (here, we are looking out of the fort). It made me think of a guardian or sentinel.

Sentinel

oil on linen, 70 x 50 cm

£260

Painted 19 May 2018 in Open Studio

Embankment: Beech Wood at Danebury Hill

Embankment: Beech Wood at Danebury Hill, oil on canvas, 40x50cm

Earlier this week, I visited Danebury Hill, where there is a large, well preserved, iron-age hill fort. There is also a very lovely beech wood on the side of the hill. Here, the beech trees are growing over the outer ramparts of the fort, their shallow root systems rising from the ground as the trees cling to the earthworks.

The painting is based on photographs that I took at Danebury.

Embankment: Beech Wood at Danebury Hill

oil on canvas, 40 x 50 cm

£210

Blue Twist (Wolverton Blue 3)

Blue Twist (Wolverton Blue 3), oil on linen, 46 x 38 cm

Last Friday, I revisited Wolverton Woods to catch the end of the bluebells. I was attracted by the fantastic contortions of the large beech tree that became the focus of this painting.

Blue Twist
oil on canvas, 46 x 38 cm

£160

Solo

The Art in Music 2018 exhibition was hung at Newbury Corn Exchange today, and this painting is part of that exhibition.

Devil's Den, or, The Resting Place - SOLD

Devil's Den, oil on linen canvas, 46 x 38 cm

The Devil's Den is a reconstructed (c. 1921) dolmen (neolithic) near Marlborough in Wiltshire. As far as I can tell, it is the closest such monument to where I live (there seems to be a shortage of suitable stone in Hampshire; certainly the chalk and flint in the immediate vicinity would make very poor building material). Dolmens, which look like stone tables, are actually the structural remains of burial chambers that were once covered in earth. Most have three or more uprights; this has two, but one of them rests on a third, recumbent stone. The stones are sarsens, which are blocks of sandstone created by glacial flow. They are plentiful in that area (which is not far from Avebury and Stonehenge).

I have visited the Devil's Den before, with sketching equipment, but this time I took my painting gear. It was a gloriously, unseasonably, hot and sunny day. I spent maybe two and a half hours on site and completed the picture in the studio, where I empasised the darks (which have a tendency to get lost on site) and the reflected colour on the stones.

Included in the group exhibition, Traces of Prehistory (Artikinesis).

Devil's Den

oil on linen canvas, 46 x 38 cm

£160 - SOLD

Beech Hedge - SOLD

Beech Hedge, A3 (420 x 297mm), acrylic inks on paper

This is one of the pieces I did for Artikinesis' exhibition We Are Forest. These beech trees are growing in a line between two fields and are part of a grown-out beech hedgerow.

SOLD