PaintFrance Workshops

Diary of an artist at sea

See the ship roll. Roll, ship roll.

The sun is rising.

I’m watching the dawn for the second day in succession from a plane. Yesterday, I was with Sally as we flew from Miami to Barcelona. Today the sky exploded with Crimson, Red Gold, Cadmium Yellow Light backed by Pale Cerulean Blue seamlessly blending with a smoky Paynes Grey just as I crossed the equator flying South to The Falkland Islands.

Gaea is the greatest painter of us all and her dawns make even those of J.M.W.Turner pale imitations of the riotous beginning of the new day that I watched. New colours arrive, second by second, as blues become turquoise, Paynes Grey becomes mauve and then they are gone and the painfully bright sun forced me to turn and shade my eyes.

Yes, I know that the prose is more than a little purple, but I am a painter and colours are important so I’m allowed.

Let us go back a few weeks though so I can tell you why I’m hurtling all over the world.

In January, we leave the grey skies of Europe and go off to Florida for a mixture of holiday, teachings, demonstrations, meetings with gallery owners, people who will commission paintings and agents. We do love Delray Beach where we stay as its close-ish to everywhere we need to be like: Wellington Show Ground (Horses), Wellington International Polo Ground (Horses), Ocala (Horses) and Orlando (Disney, M.G.M. And Universal Studios, well, I’m a child at heart and Sally is very kind to me ‘cos she hates the place). What more could we need ?

The teachings and demonstrations are always fun. This year I decided to use pastels and Mi-Teints Touch Paper. I discovered this paper last year and it’s fantastic with just enough tooth to hold pastel without needing to use fixative…I can’t recommend it highly enough.

For the teachings, over the last few years a group of us have got together on a friend’s enormous porch in her amazing garden which, like her, is a riot of colour. People work in whichever medium they prefer and everyone chips in with advice and comments while I wander round offering technical suggestions. It’s the same Atellier system that I use at home and it works. The demonstrations are another matter.

I stick to portraits so during three hours of instruction, anecdotes, jokes, quotes and technical ‘ stuff ‘ I have to produce a likeness for a large audience of painters. So, no pressure then ! This year I decided to work with pastels. Like most people I know who paint in pastels, I have a huge range of all makes, shapes, sizes and densities. If I had to say which formed the core of all of them I’d go for the wonderful Lakeland Pencils, which I’ve used since I visited the factory at the age of ten. I’d chosen a theme and decided to paint figures who had shown extraordinary love for their fellow man during times of war, so Irene Sedler and Uncle Avi became my models. This year I was asked by another Art Supplier to demo in their gallery so I was able to meet a whole new set of painters and next year Easel Art will join Hands in Delray Beach as a regular venue. It’ll be Watercolours next year, so see you then.

One of the highlights of this year’s series of demos was that I got to meet Rickie of The Rickie Report and she is lovely. The Rickie Report is a wonderful Blog and it tells you everything you need to know about The Arts in The Palm Beach County area. Sign up and check it out.

We have taken a lot of big paintings to Forms Gallery, Delray Beach, this year and they have decided to push these to a number of other galleries throughout the South West, Far West and Canada and are going to seek as many commissions as I can cope with.

Some of you know that I chat on Facebook a bit, well, a while ago a friend mentioned that a new Equestrian Gallery was to open in Wellington, West Palm Beach, so we talked and I was given a name to contact. After a couple of visits to the gallery and meetings, meetings, meetings — I have a fantastic and wonderfully eccentric contact with over thirty-years’ experience at the heart of Equestrian Art and I look forward to producing a number of Polo, Dressage and Show Jumping commissions throughout the year. I’m so glad that a few years ago we got off our bottoms and took paintings to the U.S. It’s been such an exciting time and we’ve made so many new friends. So check out The Chisholm Gallery.

About a week before we left France Sally read an e-mail from a friend in the Falkland Islands offering me a commission on a number of paintings of one of his ships at rest off the coast of South Georgia…and he read more »

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David’s at sea, leaving Sally with the B&B

The painting, is one he did about ten years ago of South Georgia.

This painting, is one he did about ten years ago of South Georgia. (Painting by David McEwen)

As some of you will know, David is at this moment on a ship somewhere between The Falkland Islands and South Georgia. He will be back home on the 20th March and I will breathe a sigh of relief! He seeing ships, shipwrecks, icebergs albatrosses and other birds. There will be some amazing paintings later in the year and hopefully a book.

Until he’s back, I’ll give you a brief recap of our trip. We had a wonderful, working holiday in Florida, being joined by a couple of friends and daughter Mia, who really enjoyed themselves. We even managed a visit to Epcot, which, surprisingly I enjoyed. Our time was spent between polo, show jumping, David demonstrating painting, and me trying to teach him to play tennis! Believe it or not he’d never played before, but did manage to hit some balls back! — Sally

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Societies and Social Networks.

By David McEwen

SOCIETIES, WEB SITES, SOCIAL SITES AND ALL THAT STUFF.
Let me start by bringing you up-to-date, because I do know that I have been absent a bit from this blog. So let me tell you why. This has been the busiest year we’ve ever had and painters have arrived from all over the world, repeat clients have worked here for weeks on end and Bed and Breakfast clients have watched us all paint since we got back from the U.S.A. in March. At the time of this writing, we have clients in the studio. It’s been truly amazing…people have contacted us through Face Book, e-mail and various other social sites.

I started the year by frequenting about eight Social Sites and I think that I was becoming addicted. A chap has to keep up-to-date with what’s going on in the e-universe — including the site I (the most e-illiterate person outside of The Brazilian Rain Forest) had built. O.K. it was a template site that any intelligent starfish could “design”…but I did it and it ran for a few years…BUT…Well it’s enough to say that it didn’t live up to my hopes and members talked more about virtual sofas than PAINTING which is what it was all about ..Ah Well.

So….the sites had to be pruned if I wasn’t going to become Zombiefied. Then there were the sites selling my work…oh, so many of them…they were easy though, because I left those which had never managed to sell anything of mine and stayed with Redbubble, who make wonderful calanders, and Fine Art America…who I use as a website (and as a bonus they sell lots of prints of my work.)

Now, there is Paintfrance, FaceBook and two others and the ‘work load ‘ is concentrated on painting and teaching…and…er…doing EVERYTHING that Sally tells me to do, at once or sooner…I’m a slave and people just don’t realise how tough the life of Painter in The South of France is…can I just say ‘ Vincent ‘ at this point!

So, that’s the teaching bit and the internet out of the way…what else have I been doing?

There have been commissions and paintings for exhibitions; here, there, and everywhere — and a rather sad diverson via a Gallery whose owner promised so much but, in the end, didn’t do much more than cause problems and refuse to do anything I asked him to do, so that particular adventure ended in tears…thankfully not mine. Janey, from The Dog and Horse Gallery in Charleston, South Carolina, asked me for some ‘ Story ‘ paintings for her November exhibition so our grandchildren are there again. Other paintings having included an experimental series of images that came from the paint left on the pallet at the end of the day…musicians, conductors and instruments which were going to the States, however, most of them sold almost before they were dry…bummer…I have to do more for our trip to Florida in January. Our friend Frank, an Internationally respected equestrian commentator gave me some images of the most amazing Arab horses ( which I didn’t really like before now ) so I’ve loved painting them and hopefully they might end up in The Middle East.

By David McEwen

I suppose the most important thing I’ve done as a painter is grasping the nettle of submitting my work to a very serious professional society. For years I’ve painted portraits, specialising with horses– so for somebody like me there is only one–The Society of Equestrian Artits. The S.E.A. has respected annual exhibitions in London, a respected membership and the most beautiful animals in the world, so, I signed up thinking that one day I’d submit some paintings…maybe. If I could summon up the courage…maybe. They sneaked up on me though by changing the rules. To be promoted from Friend to Associate a while ago a candidate had to submit work to several exhibitions before being automatically elevated. This year, however, they decided that Friends could submit five pictures to a committee of full members…So…one of our daughters taught me something. She’s a show jumper and an Equestrian Trainer, a bloody good one too and she enters so many competitions, not so much to win everything around her but to COMPETE.

“It matters not that you won nor lost but how you play the game “…she’s got guts..so I followed her example and sent off paintings to the U.K. Bloody expensive ! Had to wait, oh boy, did I have to wait…then…they sent me an e-mail and now I’m David McEwen A.S.E.A.

What next? Well, the paintings were in the U.K. so when the time came to submit entries for the annual London exhibition I thought, go on …why not? They are already there. Soooo, more submissions, more waiting, no weight-loss though (again bummer). Then a nice lady wrote to me to say that they’d accepted three.
Caloo, calay, oh frabjouse day !!!!

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The Terrible Minefield of Copyright

This painting of Eric Lamaze hugging his horse, Hickstead, was inspired by a photograph by Molly Sorge. Painting by David McEwen

The Internet has opened so many possibilities for the painter. We can use it to view Museums and Galleries throughout the world, see the work of other painters on a thousand social and selling sites, we can search for painters and their work and we can find photographs, millions and millions of photographs. The Universe is there and we can surf to our hearts content and find things to paint…whoopie-do! Er, well, maybe…there are all kinds of rules about what, where, when and all kinds of punishments that may descend on the unwary.

For painters who like to copy other people’s work there are rules, well actually there are laws to obey. To just copy and put on sale is fraud unless you make sure that your name is in a prominent place and the painting is described as ” After ” whoever you’ve just forged. My old friend Shelley used to learn how other painters did it by copying their work. He once painted a work “In The Style Of”, well I’m not going to tell you who, and when a very rich patron called to his studio one day saw it and asked, “Is that by who I think it’s by?” Shelley laughed and said, “no, I did it.” When the rich patron said that he would buy it if Patrick signed it…so…he signed it with the name of the world famous painter…in watercolour. Er, illegal. Any way time passed and the R.P. died and his art collection went to a famous Auction House with Shelley’s painting catalogued as… so when Patrick went to view he rubbed the watercolour signature he had made with a damp finger – but, somebody had redone it in oil and varnish…BAD, SO VERY BAD.

To a lesser degree if a painter copies a photograph without permission then the Gods of copyright can fall on the offender like a wolf on the fold. The painter probably won’t go to jail but if the copyright owner discovers the abuse then it’s lawyers at dawn. There is one very famous photographer of horses who keeps a herd of lawyers on retainer and if and when a copyist is found, court action ALWAYS follows. Fines, seizures of originals and prints can haunt the painter.

So when I saw a wonderful photograph of Eric Lamaze, Olympic Showjumping Champion, and his horse Hickstead appeared on the Internet I was so moved and inspired. We used to go to the Hickstead Show Ground three times each year and loved it so much so when the horse began to make himself known I followed his progress with interest and when he became an Olympic Champion I was delighted. Only a few months ago, at the height of his powers, Hickstead left the Show Ring in Rome and fell dead. A weak artery had betrayed the great heart that beat in his wide chest and a great athlete left us. I had to paint from the photo.

While I worked on the painting I tried to discover who the photographer or who owned the copyright. I flooded various sites with appeals for help and advice, even trying to get in touch with Eric Lamaze himself. Weeks passed and I grew worried as I wanted to enter the painting for a juried exhibition in London. Then, out of the blue ten days ago I was contacted by the photographer Molly Sorge who told me that she had taken the piccy. Oh, I was a happy little chap cos after a little bit of to and fro advice and a small payment I have full rights to the image. Now prints may follow.

Now a bit of news for the future. Kate ( She-Who-Controls-The-Keyboard) and I want to drag Sally kicking and screaming to the Blog to write about cooking. Bare in mind that my darling is Cordon Blue trained and has made my waistline overtake my I.Q….so what do you think, a few recipes a photo or two of something wonderful….tell us.

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An old friend and fellow painter is gone.

Our friend, Patrick Shelley had died while we were in Florida.

I‘ve been away for a while from this blog and I’m sorry but we’ve been so busy. We’ve had so many painters staying with us that we haven’t had a moment to put thoughts on paper about anything as we’ve been rushing about taking people to beautiful village after lovely landscapes, painting, contacting agent in The United States who is working on a very exciting commission and just generally chatting to painters all over the world via the e-waves. But now I have an evening off so here I am.

While we were in Florida we heared the sad news that our friend Patrick Shelley had died. Patrick used to call on people and then slip away quietly without any fuss always leaving his hosts wanting more of his time so it was typical of him to go finally without many people knowing that he was shuffling off this mortal coil. He was born in South Africa to Doctor parents and he went to spend a year in Medical School in Cape Town which gave him enough limited experience of illness to become a life long hypocondriac. He turned from Medicine to the arts in the fifties and, of course, drifted up to Paris to paint, talk, and marry a pretty English girl called Mary, yup, Mary Shelley and in a way she created not a monster but definately a larger than life figure.

Patrick worked for some years in Paris, then the East and West Coasts of America painting nudes and landscapes while Mary laboured in Merchant Banks making lots of dosh. He then returned to France and bought a tiny house in the next village where he built a studio and worked on his paintings while Mary worked in Paris.

When we met him his hair and beard had turned white but he still looked and acted like a faun, or maybe a satyr, he was small, his laugh was rich and he twinkled as he danced from mistress to mistress. Patrick was charm personified and ladies fell for him often and too well and when they became a problem he turned to Mary who gave him advice and became friends with his latest ” friend “. We called him Mr Tumnus because he reminded us of the faun in the C.S. Lewis book but it wasn’t only his looks that gave us the link to Narnia. When we were in his sitting room looking out across the valley filled with vines listening to the cracked church bell he would jump up and say come and see what I’m working on and he would then open a wardrobe door and skip through and we would follow onto a minstrels gallery which looked down onto a huge studio space which held three hundred or so pastel and acrylic paintings…it was another world.

: His landscapes drawn in pastel on large sheets of brown wrapping paper were sublime

The nudes were painted with acrylic and were dramatic and wild all the models were in a subserviant and painful position and I hated them, but his landscapes drawn in pastel on large sheets of brown wrapping paper were sublime. The landscapes were all local and they sang of the jewelled light that makes The Midi the subject of choice of painters for two hundred years. Shelley, to put it simply, was a Master. He was the only painter I’ve ever allowed to take the paintbrush from my hand and work on my painting because I knew he would make it better. He was a Master, he taught me about mixing and brevity…he was a Master and I shall miss him.

Over the next few episodes of this blog I shall tell other stories about my friend but for now let me tell you what we’re working on apart from making peoples painting holiday as special as we can…well I would say that wouldn’t I.

You know that I now have an Agent in America and she is doing fantastic work but I’ve been looking for somebody to do the same throughout Europe…well I’ve found him. While we were in America I contacted a web-site for a Gallery called Whitepeaks and submitted some paintings for approval for their on line sales department and I was contacted by the owner Mark Pasek . Mark is dynamic and fun, he has not only given me some wonderful advice and now that he has a real life gallery in the Peak District of Derbyshire he has also travelled down to see us to pick out some paintings which we are packing for him to put on show, others will follow.

You may remember that I work on a number of paintings at once. I block in five or six then let them stand or hang in the studio in plain sight while I get ready for the next stage which is the part I like the most…detail. So now I have them waiting for their turn, I’ve ordered 0/1 brushes from Rosemary & Co., and I’m ready to go. So over the next few weeks I’ll be working on a great scene of horse plowing, a genre painting of our grandchildren fishing, a musician, some draught horses from Jerez in Spain and a super show jumping image.

Keep on painting and remember where we are and that you can come and visit for a while or contact us by internet.

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Two students exhibit in Austrailia

David McEwen by Jean Buettel

Two artists who’ve attended David’s workshops are having an exhibition, 24 May to 17 June at the Gloucester Gallery in Gloucester, New South Wales, Austrailia. Jean Buettel and Jean Spokes will be featuring paintings they began in the South of France while staying with David and Sally.

Two of the most gifted watercolourists to have visited L’Atelier du Soulondre they both painted in a highly professional and orignal style, one giving courses herself in painting on porcelain and the other other a very good portraitist — she even dared to do a portrait of “The Master” (David McEwen, which you can see above). Thoroughly enjoyable students to have around – David thought “Bonzer and Ripper” – for Colonials that is!

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Back to France and home…and it’s lovely

Artist David McEwen hard at work writing his blog.

I suspect this is a self-portrait of David McEwen hard at work on his blog - Kate

We’re back home. The jet lag didn’t seem to bother us too much and once we’d said hello to Ella, Gigi and Ken (no, Ken isn’t another dog, he was the dog/house sitter while we were away), we started work. Our little darlings had him trained to a hair, in other words, they did exactly as they wanted for seven weeks! Seven weeks worth of letters, junk mail, magazines various and assorted trivia and then the awful part SPRING CLEANING and GENERAL REFURBISHMENT. Oh, dearie, dearie me…and then the first of the american commissions, a horse portrait for a Mummy’s birthday…BUT…For the Blog…First things first…..

The THANK YOU moment

There are so many people to thank for our extended working holiday and, of course, we must begin with the lady of the lap top, Kate. Kate gave us respite care and wonderful food, she sent us a GPS Tom-Tom and then helped us through the setting up stage, gave us an Ipad then helped us through the setting up stage and we re-paid her by watching hours of cookery programmes on Netflix when she was dieting.

Carole and Dan at Forms Gallery in Delray Beach told us about some terrific eating places, took us to a lovely concert in West Palm Beach and publicised my paintings very well indeed. David, Barbara and all the staff at Hands Art Shop on Atlantic Avenue who organised demonstrations and teachings for me to give. Jaynie in Charleston, (my agent) gave me huge amounts of very good advice, gentle encouragement, took us to wonderful restaurants and found us a lovely hotel in Charleston. Then there was Terry in Tampa. Terry had stayed with us here at L’Atelier du Soulondre three times and is a very good draughtsman…(though he says he doesn’t draught). He and his neighbours Joe and Paula took us by boat for a feast of crab claws and showed us the Headquarters of the Scientologists… so disappointing…not an alien in sight. We then went off to a tiny and charming Race Track where they made bets for us all – it was strange that I got all the three legged, sway backed, spavinned rejects from the glue factory which all finished last in the race after one in which they had started.

And then… a really big THANK YOU

: A painting of Einstein that David created during his demonstrations in Delray, Fla. January 2012.

We seem to meet a lot of interesting and slightly eccentric people. Many of them come and stay with us. I’m not sure why!! Last year I was painting in the street on Atlantic Avenue when a wonderful lady with splendid red hair came up to chat. She then came to stay with us in France and painted highly colourful paintings of anything that interested her…which included just about everything…especially monkeys…don’t ask. The lady with the splendid hair is called Jean…what is it about that name…why are people with that name as charmingly mad as a bag of badgers ? O.K. they’re eccentric, fun and Beaut, Bonzer and Ripper… you know who I’m talking about. So when we got to Delray we went see Jean and eat with her and talk and laugh and then she said that we couldn’t stay in hotels and gave us the key to a condo she had for sale. It was so generous. Then she opened her porch and garden for more teaching sessions and we had FUN.

Not just that we met so many super people incluing Jurgen and Pat, from Prince Edward Island, more Snowbirds, Stan from Delray Beach and others; not only were they all good painters but Jurgen gave me all kinds of advice which has helped me to walk without discomfort for the first time in six months..( I’ve had a problem with tendonitis and nobody else was able to help…ta very much Jurgen ). Best news of all, Red Jean is coming back to us this summer. It’s great to be able to swop holidays here with accomodation in the U.S.of A

Janey phoned us shortly after we arrived and told us that we’d been invited to lunch on a plantation near Charleston so we drove for nine hours through Georgian Oaks draped with Spanish Moss. There were little cabins to be glimpsed through the trees and I almost heard dueling banjos! The plantation was amazing with acres of parkland and we were transported to a long gone age and expected to see top-hatted “gen’lemen” named Gaylord and Rhett duelling on the banks of the river. We ate Oysters and fried chicken and I was a happy little soldier……a commission may follow….maybe…in the fullness of time. We stayed in the 19th century by wandering through the city of Charleston which we love, because it’s old and we feel at home. So many houses in the old town have signs outside which tell of Dr. so-and-so who was brought back to die from a mortal wound sustained in a duel with Colonel what-his-name in 1720. It’s a wonderful place.

Then…to Kate’s and steaks the size of small continents and lots of rest, the do-bugger-all type of rest which we needed soooooooo much. We slobbed about and watch tele for a week, bliss. An all to brief stop in Orlando with our friends Scott and Jasmine, not forgetting new baby Erika and Gloin and Gimli, two adorable but bouncy yellow labs. Then…back to Delray to watch some horses jumping at Wellington. All the riders are getting ready for the Olympics and the weather in Florida and the wonderful courses make it ideal for Nick Skelton, Ben Maher and Scot Brash to hone their horses before the final choice for the U.K. Team is made. We sat in The Tikki Bar, drank beer and O.D’d on horses and show jumping.

We met so many colourful characters. From drunks at horse shows to an amazing Nibelungen at the Museum in West Palm Beach. There’s so much to do in Southern Florida and Jean took us to most of them from the beautiful Japenese Museum near Delray ( I loved it even though told by She -who- must- be- obeyed that I wasn’t allowed to buy an embroidered kimono, O.K. it was $3,000 and it might have looked a little o.t.t. in Lodeve Market, but…) to the Art Gallery in West Palm Beach. There was an exhibition that we’d heard a few people talking about – it was of “pictures” painted by Jenny Saville. Well, those of you who have read this blog before know how much I detest opinionated people , they don’t shut up for long enough for me to give my opinion and this is one reason I like doing this blog….nobody can stop me or talk over me, Ha Ha .

So Jenny Saville ….she can draw really well, she applies the paint well at times, however sometimes it looks as though she was painting flats for the stage of a bad Amateur Theatrical show. She seems to delight in finding ugly models and she made me think of my old Professor, Victor Pasmore, who famously said that if you set out to make an ugly painting you should pack up and go home and that’s what Saville does, rather like Lucian Freud. Somehow, worse than the paintings, was the patronising, pompous and pedantic rubbish that the docents (guides to anybody other than the Yanks…sorry, Americans) were spouting. They spoke of genius, the search for truth, the spacial and kinetic awareness etc., ad nauseam. As we wandered around I got more and more angry until Sal took me gently but firmly by the elbow and dragged me out of that part of the Gallery threatening me with no more steaks because I wouldn’t have teeth to chew them…..But ….that wasn’t too bad.

In leaving ugliness behind we walked into gallery after gallery of 18th and 19th century paintings of light, joy and lovliness and my blood pressure gradually fell and I loved every moment and learned so much about “how to.” I’m not saying that I’m as good as some of those on the wall, but I’m learning and by looking closely at greatness we can all learn and I would have understood more if it wasn’t for Gollum’s grandma. At one painting I got too close, 2 feet I suppose, and a tiny homunculus-like creature appeared from nowhere screaching, ” You’re too close.” I leapt back apologising but it wasn’t enough as wherever we went she followed like a gimlet-eyed pantomime gnome ready for us to cross an invisible line and breathe on a painting, or fold them up and slip them into our pocket. We didn’t know how she did it – it was like a game which we lost every time, it was scary…she was old and small and never lost breath…we did, so we gave up and fled.

One thing was rather nice - we flew with American Airlines, sadly not in First or Business but it was comfy even for a large cove like me. The food was good and the staff were so nice and welcoming as we brought on board so much STUFF. The final thanks go to Xaviere Chatagnier, a lovely Flight Attendant, who just happened to be working on both our flights and was caring, helpful and a truly wonderful representative of her company.

Thank you America — we will be back.

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Ring out the old, ring in the new

Amelie reads to the animals. Painting by David McEwen

We are deep into the New Year and, as usual, I’m late with this blog, but then most of you who read it know that I work slowly!

I can’t believe that it is February, so much has happened recently…so much happened last year…so where to begin? I have to say that 2011 was BEAUT, BONZER, RIPPER. Sorry, but we had an awful lot of Aussies with us last year and their quaint colonial, vocabulary was catching ( I can say things like that cos they’re thousands of miles away and they can’t hit me ).

The Doomsayers began the year by saying that the Recession was so bad that we wouldn’t get anybody from A to Z. Worrying, eh. However in January, when I was Painting in the Street in Delray Beach, Florida, a lady walked by and within an hour she had booked for a two week painting holiday in May soooo that was A. Tension mounted during the year until somebody from New Zealand booked in…. Zealand…get it? Oh, please yourselves, at least that meant we were safe from promised financial collapse. Well seriously, we were told that it would be a bad year, but, you know, either we’re doing something right or we’re just lucky because we met a lot of very, very good painters from all over the world and they did many fine paintings. (And this is where I think I’m so fortunate) I learned so much from our world-wide guests.

Other news from 2011. I entered a number of competitions including The Society of All Artists, Painter of The Year which I’ve already written about; I put work into a number of exhibitions in Europe and North America and sold amazingly well especially when one considers that during a financially unsettled time, nobody really needs a painting.

The highlight of our year was the birth of James David, our third grandchild.

However, the absolute highlight of 2011 wasn’t meeting so many nice people, it wasn’t winning prizes or finding patrons or making sales, nor the arrival of a black labrador puppy, Gigi, quickly re-named The Dark Destroyer as she gnawed and dug her way through our garden, the most wonderful thing was the birth of our third grandchild, James David. B.J. or Baby James is a serious little chap who complains during the still watches of the night as he DOES NOT WANT TO SLEEP. He has had bright red cheeks for some time now but no teeth, he looks at me as though he’s thinking, “What on earth is that hairy creature ?” and he thinks deep, deep thoughts and within hours became the centre of all our universes.

You may remember that I’ve mentioned one of my painter heroes, Norman Rockwell, once or twice because I love his paintings but also his gift for telling a story. So after I finished a painting of our grandson, Sam, and his report card, he and I went for a walk through the woods and talked about the Next One. Two stories came out, one was about Sam’s sister Amelie, the other I’ll write about later. We thought that it would be fun to paint Amelie reading a story to some of her animals…and boy, does she have animals….so we asked her to sit for some photographs and she said, No…….! Amelie is nine and you may ask why is she so…… so, er, well a pain in the bum, er, you’ve not met her mummy have you ? We asked her Why and she said that she had never read a story to animals before so she didn’t feel that she could do it…so Hollywood ! We eventually did the photo shoot and started the drawings and as usual the story evolved and changed as did the animals; one cow took the place of a less attractive breed, a goat gave way to cats who, in their turn faded in number and a puppy appeared. We all had fun deciding what the books would be…Animal Farm and White Fang in the end. At this point it moved to the far end of the studio so I could look at it for a while as I worked on four stag paintings for an exhibition at The Dog and Horse Gallery in Charleston.

Stag Paintings by David McEwen

Mia, our horse lady daughter has found a rather nice guy called Andy who stalks deer (we like him because he gives us venison …oh, and he makes Mia happy ) and he found some wonderful photos of stag hunting so two of them and two of my old ones from Loch Assynt have helped me to make some paintings that I enjoyed working on.

Looking at Amelie Reading I realised that something was missing, there was a big bit of damn all right in the middle so I put a half door in….then a heavy horse and it seemed to have worked, only time and somebody’s cheque book will tell.

While I was painting Bedtime Story we asked Amelie if she wanted to see progress but she would shrug and say Nah…but…she started to call by with different friends and bring them into the studio where she would stand, casually, by her painting and when her friends noticed and said, “Hey, that’s you” she would look surprised and throw away a ” Oh, yeah, ” as though it happened to everyone else in the world every day.

Now we’re in Florida, talking about exhibitions, delivering commissions, doing demonstration days with Open Acrylics and …Oh I have to mention one thing…we had lunch near Gainsville one day at an outwardly understated place called Chopstixs Cafe…..it was THE BEST MEAL WE’D HAD IN AMERICA….thank you guys. More about Florida next time.

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Meet David McEwen in Delray Beach, Fla

David will be demonstrating at Hands Art Supplies, Atlantic Avenue, Delray Beach Florida on Saturday, Feb. 18. Times to be confirmed.
He will also be running courses in Delray Beach from 930 am to 1230 pm, February 22-24 – venue and times to be confirmed. Please contact Sally & David via their website, http://www.paintfrance.com, email sally.mcewen@wanadoo.fr or call (561) 843-1230 for more information. Spaces are limited.

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Dreams of fame and glory

It’s all gone quiet. All the painters have gone home and all we are left with are echoes and memories of happy holidays. The South of France is yawning and preparing to slumber through the short winter, houses are being closed up and we are doing all kinds of things that we didn’t have time to do while Painting Holiday clients and those on vacation in general were here… sleeping and then sleeping some more !!!

Well actually our break won’t last too long because we just confirmed some bookings for November and December and today our first Christmas booking came in. Yes, we paint at Christmas but also we eat, eat and drink and then eat a bit more. We try to combine French and English Christmas food and the table groans. It’s amazing to think that Sally has been producing amazing meals for Holiday makers for fourteen years.

Although I usually talk about the sort of paintings that our clients do in our lovely villages, this time I’m going to write about something different. Something that we thought would change our lives, something new and very exciting.

You may have heard that Saatchi ( you know who he is…he’s the man who discovered artistic geniuses like Tracy ‘ Dirty Bedroom’ Emin and Damien ‘ Half a Cow’ Hurst is starting to collect Realism. (Shock, Horror.) Well it’s a sort of Realism, it’s Realism with anachronisms which are actually interesting and fun.

We have a neighbour who is a sort of super Art Consultant and something really important at The Tate Modern, well to show you how his finger is close to the throbbing pulse of GREAT Contemporary Art he thinks that Tracy is … wait for i t… the greatest Artist who has ever lived. So there we are then. You might be surprised, therefore, when I tell you that I contacted him a while ago and asked him to look at my website and offer suggestions as I’m trying to find an agent for The U.K. and Europe and although I don’t like much of the Art that he works with I’ll listen to advice from anyone.

He came to see me a couple of weeks later and looked very carefully at everything that I have at home including W.I.P.’s (works in progress) and we talked about all kinds of trends including Mr Saatchi’s Anacronistic Realism. Then he asked me if I could work from photographs that he had and gave me sizes of the wood panels that he wanted the paintings to be on…unsigned..because that is the new trend !

The photos arrived via the magic of e-mail and you could have knocked me down with a fairly large feather as they showed some ladies who had forgotten to put on their underwear….our neighbour is a lay preacher and his wife is a Vicar.

I looked at the photos and thought alot about what I’d been told, that these paintings could be the start of something HUGE, he talked vaguely about being the new Banksy etc., etc., so they needed to be planned with care.

The painting of three girls was to be called The Judgement Of Paris: London 2010 so I thought straightaway of the painting by Rubens and decided that as we’d talked about anachronisms that I’d introduce some of the figures from the photos into his background…..so…….this is the first version….a lot of work but interesting.

The second was of an Art Work in an exhibition in Japan where people could enter a swimming pool from below and look up to see water over a sheet of heavy glass….O.K. it’s not my sort of Art Work but a friend of our neighbour, a photographer, took his girlfriend into the pool and said, “ Lift your dress ” …. the rest is history.

Let me take you back for a moment to the days of the Pre-Raphaelites, Ruskin and Millais. Poor old Ruskin, the well known critic and supporter of Turner, got married to a lovely young lady but when they arrived at the marraige bed he was so shocked to see that his bride had pubic hair he was never able to consumate the marriage. Later the Ruskins went on holiday with Millaise who started a painting of his host standing on a rock beside a waterfall……………soooooo…..I thought the girl in the swimming pool would have got on well with Mr Ruskin….and….the painting grew.

I got in touch with my Consultant neighbour and sent him photos of the finished paintings and sat back waiting for fame and glory……..ho, hum……well he eventually told me that he couldn’t remember talking about anchronisms and had really wanted the paintings to be copies of the photos and…and.. so I changed them.

He came to see them, eventually, and, well, he told me that, ”…it really is very difficult to sell paintings at the moment”. Haven’t seen him for months now. Bum. No contract, no fame, no glory.

Now then, if the Aussies who were with us recently have actually read this far… hope that you got home safe and sound, girls, miss you, it was fun.

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Diary of an artist at sea

David’s at sea, leaving Sally with the B&B

Societies and Social Networks.

The Terrible Minefield of Copyright

An old friend and fellow painter is gone.

Two students exhibit in Austrailia

Back to France and home…and it’s lovely

Ring out the old, ring in the new

Meet David McEwen in Delray Beach, Fla

Dreams of fame and glory

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