Roy Connelly

My painting Wittering Light has been short-listed in a competition to choose a cover image for the next Ken Bromley Art Supplies catalogue.

To see all the shortlisted images  click here and don’t forget to vote for your favourite!

Another of my paintings, Watching the Thames,  has also been long listed for the London Lives painting competition.

Update: This picture has now made the shortlist and will feature in the exhibition at Bankside gallery in September.

I have work in two exhibitions in London at the moment.  ‘London Seen’ is a group show of London paintings at Llewellyn Alexander Fine Paintings.

‘Venice in Peril’ is also a group show,  in this case featuring paintings of Venice.  This popular annual exhibition, at W.H. Patterson in Albermarle Street, helps to raise funds for restoration projects in that most beautiful city.

At Venice in Peril there are works by Ken Howard, Auguste Bouvard, Ivan Lapper, David Sawyer, Robert E Wells, Roy Connelly, Jonathan Trowell, John Stillman and other talented artists.

London Seen features Tom Coates, Bruce Yardley, Roy Connelly, Liam O’Farrell, Terry McKifragan, Robert E Wells, Fraser King and others

If you fancy seeing both wonderful cities in a day, its only a short 20 minute walk between the two galleries.

London Seen Llewellyn Alexander Fine Paintings
11 January – 10 February 2010

Venice in Peril W. H. Patterson
13 January – 5 February 2010

The paintings above show the view from Riva Degli Schiavoni in Venice with San Giorgio on the left and the Doges Palace (under scaffolding) on the right,  Santa Maria Della Salute is in the distance.

Below that is a view of Cleopatra’s Needle by the River Thames in London.

Earlier this week I was painting the River Thames at Strand on the Green.   The top picture shows the painting a couple of minutes after I started.  I have used very thin paint to draw in the basic composition. 

The middle photograph was taken twenty minutes later.  With a dramatic and fast moving sky I needed to work quickly to capture it.  The trees are a little more solid but the river is still almost untouched.

The last photo shows the painting an hour later.  The trees and river have been worked on together, with a little more work on the sky. By this point the day was starting to brighten up and touches of blue were appearing in the sky.  It was time stop as I did not want to end up with one scene painted on top of another.

I was working in oils on an 8 x 16 inch board.   Click on each image for a larger view.

South Bank Summer Evening

This picture was painted on the South Bank of the Thames in London yesterday afternoon.  It was painted very quickly to catch the effect of the light reflecting off the water between the bridge supports.  It is an effect that only occurs for about twenty minutes so it was necessary to work fast.

The background was painted rapidly in thin paint and the high lights off the water painted next in thicker paint – fat over lean as they say.

The figures were painted on location but after the sun had moved around and much of the sparkle had faded.  The shadows had to be moved back to match the position of the sun when the sparkle was painted.

Big Ben is one hundred and fifty years old. On this day in 1859 the Great Bell was struck for the first time.  Originally it was only the bell that was known as Big Ben but most people now use the name to refer to the clock tower as well.

Painting outside in London, I have painted the clock tower many times and it can can be seen in the back ground of the pictures above.

French Impressionist Claude Monet painted Big Ben when he visited London the 1870’s. You can see his picture The Thames Below Westminster at the National Gallery in London.

I have been very busy recently and thought I should post a few photos from my recent painting trips:

Working by the Thames at the Henley Regatta…

Waterloo Bridge at sunset…

Painting a stately home in Oxfordshire last week I had to retreat into the temple to avoid the rain…

Painting Waterloo Bridge and the city from Hungerford footbridge…

A closer shot of the painting in situ…

The summer show at Llewellyn Alexander Fine Paintings opens on Monday 8th June. Titled Not the Royal Academy 2009, this fine exhibition is London’s answer to the Salon des Refusés.

Every painting is for sale and may be taken by the buyer straight away, creating space for another to be displayed. Paintings will be on show for three weeks, after which new work will be hung.

Last year I was very pleased to hear that my painting of Kensington Gardens was the first to sell when the exhibition opened.

 LLEWELLYN ALEXANDER GALLERY
124-126 The Cut, Waterloo, London SE 1 8LN UK
(Opposite the Old Vic Theatre)
Tel: 020 7620 1322/1324 Fax: 020 7928 9469
e-mail enquiries@NotTheRoyalAcademy.com

The Gallery is open from 10am until 7.30pm. Monday to Saturday.

The hottest day of the year so far and I have just spent a very enjoyable afternoon at the studio of Bob Brown NEAC. Set in beautiful rolling English countryside beside a very paintable river, Bob has the perfect studio.  It was completely filled with an exhibition of his richly coloured landscapes.

 Ken Howard and Richard Pikesley, another two of my favourite painters, were also there, along with many other friends. Many thanks to Bob and Sue for their wonderful hospitality.

Afterwards I spent an hour painting painting the nearby river, one of Englands most beautiful chalk streams.  While I was painting a mayfly settled on my hand among the brushes. 

A quick sketch - 8 x 10 inches, oil on board

Here are some of my paintings of the River Nevern at Newport, Pembrokeshire. All are in painted in oil on board.

In the first painting Tonnau is a Celtic Longboat setting off from Newport Boat Club.

Richmond Upon Thames

Here is one of my recently completed paintings.  It was painted over three days in March 2009 on the river front at Richmond in Surrey.  Most of the work was done on the first two days and on the third day I was just making a few corrections.   The picture was allowed to dry between painting sessions.

As most of my pictures are painted in ‘one wet’, it was quite a luxury this time to be able to work over dry paint.   One of the things I enoy about painting a picture like this one is the challenge of painting the people (staffage).  They are all painted from life and, obviously, it is easier when they come and sit by the river than when they just walk by.  In which case I will often mark the position of their head and feet to fix their size on the canvas and adjust the scale as they walk away – diminishing in size.  And as for those who cycled past – well – I’ll just pretend I didn’t see them.

It is oil on board and measures 10 x 20 inches (25.5 x 51cm).