Roy Connelly

Just a couple of photos of me working at some fabulous locations on my recent trip to Dorset.

Top: At Old Harry Rocks (spot the Artist!)Above: Painting on the beach at Lyme Regis.

I will post some of the paintings as soon as I get round to photographing them.

I spent yesterday afternoon and evening painting in the city of Bath.  It’s a great location and much quieter thanWestminster Bridge in London where I was painting today.

It was 30C in London with the sun blazing down on Westminster Bridge.  This one one of the busiest places I have tried to paint.

Painted on the King’s Road in Chelsea this afternoon.  I liked the way the shadows fell across the side of the building. Oil on board, 12×10 inches.

These are a few of the locations I have been painting in this week.  I spent several days painting by the River Thames in Richmond then worked on the beach at West Wittering yesterday.

London has warmed up and the sun has been shining for a week now so it has been good to be able to paint without a jacket on.

On Friday I spent a very enjoyable day painting in London with Peter Brown NEAC. Along with Susan Wolff and Ann Hopkins the four of us set up our easels by Cleopatra’s Needle next to the River Thames.  You can see one of my pictures above.

In the last week I have painted at Marble Arch,  Hyde Park,  The Mall and St James Park (above).

Above is a view Duke of York Square, by the King’s Road in Chelsea.  All the paintings shown here are 8×10 inches (25x30cm) and are in oil on board.

This afternoon I painted in the company of the Wapping Group of Artists.  The “Wappers” as they are affectionately known are a group of painters who get together once a week in the summer months to record life along the River Thames and its estuary.

Above is my painting of the Golden Hinde.  This 12×10 inch study is in oil on board.  The two small figures hidden in the middle distance are Bert Wright and Geoff Hunt both of whom are Past Presidents of the Royal Society of Marine Artists.

I recently spent a week painting in Dorset.  Although it was really a research trip for Victoria‘s next novel I did get some time to paint. Here are a few photographs from the trip.

An evening stroll along the Cobb.

View from Eggardon Hill.

The Cobb habour at dusk.

Very fresh fish from the Old Watch House
which sells locally caught fish, crab and lobster
by the Cobb in Lyme Regis.

Simon from the Old Watch House fish shop
with some hand dived local scallops

We took a trip out to.. Well I’m not too sure where.

Here are some of the panels I painting during the week.

This is a very quick sketch of the Lasers setting sail at Lyme Regis.  They had sailed past me as I was painting at the end of the Cobb and I quickly sketched a couple of them before rushing round to the beach to paint the picture shown here. The intense colour of the backlit sails was an irresistible subject but one which lasted only a few minutes before they set off again. It is 6 x 10 inches, oil on board.

I painted this view of Golden Cap from several miles away on the beach at Lyme Regis in Dorset.  It is a very small picture at only 4 inches high.

I had a fun day out in London today.  I started off at the annual exhibition of the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours where my friend Naomi Tydeman won the Winsor and Newton Prize for a series of beautiful moonlit beach paintings.  Well done Naomi!

Then I went on to paint the Thames with Karl Terry but we found that Ken Howard RA had beaten us to the best spot

We stopped for a quick chat with him on Hungerford Bridge then left him to get on with the two wonderful paintings of the river towards Westminster.

Ken and I will have work in an auction on Thursday 22 April, conducted by Nick Bonham, to raise funds for a young artist’s bursary at Heatherley School of Fine Art.

There will be selected works by artists including: Ken Howard; Jane Corsellis; Bill Packer; Julian Barrow; Roy Connelly; Hazel Soan and others.  You can see the auction items and competetion entries here.