Roy Connelly

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.

Yesterday I visited Room A at the National Gallery.  This little known room is rarely visited as it is only open for a few hours each Wednesday afternoon.  It houses around 800 pictures.  I was there to see the gallery’s collection of works by Eugène Boudin.  I made sketches of several of them – the one shown here is a beach scene at Trouville.

In the evening I visited the historic Life Room at the Royal Academy, for two hours of  drawing from the model with the New English Art Club Drawing School.

Next time you are in London on a Wednesday you know what to do.

Above: Newgale Beach, Pembrokeshire. 8 x 20 inches, oil on board

I was back in Pembrokeshire, West Wales, last week.  And, being a plein air painter, there was a lot of weather to contend with.  Frequently the best painting weather – ie. when it wasn’t actually raining – came in the last hour or so before dusk. But working fast against the fading light in wild locations is one of the great things about being a landscape painter.

Above: Me painting after sunset on a calm evening at Newgale.

We visited artist Naomi Tydeman and walked our dogs on the beach and out to Monkstone Point at sunset before an unforgetable dinner.   Later in the week we met up for a meal with thriller writer Scott Mariani at his country house in a secret location in the wilds of West Wales.

I snapped this shot of the figure above walking across the sand or was it the sky at Newgale Beach. Below is another view of the same wonderful beach. 

Yesterday I visited the Corot to Monet exhibition at the National Gallery.   The show follows the development of outdoor landscape painting up to the first Impressionist exhibition in 1874.

One of the many painters featured is Eugène  Boudin, who taught Monet to paint outside.  Above is one of the sketches I made at the exhibition,  one of Boudin’s beach scenes from Trouville.

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.

Painting at Newgale, Pembs.

I have just returned from a very wet and windy week painting in Pembrokeshire, south west Wales. The coastline here is stunningly beautiful with long sandy beaches and rugged cliffs. Despite the wild weather I got plenty of painting done, much of it while sheltering behind the open tailgate of my car. The picture above is 8 x 36 inches (approx. 20 x 90 cm) and was painted with the easel resting in the boot. To see the painting in more detail, click on the image below.

St Bride's Bay, Newgale