The Cloud Study

Cloud study, Anonymous.

The cloud study is a great plein air exercise. It's something you can do anywhere, even in the city, or in a landscape where the scenery at ground level is totally uninspiring. 

And because clouds are a moving target, it forces you to paint rapidly. Having a palette prepared with tonal strings of blues and greys would be a good idea, so that you don't waste time mixing. Adding a speck of yellow to the whites and violet to the grey shadows produces a nice complementary colour harmony.

Johan Dahl, Cloud study (Wolkenstudie)

Views of clouds reflected in water are an interesting variation, popularised of course by Monet.

Here's one by the Western Australian artist George Haynes.

Using Encaustic to Create Texture

Last night I watched a TV documentary about the life and work of the Australian artist Jenny Sages.

It was inspiring to learn that someone, who only took up a serious art career in her early 50s, went on to win many major awards in her chosen areas of landscape and portraiture.

The catalyst for her decision to take up fine art, full time, was a painting expedition to a remote area of the Australian outback. She said it was an epiphany for her; the landscape totally changing her palette and approach to making art. Her conversion was sudden and complete.

I've had a similar experience in central Australia - the colours there are indescribable opalescent pinks and greys. The desert regions, tend to lack the conventional elements of landscape subjects: trees, mountains and lakes, and lend themselves to abstraction.

Wanting to convey the complex textures of this ancient worn landscape, Sages took up the medium of encaustic (wax mixed with pigment). The melted wax is poured onto a board and spread over the surface, immediately creating interesting random textures and a kind of sculptural element. Sages then engraved the wax, gouging and scratching it with a variety of sharp implements, further adding to the texture. She then rubbed powdered pigment into the surface.

Though I have never used it myself, I have read that encaustic is compatible with the oil medium, and a great way to introduce texture into a landscape painting, whether it be representational or abstract.

Philip Wolfhagen

Third Exaltation


The study of clouds was my first interest within the genre of landscape painting and every few years I return to the subject with renewed enthusiasm. Often I am driven by dissatisfaction with my earlier efforts, always striving for a more refined palette and a lighter touch.

Third exaltation is one of a series of five large cloud paintings from 2011. In this painting I have worked over a pale citrus yellow ground, concentrating on paring back tonality to its bare minimum and allowing colour temperature to define pictorial depth.

- Philip Wolfhagen, 2012

This large scale work (I think it's about 3 x 3 m) was a finalist in the Wynne Prize this year, perhaps the most prestigious landscape prize in Australia.

Using a warm orange or yellow ground lends vibrancy to the blues and greys in skies.

Kerry Martin

Lake Lea, High Country - 1, 70 x 70 cm

Dream

A dream-like depiction of the Australian landscape by Gordon Robinson. Though demonstrating a deep understanding of 'real' landscapes, this kind of painting draws from memory, imagination and dreams.

The stream leads us into the inner world.

Blue and mauve shadows are contrasted to yellow rocks and the stamens of native grass trees.

WC Piguenit

Kosciusko


William Charles Piguenit, 1836-1914, Australian.

Unassuming and retiring, he shrank from controversy and quietly resigned from the Art Society of New South Wales when it split over the impressionist movement. The first Australian-born artist of note, he delighted in mountain scenery and often chose dramatic subjects for his painting.

Mount Kosciusko is the highest point in Australia.

Read more about Piguenit on a very interesting blog I follow: Art and Architecture, Mainly

Chiaroscuro

The Australian painter John Anderson makes use of chiaroscuro - strong contrasts between light and dark - to give his images power. This landcape is rather like a charcoal study, and indeed chiaroscuro originated during the Renaissance as drawing on toned paper, where the artist worked from this base mid tone towards light, with white gouache, and towards dark, with ink, bodycolour or watercolour. Chiraoscuro can suggest a dream-like world in which images emerge from the dark background of the subconscious.

Alasdair McGregor - Australian

Peter Simpson - Australian

It's often said that artists and galleries avoid green paintings. It's difficult to mix convincing greens. But I love the green in these pieces.

Ralph Wilson - Australian

Lotus, 167 x 152 cm, $38 000

Haziness creates a sense of mystery

William Robinson - Australian

Mt Lindsay, Afternoon Light,
110 x 162 cm, $200 000


Gums and Rock, Carnarvon

Richard Dunlop - Australian

Kyoto Garden, 150 x 150 cm


Wattle, oil on linen, 150 x 150 cm

Adriane Strampp - Australian, 1960 -

Oil on linen, 91 x 91 cm

There is a definite trend in contemporary landscape painting towards largish square canvases, bordering on abstraction.

Linton - Western Australia

detail

detail and modif

detail

Distant Fire

Swan River

Arthur Streeton - Australian

The Purple Noon's Transparent Might, 1896

Margaret Preston - Australian

Shaun Atkinson - Australian

Lawrence Daws - Australian

Glasshouse Mountains

John Caldwell - Australian

Michael White

Michael White is an Australian artist with a gallery in the Blue Mountains. His works have a strong sense of design, and the colours of the Australian bush.