Winter shopping season Southampton - oil painting

Winter shopping season Southampton - oil painting

Winter shopping season Southampton - 24" 36" oil painting

During very early 2018, the important Southampton City Art Gallery held an open exhibition where the theme was 'the seasons'. I created 3 oil paintings for this exhibition which were exhibited, and the one featuring in this post also won the competition beating over 500 other entries.

It shows a miserable, winters day in the middle of the shopping zone of Southampton City. It has been raining and members of the public have only the thoughts of shopping on their minds as they use the road crossing. One of the main features of the painting is the wet surfaces and puddles, that adds lots of visual interest to the scene in the form of reflections and damp surfaces.

The painting is done in oils on a canvas sized at 24” x 36”, and took approx 4 weeks to paint, during December 2017.
Details and pictures of the exhibition can be seen here.
The painting can be seen at a larger scale on this link.

Winter shopping season Southampton - WIP stages

Winter shopping season Southampton - WIP stages

Winter shopping season Southampton - WIP stages

This painting was created during late November/ December 2017. The subject is a rainy day along a street in central Southampton, UK. It was created in response to an 'open' exhibition at the Southampton main gallery, the subject being 'the seasons'. This painting came 1st place the competition out of over 500+ entries.

Above is an image showing a composite of the painting being worked up in stages. In the first panel can be seen the initial drawing, done in brown acrylic paint on a reddish ground (base). In the second panel work can be seen on the application of oil paint, though these are just the base layers or under-painting. In the third panel it can be seen that quite a few layers are now being applied with details added as the work progress. The fourth panel shows the finished painting.
Follow this link to view the final painting at a larger scale.

London Manga shopping girl

London Manga shopping girl

This illustration was done in the summer of 2013. It depicts a young, happy girl, drawn in manga style, shopping in London. She is pictured walking down a street with the famous landmarks of Big Ben, the London Eye and BT tower behind. The girls dress is red and provides a nice combination to the purples and similar hues used in the other elements in the street illustration. The image is created in a vector drawing programme, and output at A3 size.

London Manga shopping girl

Animal Supermarket

Animal Supermarket

This was painted in photoshop and completed in oct 2010. It is a follow on I suppose from the animal underground commute illustration done a few years ago. Some of the animals are the same,in particular the crab and snake, but there are a few additions that were noty in the previous one. Doing all the packs on the shelves does take time, even using cloning,etc tools in digital painting.

from website...
This image is painted in photoshop at a size of 29cm x 21cm. It is a follow on from the animal underground commute painting done the year before, by picturing animals doing a very human mundane activity, and features a collection of animals enjoying their weekly supermarket shop. The animal customers featured are elephants (and daughter), Lion, Cow, Bull, crab (carrying stuff on his shell as on the tube journey picture), Lioness and son, Pig, Snake, Bear, Crocodile, Zebra, Rhinoceros, Hippopotamus, Tiger, Giraffe, and Monkey. Horses are again featured serving the customers at the checkout as in the supermarket horse illustration, else where on this site.
Producing all the packs can be a bit tedious, even using photoshop, but it is important for the setting. Also for the setting it is important to have boards with prices around, so time was spent creating graphics that look like numbers but are not recognizable as numerals.

dinosaurs out shopping

Dinosaur shopping trip

Dinosaurs are of constant interest to most people because of their unusual size and looks compared to todays animals. It seems fun therefore to place them into mundane human situations, as here illustrated with a mother and son out on a shopping trip walking along a sidewalk. The boy is a typical boy, dressed in his favorite football colours and kicking a ball, the mother by his side with a basket for shopping, but they are both biped dinosaurs, and a nearby shopkeeper is a triceratops. The shop itself is very ordinary, almost old fashioned but has 'dinosaur' language on the price cards. The dinosaurs themselves are not technically accurate, but are slightly cartoony and friendly, and modifiyed so that they can wear cloths. The composition is nothing special and shows up the details easily. The illustration is painted in photoshop to a size of 10" x 8". Other dinosaur world paintings are here and here. Painted in 2009.

supermarket horse serving animal customers

SUPERMARKET HORSE

I find it amusing to think of animals in human roles and have visited this area several times as seen here on this site. The illustration shows a scene in a small shop with a horse acting as a cashier. She is serving a devious looking crocodile and snake friend some cigarettes and beer. Outside of the shop can be seen ordinary members of 'animal' society going about their business. A mad monkey can be seen looking out of the window of the building opposite. The cashier can be seen in a animal supermarket view elsewhere on the site. Painted in 2008