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Watercolour painting of sunflowers in a vase of water, on a wooden table. Light shines through the vase from behind.

Sunflowers, watercolour.

For most of the day, a brilliant light filled the open-air dining area. There were sunflowers on each table placed in plain bottles of water. It provided great painting subjects. I was really happy with the effect of back-lit water here, and the overall feeling of warm glowing light.

Watercolour painting of a rustic wooden chair on a dirt road, facing a hilly overgrown field of grass.

Farmyard seat, watercolour.

This rustic chair was sitting by a rather ugly table, so I decided to skip the table and enjoy the strange implication of the chair facing the grassy mound. This was the first time I felt vaguely in control of watercolours, and I'm really happy with how the shadow came out. My friend, unaware of my painting session, took the chair to join an activity elsewhwre - just as I lay down the last stroke!

Stylised black and white woodcut print of a waterlily in a pond, surrounded by lilypads.

Waterlily, wood block print.

Colour pastel drawing of a late-afternoon woodland pond. Broken trunks emerge from a small central island.

Swamp, soft pastels, ~2 hours.

I wanted to try capturing this little scene from a phone picture. I really enjoyed adding all the pond plants and tweaking the "sky holes" in the distant trees. I could have done with more shades of green, but I appreciated the limitations! I relied heavily on adding patches of black to make the image readable - something that feels close to how we perceive chaotic natural scenes.

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