BATH PAINTINGS

View of The Guildhall, Bath, painted from the roof of the Abbey.

 SOLD

Been pretty busy and I couldn't get over to Bath last week, but wanted to paint the Guildhall. On Sunday I drew the outlines with watercolour on  a gesso-board, at street level. 100's of people walking by, and buses, kept blocking the view. Drizzly rain finally beat me to a stop before I could get into painting properly.
Then I  joined a  tour of the Abbey roof and tower; the sun came out, so asked if I could paint from the roof. As a special circumstance the tour guide generously agreed and I returned on Monday morning, climbed the 212 winding steps and spent several hours up there over two days trying to process so much information and capture something of the complex scene.

The painting still needs a little finishing. By chance I had Vivaldi music on my walkman player, and in the glorious sun was somehow reminded of  Canetto's painting of Venice.  However right now I feel I've had my fill of painting buildings  and  something simple like a tree or cloud  and landscape would be a great alternative.

A view towards The Circus on the steps of no.16, the top of Gay St., a ring of buildings built by John Wood and Son ( 1754-1768. (Thanks to the kindly residents who allowed me to stand on their door steps, they had to negotiate their way around the easel). The Circus is said to symbolise the Sun, whereas the Royal Crescent represents the moon,   Here you can see a great Aerial photo of both and  a virtual site for exploring  architectural Panoramas of Bath

The middleground looked a bit empty so I added the two main figures afterwards. Tricky, trying to make them look natural without getting fussy on the detail.