Following my research on landscape artists – past and present, I was keen to develop the studies of my back garden further. I see it as a familiar place and am particularly interested in looking out for things I don’t usually see, looking at how the light effects it at different times.
Looking at the earlier studies I had made and photographs I had taken, I decided to look at different ways to frame the views to make an interesting study. As it was a sunny day, I also decided to take new photos of each of the views to consider any new interest which may be added.
The original and secondary images are provided below:
Original photos, taken early afternoon, in summer time on an overcast day. These were the photos I took just after each of my sketches (see earlier blog post). Initially I most liked the image in the top left hand corner, I was particularly drawn to the different lines created by the wall, ladder, trellis and other items. However I also felt the view was quite busy for developing further, and I struggled to crop it whilst retaining interesting lines and natural foliage.
Second set of photos taken in summertime, early evening, sunny day with light clouds.
After taking the second set of pictures, I was drawn more to the image on the bottom right, because of the shadows cast, however I was concerned that this did not contain enough foliage and was not interesting enough to carry forward, I also though the actual space was too small to really qualify as a landscape.
I decided instead to work on the view from the end of the garden towards my house (bottom right on original set and bottom left on second set of photos). I liked this view as usually I would view my garden from the opposite direction. I also felt it contained different elements of landscape that were interesting and I had purposefully used a vertical view which I felt added a different dimension to the idea of landscape. I decided to explore this view further at different times of the day.
All the above were taken over a few days after the first sets of photos, at different times of day with slightly varying weather conditions. Clockwise from top left, late evening, sunny, visible sky with light cloud; morning, sunny with light cloud; morning cloudy; late morning, sunny with light cloud.
I liked the bottom right image best as I felt the view had the best combination of light and shade. I also liked how I was still able to see the differences in tone caused by falling shadow – in the sunnier views these contrasts were much more difficult to determine. I decided then to play with the framing of the composition I wanted to draw. Thinking back again to my research, I was interested in Peter Doig’s concrete cabin series, and decided to focus in further and to remove the sky. I thought that this would have the effect of drawing the viewer in. I also thought it may help focus on the fall and effects of light without distractions.
The above image is the composition I decided to take forward as a drawing.
Deborah McAulay 