Abstract sketches of Winter

In my first post about this collection, I mentioned a 'freedom to express through mark making'.  Some of my work can get quite tight the more I work on it and so I'm keen to get in the habit of exploring freedom of movement and expression and acting more instinctively.  I was working on a larger canvas where I was treading quite carefully around an idea and working one stage at a time but I also felt in the mood to create something where I wasn't going to be too precious with the paint or the outcome and just see what happened. And so these two little pieces evolved next to me. A bit like those in my first post.  I think I may have a thing about working in pairs... 

Similarly to the watercolour images in the last post the subject here is around the spindly tree silhouettes that I find so beautiful and iconic at this time of year.  I marked out some skeletal lines in pencil that I could leave open as well as paint over, and then let the paint have a more organic movement around them.   Then, addressing the colours I have chosen, I hoped to capture the hardness of the winter that I was seeing and that bitingly cold but ultimately refreshing and uplifting feel that I felt from stepping out into the countryside in the last few months.