Winter Collection - Paintings on Canvas

Good morning April!  It is a freezing cold start to the day, ice on the car and everything, but, it is a stunner.   The sun is bright, the air is clear and the sky (at the moment) is blue.  I feel that although we have breached April, the temperature gauge will allow me to post these last two paintings that I consider as part of my winter collection.  They are both on canvas and they are the paintings that I have been working on the longest in the last few months, and have been the main source of activity while the pictures from my previous few posts have surfaced.

They have both been inspired by winter days, that kind of mid-light that you get early in the morning or late in the afternoon when the sun is going down.  The temperature is crisp, the sun is bright, the colours are vivid.   The landscape is bare and much is sleeping but the core of our countryside is strong and powerful and deep down still working as the seasons move around.  I feel like I have captured the light and colours that I have been witnessing this year.  

Every painting is a step towards better understanding my eye and my practise.  With these two I have worked with oils and acrylic (respectively) there is also elements of ink and pencil to include the wonderful bone structures of the trees, often reaching through the mist or silhouetted in the night.  The first painting is calm and serene based on some photographs and sketches I took on the cross country route that I take down to the coast.  The second is a more expressive take on the stormier nights, with water and wind and movement.  I'm not sure that the first painting is really finished so the story will probably continue when winter returns and perhaps that is apt to follow the seasonal cycle.