I’m currently taking a look at some paintings I did a few years ago with the idea of reworking them. It’s not that that I’m dissatisfied with my past work or that they are particularly bad paintings. I want to explore the idea that something new could be said by reworking a subject in a different medium. A few years ago I did relatively few watercolours and worked mostly in pastel so the choice was virtually a faite accompli – what could be discovered about a place by transforming a pastel study into a watercolour.
The first work I chose for reworking was a little pastel of a hill farm above the Mawddach estuary in Wales. It’s a small work done in 2002 measuring 15cm x 21cm. on a buff Ingres paper. I found pastel a difficult medium to use on such a small scale – though Diana Armfield has produced some little gems which are no bigger! She has the talent to focus on the most significant forms and colours leaving areas of the paper untouched. On a small intimate scale this approach works better than the full painterly treatment that I used.
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