Memories of Skipness

In June I had a lovely holiday in Skipness.  Although the weather wasn't exactly perfection, Skipness is a special place and G and myself were very lucky to spend our week in a lovely cottage overlooking the isle of Arran.  We visited Arran by car and Gigha on foot that week, but the memory which stays with me most vividly is the drive to Skipness via a beautiful long and windy wyndy single track road.

I took a few photographs as G drove and have made a quick watercolour based on one of them.

Here are a couple of stages of a pen and watercolour painting I've made based on a photograph I took of Skipness bus stop.  G & I sat on one of the picnic tables you can see in the distance.  We managed to sit there a few minutes before being chased away by midges.

I've begun another watercolour of this same scene, sketched in with graphite pencil and coloured pencil this time.  I'm not using watercolour pencil but Derwent's Coloursoft pencil, just 2 colours for the line as I don't want the lines to melt too much into the watercolour.

I'm working with real fear on these pieces, I'm quite pleased with the single track lane piece, but I'm terrified to work on it any more in case I ruin it.  I've worked quite a lot on the Skipness Bus Stop watercolour, maybe too long.  Resisting the temptation to work on when I should be leaving alone is one thing I need to work on.  As is resisting the temptation to continue working when my mind and body have slipped into autopilot. 

Autopilot is disaster, in art as well as so many other areas.