I have decided to have another go at painting the same photograph of St Ives but using a different style!
My painting of Venice turned out well using a stippling method. By drawing the buildings in ink, the background were given a solid structure. Then when I added the watercolour paint and I didn’t need to worry too much about the detail, as it was already there.
So I decided to paint St Ives using the same pen and ink method, only this time not using stippling but using my lovely old ink pens. Dipping in the pen regularly into the ink gives a different vibrancy as the pen stroke is not consistent. I am still struggling get the depth of field correct, with the boats in the water, but hey I am not going to worry about that too much!
Next stop add some colour. I am quite happy with the sky, so now just need to work on the foreground sea. I already prefer it to the other one, which is shown below.
My second version of the St Ives painting is now complete, my aim was to give more definition to the background of the buildings of St Ives. However I am not sure how well it works, which one do you prefer?
This version of St Ives harbour is now available as an A5 Greeting Card.
Original St Ives Painting
This is the original, I suppose that is the joy of art, everyone can have their own opinion!