Boats and Harbour - Mousehole, Cornwall

"Sunny Day", Mousehole, Cornwall.
Oil. Alistair Butt © 2008.
I hoped to capture the stunning bright light as it bounced from almost every top surface of this view along the harbour of Mousehole. The tide had just gone out leaving the boats at wonderful angles, with wet glistening sand and seaweed covering some areas around them. In the background are some of the sturdy stone cottages that line the harbour while on the left is one side of the harbour wall which has some rather large lumps of stone built into it.
Mousehole is a stunning West Cornwall village, with it's harbour which spreads out in a fan shape in front of the village buildings. Ideal for artists with many little alleyway's to explore, some overlooking the harbour while others are in the village, there are number of galleries in the Mousehole, plus a range of other shops. Not far away are Newlyn and Penzance, again well connected with art and galleries.

For more info:
Cornwall-online - info about Mousehole
West Country Views - some pictures of Mousehole
Urban75 - 360 degree panorama of the harbour - taken from the steps just below the cottages - the white yacht is in the painting (at the back of the boats towards the left) but being winter not many other craft in the harbour.

At Christmas the Mousehole Christmas Lights are well worth seeing with both the village and harbour lit up with some wonderful 'light' creations.

Lookaroundcornwall - see panorama at top of page.
Mouseholelights - still showing last years dates but worth noting for next year.

Cleaning Oil Painting Brushes after a days work...

Unlike my watercolours where I use only a few brushes (Winsor and Newton Series 7, no's: 3 & 6, a mop or flat, rigger and fan), for oil painting I have a wide selection but mainly from three ranges.

A selection of both size and shapes (long flat, round and filbert) from Pro Arte's Series 201 which have a wonderful soft feel when painting, something that's not to every one taste.

A number of Pro Arte's Series 103 Riggers.

Again a selection of size and shapes (long & short flats plus filbert) from Rosemary & Co's Chunking Bristle Series 2015, 2035, 2045. Slightly stiffer than the Pro Arte but again superb to work with.

Update: Rosemary has brought out some new ranges since this post which I now also use...


I should make it clear I'm not connected to the above companies other than I use their products.

I prefer to have a two or three of the same size so that when working one will be for the light colours/tones, another for mid colours/tone and one for dark colours/tone.

A single brush in a range of sizes and/or shapes would be more that enough when starting out in oil painting, the above selection has come through trial and experiment over a number of years. A lot is also down to your own style and feel so go out and try some... Art festivals e.g. Patchings Art and Craft Festival (5-8th June 2008) are a wonderful place to try out the products and to ask all the questions of the maker.

Cleaning Oil Painting Brushes:
Having completed the day's painting the brushes are first washed in turps or other paint thinners are available e.g. Zest It which smell better (but costs more) to get rid of most of the oil paint - a one/two litre container with screw cap is ideal. I've found that Turps etc, never gets rid of all the oil paint near the ferrel, so I then clean the brush in soap (an ordinary bar of soap). By rubbing the brush head on the soap to create a lather then working that in the palm of your hand, like you were painting, the soap forces the oil paint out from around the ferrel. The process is repeated until no paint colour is evident in the soap. Finally wash the brush in warm water (never hot) and allow to dry upright (not on hair end) ready for the next day.

Sea, Waves and Beach - Saltwick Bay, North Yorkshire

"Streams on the Beach", Saltwick Bay, North Yorkshire.
Oil. Alistair Butt © 2008.

An 'almost finished' oil painting of the superb Saltwick Bay on the North Yorkshire coast just below Whitby. Remaining to be done, when the under paint is tough dry, is some glazing for a soft haze (sea spray) over the lower background cliffs, plus some small work (detailing) of areas like the main wave and sand (small stones etc).

It was just one of those days when the light, tide etc all combined to produce a wonderful subject... a falling tide provided some wonderful refection's on the beach and thanks to the flat shelve of rock in the bay the waves were much smaller than those just north at Whitby.

As I've mentioned in a previous post about this location, this is by no means an easy one to get to due to the steep cliff, and best avoided after any period of rain as the path down becomes very slippery but the location is also a favourite amongst photographers as it's one of the east coast beaches that you can see both the sunrise and sunset (for two weeks either side mid summer) plus fossil hunters but the flat rocks beyond the beach are again very slippery and the cliffs very unstable as I witnessed.

At the beginning of the post I stated that the painting was 'almost' finished... having not looked at it for a number of days more haze was added to lower areas of cliffs , reworked some of the wave form (highlights and mid tones) and adding some gulls. It doesn't really show up well on the image but next the whole beach area was lightened slightly, some further work on the small streams/water (highlights, mid tones) with finally some additional work, though not a lot, on the two main rocks (more modeling of form) completed the painting.

Dancer performing on Embankment, London

"Watching the Dancer", London.
Oil. Alistair Butt © 2008.

I liked the ring of people as they stood watching this young ladies performance on the Embankment in London and the contrast between the busy detailed areas and the open space around the dancer. The bright light from both the afternoon sun and that reflecting off the River Thames (in the background) added to the appeal by adding all the wonderful shadows and contrast.

The painting was produced in a similar manor to that shown in other post on this blog. Though this painting was somewhat less complicated to produce as most of the tones and colours where similar in the more detailed areas requiring less mixing time.

Starting with the background the dark and mid tones (of various colours) of all the figures, railings, barge etc was painted. Moving down, the shadows from the above figures was painted next, before going back and painting in all the highlights - reflected light on the river and on the pavement between the figures and the highlights on those figures requiring it (mainly around the heads). A lot of the above figure painting was done by painting the negative shape (painting the outside of something to create the inner shape).

Painting the dancer and the remaining figures followed the same technique as above, before completing the painting with the foreground shadows and the main highlight.