March - view of cleeve hill from Prestbury park

March in Cheltenham is all about the gold cup. This march we also began to keep chickens and by coincidence we get our feed from prestbury park which is where they race the horses. I have also drawn these hills before so a good view to revisit.

February - Christchurch Church

Over the course of february we have been slooowly clearing out the spare room, we havent actually cleared it out from when we moved in, but we are getting there. I realised the other day that we can now get in to see out of the window (yep it was that bad) and we can now see the view of the church again which I had completely forgotten about. Here it is in wonderful nighttime monochrome.

January - Fakenham Norfolk

Cutting it fine this month but I knew I was going back home to Norfolk to visit my folks and basically be pulled from one activity to another by my three nephews. So I wanted to paint a typically Norfolkian scene which is big skies flat land and trees in the middles distance. This view is towards the back of my Mum and Dads house and was just what I was after.

December - Decorated House

I never really understand why people have such huge light displays on the outside of thier houses, where they can't see them? I am glad they do. Otherwise I would have had to paint another snowy scene for this months landscape. Happy Christmas and a Merry new Year!

November Pittville Pump Rooms

I knew if I held on long enough in November we would finally get some snow here in Cheltenham. woop woop..oh it's gone. I may have exaggerated the weather conditions in my painting but it was covered in snow just not quite as much as the painting might indicate, but no-one will know because I wont tell them oh.. wait a minute.

October - Cutsdean Hill

Right, I think this was painted at Cutsdean hill in the Cotswolds but I can't be sure because I just went driving looking for a good spot to paint some autumn colour and to be honest I was a bit spoilt for choice and kept seeing something better just over the next hill. I am hoping that the colour hangs on for November and I might go for another colour hunt!

September - View from the Studio

If you have been following the daily blog you will know I have had a busy month both with painting musical paraphanelia and preparing for the start of term at work. Which is why this month's painting is right at the end of September. It seemed proper that I paint the view from my studio window at some point in this project and tonights light was one of those amazing orange lit evenings just after some rain, you know a bit like the world is about to end.

It looks a little like I live in the middle of a wood...I don't. I was sitting down so I could only see the treetops through my slightly higher than normal window. Oil on Canvas 23cm x 17cm.

August - Criccieth Castle

Here we go then, the first of  my monthly landscapes, a snapshot of August, mostly rainy with some sunny cloudy days. Semi inspried by  J.M.W. Turners painting of the same Castle, and just to be clear he changed the castle around and not me. This is Criccieth castle on the Lynn penninsula in North Wales. This is the view from the west beach of Criccieth, I spent an afternoon between the two beaches and this was my favourite vantage point, you can see me on my profile picture swinging my legs on the breakers, just before I took a breather and leant on my easel smearing green, blue and brown paint up my arm. It was a quieter beach too so less distractions.

Monthly Landscapes

I was going to use this idea for my Daily painting project, Dan Young, Daily next year but I realised the enormity of the proposal while painting in North wales a couple of weeks ago. My plan was to make a landscape drawing/painting everyday for a year. A worthy goal, but while my dedication to my art is strong (639 and counting daily paintings!) I still have to keep a full time job and maintain human relationships.

So, I thought, 'Why not paint a landscape a month?' (especially as I have already done the first painting while on holiday). I hope you will follow my efforts as I explore another traditional genre of painting for a year. You can view the paintings here or follow me through twitter or my facebook page or even youtube, there may be footage of me actually painting outside in the real world. The French would call it 'en plein air', I call it 'lugging your painting stuff around until you find a good spot ' but it's all good fun.

Aided by the invention of the tube of paint artists in the late 19th century were freed from their studios and their gangs of assistants mixing up paint to go out in the natural world with only their canvas, easels, tubes of paint, brushes, turpentine, rags, palettes, (along with probably some bread and wine) and made some of the freshest and vibrant paintings in history. I don't expect to rival Monsieur's Renoir and Monet but I am interested in seeing how I do it. I am also excited by mobile blogging, being a similar invention to the tube of paint (if a little more complicated) it means I can tell, and show, the world (or those of you that care!) what I have painted from the location I just painted it in. I haven't set any rules or constraints yet I want the project to grow as it goes along so I am going to make them up, if there are to be any, along the way.