Given the elbow, a new series

Shelter (Oil on canvas, 24 x 24 ins)

This painting is from 2001, but it represents a theme I want to see if I can return to.

Despite the injury to my arm - it turns out I have tennis elbow - I've been putting in some vigorous palette knife work on a couple of paintings which I think may go well with Shelter.

Blawearie Steps (work in progress)

I don't think this needs a great deal more work, but I may surprise myself when I return to it. The other I'm less sure of, but I like the subject matter. It's based on a Second World War pillbox lying at the edge of the golf course just beyond Dunstanburgh Castle.:

Pillbox (first stage)

I bought these canvases - they're Loxley Ashgate canvases - in a carton of ten from Ken Bromley at a decent price. They work out at about a fiver a piece. I couldn't make them for that price, even if I could make them of better materials. Still, tennis elbow and all that ... The canvas is only 10 oz., which is a bit light, and they're only double primed. but I've put on another three coats of acrylic primer and they look much better now. In addition, on the Pillbox canvas, I put on a layer of Winsor & Newton Pumice Texture Gel to give the area of the foreground grass a bit of "tooth."