Peter J Chapple

Saturday 2nd June 2018
The Piece Hall, Halifax

I recently applied to do a painting demonstration in the courtyard of the Piece Hall. I wanted to show the process from start to finish of a simple watercolour and get the chance to talk to people about my work. I was invited to set up on Saturday 2nd June - fortunately the weather was dry-ish and there was a lot of people who passed through on the day.

Since the Piece Hall re opened after being renovated last summer, it has attracted large numbers of visitors to the town and is continuing to do so. From an artists perspective, it makes for an interesting subject matter to paint and draw in a variety of mediums. I have been working on a couple of watercolours, just using black paint and it was good to have the opportunity display these.

The painting that I was working on for the demonstration was a portrait of Noel Gallagher, again, just painted using black. This is part of a series of portraits of stars from the music industry that will be exhibited in Loafers, the Vinyl shop that has opened in the Piece Hall. It’s a great outlet for vinyl records as well as a place to sit and enjoy a coffee.

The day went really well, providing a good opportunity for me to paint in a stunning location, talk to people and about my work and even sell a few prints. I’m looking forward doing more of the same over the summer.

May 2018

I was invited by someone who had recently commissioned a painting of their home to paint at their open garden event in Warley, Halifax. Although it was warming up by now, it had been a long winter and the garden was still in its early spring stage.

Watercolour of The Grange, Warley

It was good to go and demonstrate my work as these kind of events are great opportunities to meet people and personally introduce them to my work. I took my watercolours, an easel and a couple of sheets of paper so I could work on more than one piece at the same time. I had just acquired the easel which is a new design - using the idea of a camera tripod with the painting surface fixed to the top. It has many advantages over the traditional wooden easels being lightweight, easy to adjust when working on uneven surfaces and very stable when set up.

The Studio / Potting Shed

When I arrived, even though there had been nearly a week of unbroken sunshine, it started to drizzle. Plein-air painting and rain to not make a good combination but fortunately there was a little potting shed at the end of the garden that I could use as a makeshift studio. There were also plenty of umbrellas on hand for the guests to use as they made their way around the garden.

I had just over an hour of painting time so I started two pieces and finished them off in the studio. The first was a woodland scene, the kind that you get when you look up into the canopy early in the year before the trees are in full leaf. You can still see the skeleton of the branches within the numerous shades of greens and yellows that are highlighted by the sunlight filtering through.The second was a typical english village scene of a cricket pitch with the small pavilion and scoreboard in the middle distance.

It was a pleasure to chat to people as they looked at the garden and explain a bit more about my work and the processes involved. I’m looking forward to attending more open garden events as the year goes on.