The Finale of the 4th Pool, 7 Cascades

I wanted to explore a new path I hadn't taken before which links the 4th pool to the 3rd Pool. I hadn't taken it because the guides told me there were killer bees there and it was dangerous, but I had heard recently that it was alright to go there now as there were no more bees. So, I stopped at the bus terminus to ask one of the guides and he confirmed it was okay.

I set off with a friend to show her the 4th and 3rd pool. We climbed carefully down to the 4th Cascades, had our lunch and relaxed on the rocks then made our way over and up to the 3rd waterfall. I hadn't been back to the 4th pool for a year now, I had wanted to go, but the climb down is very tricky  and I kept putting it off.  The next few days after the walk I kept thinking about the 4th pool. I had made a big painting of the pool but wasn't happy with it, it had changed twice, here it is:

Oil on canvas 35x42" First attempt A

Oil on canvas 35x42" painted over the one above. 2nd Attempt, same picture as above.B

5x7" oil on board done on fist visit in July 2011.

I took my small 5 x7" study above which I had done a 15 months ago and decided to rework the large red, blue and yellow painting above using this as my inspiration. I worked several days on it and then did a second one - a smaller version at the same time:

Painting 1. oil on canvas 42 x 35" Third attempt.C

Painting 2. oil on canvas 76cm x 62cm Different picture.

I now realise that these two paintings are the finale of the whole episode. I was called to go back to the spot and 'feel the atmosphere' and see the place once again, and  then to make these two pictures. It has been 15 months since I very first went there and made the small oil sketch above. I've finished working at the 7 Cascades now. I've stopped painting for the moment. I feel quite tired from all the hard work and energy spent during the year on these paintings! It's taken me a long time to get these two paintings out. But that's the way it works: you get inspired, keep listening to how you FEEL you should work, keep going back to make studies and then the work that is germinating, gestating inside of you, one day is delivered and you feel exhausted.

I always know when the work is finished because I no longer FEEL like going to paint there. It's a simple as that. You must listen to your feelings. If you feel like working on a picture, it's not finished. If you feel like making another study or sample you do so. The only difficult thing is that you never know where it's going. Sometimes, often, it stops, and you start painting somewhere else, or put a picture down and not know what to do next. But, if it is meant to go on, the feeling will come back and you will pick it up again and work some more on it or go back to the spot and start work again!! I do feel the work quickening when it's coming to a climax. But it can surprise me, like this one above, and lie dormant for 11 months only to be born in a double version, twins, like myself (I am a twin!). In fact my sister and I are not identical twins, I am the youngest by 15 minutes and am bigger than her. Like the pictures above, one is larger than the other!!  Maybe I should call the paintings: Georgie and Kate !!

The End.

14 October 2013.

I decided to go back to the pools with my large painting above, painting 1, above, as I found it was too stylised.
I took it off the stretcher, rolled it up, packed up the stretcher bars and my tools and headed down to the waterfall.  Once there, I stretched it back onto the stretcher bars and started work.  This is the outcome. I worked quickly. After painting I put kitchen roll over the painted surface, rolled it back up together with the stretcher bars and carried it home.

Painting D

The oil painting above measures 42 x 35" and is similar to one of the pastel sketches I did down there, below. For the moment, I'll leave it like that. It is the emotional response to the place that I have expressed, nothing else. No fancy picture, no decorative statement.

Friday 25 October 2013. I still didn't feel that it was finished so I reworked it once more taking the small oil sketch  below as inspiration. I used transparent paints from Gamblin, USA, cadmium orange, magenta. The yellow is ochre light. I think it's finished now... there are 4 paintings underneath it, see above: A, B, C and D

45"x32" final painting. Painting E, the fifth painting!

small oil sketch done on site 8x10" used as inspiration for the painting above.

I worked some more on the above large paintings, we are now March 2015, all this started in July 2011...just to show you how long a painting takes from the very beginning to the very end: I concentrated on the tones pushing the red back into the distance so that the yellow lady lying down would come to the foreground.  Barry pointed out to me that when one mixes hot and cool colours next to each other whilst keeping the same value it works very well, this is what I'm doing in the background with the terre verte and the orange, likewise with the alizarin and grey.  The lady can be seen in various positions, either lying on her back with her breast, knee and face looking up, or on the side with her face, elbow and legs looking to the bottom right hand corner.

Third Pool, 7 Cascades

I went back to the pool all week, Tues 9, Wed 10, Thurs 11, Friday 12 and Saturday 13. This is what I did:

I started to the right of the waterfall, looking down. I liked the shapes and the diagonals of the background
slopes, which were mirrored in the foreground. I used a mixture of greys concentrating on tone.

Painting 1. 8x10" oil on board Step 1.

Painting 1. 8x10" oil on board Step 2, the following day.

Painting 2. 6x8" oil on board. I left this one like this.

Painting 3. I moved round to the right. I liked the diagonal in the foreground repeated in the edge of the pool Stage 1.

Painting 3. Stage 2. 6x8"

Painting 4. From the middle. Stage 1. 8x6"oil on board.

Painting 4. Stage 2. 6x8"oil on board.

Painting 5. I moved down to a lower level. Stage 1. 10x8" oil on board

Painting 5. I moved back up and changed the foreground Stage 2. 10x8"

Painting 5. Stage 3. 10x8"  At home, 2 days later, I took out the orange trees in the foreground on the left, they were disturbing me.

The Round Pool

I changed place and went to the next waterfall up, number 2. I remember when walking there taking a photograph of a pool with hills in the distance. It was a lovely walk with the dogs. I used my view finder to create the composition and worked for 2 1/2 hours. I also used a smaller brush than I normally do and tried to keep the oil as dry as possible i.e. not adding any liquin or turps to thin the paint. That way the paint sticks more to the board.

8x10" oil on MDF

3rd waterfall rock wrapping around

I did some sketches to try and get that feeling of the rock wrapping around me. The other night I was looking for my black zip up fleece and when I found it and put it on I had a strange feeling. I immediately thought of the rock at the 7 Cascades wrapping around me like the fleece.  In fact, this is the feeling I get when I'm there. I feel safe, protected, cocooned, so this is the feeling I must try and express in my paintings. I did some charcoal sketches on site:

46 x 61cm charcoal on Arches 300 gr fin

46 x 61 charcoal on Arches 300gr, fin

8x 10" oil on board MDF

8x10" oil on MDF

7 Cascades View Point- from start to finish 19 months

I started at the viewpoint in February 2011 and did many studies on site. I always take my dogs, Fox Terriers with me, they love to run and hunt in the forest below.  It is a lovely place, very quiet, and there is a CEB (Central Electricity Board) post just next to it with a security guard on duty, so very safe!

One Monday morning when I was there,  a group of men turned up and got out of their car with bottles of beer in their hands, they had come for a picnic at 9am in the morning.  I said to them "Good morning, you aren't going to give me any trouble are you?" They replied, "No, Madame, we are going to protect you!". They were fine, and when they left, offered me a bag of fried samousas!

1. Watercolour 30 x 45cm. On site

2. Charcoal study 30 x 45cm. On site

3. Oil 5x7" on board On site

4. Oil 50 x 50 cm On site

5. oil 5 x 7" on board. On site

6. Oil 20 x 25cm on board done from charcoal sketch in studio

7. Oil 20 x 25cm on board done from charcoal sketch in studio

8. Oil 20 x 25cm on board done from charcoal sketch in studio

9. Oil 5 x 7" done in studio from charcoal sketch

10. 160cm x 120cm oil on canvas from sketch above, no 9.

11. 5x7" on board done on site

12. 5x7" on board done on site

13. 5x7" on board done on site

14. 5x7" on board done on site

15. 20 x 25cm oil on board studio.

16. 20 x 25cm oil on board, studio

17. 5x7" on board done on site

18. 120 x 80cm oil on canvas done from sketch 8 above. Stage 1.

The last one, above, no 18 was the last in this series. I did this in June 2011.   I felt I had finished at the view point and started exploring the waterfalls themselves.  I visited my teacher in July 2012 , showed him my work and he commented on the study no 3 saying how much he liked it and how the foreground was working well.  I knew that my last oil, no 18's foreground wasn't working well and kept thinking about redoing it. But, not sure what exactly to do, I hadn't done anything.  Then, yesterday, 22nd September, 2012,  I felt like tackling it so, I took out my study no 3 and had another bash at the oil above. All this to tell you how you have to wait months sometimes before you get the answer and then the inspiration. But the wait is an important part of the process. Like the gestation period of a seed.

It changed quite a lot whilst I was working on it, but I slapped on the paint quickly and confidently, referring to my study no 3 all the time.  The colours are quite different in reality, the photo hasn't come out well, it's looks more redder than this. But I'm happy with the outcome. I understand the space better as I have been walking down through the forest on the left to the top of the 3rd waterfall and looking down for the last 9 months. This goes to show you how important it is to walk in the space and to understand it. In fact the reason why I ventured down to the 4th waterfall, the one at the very bottom, is because I wanted to understand what was going on down there! I think I can say it's finished now.  It's a lovely feeling, like getting to the top of a mountain after a long hard struggle, but even better!

120 x 80cm oil on canvas.

More wateralls!

The sun was shining Friday afternoon, so I asked my gardener if he could come back around 2.30 to come painting with me...he did. I rushed down there, not knowing what it would look like as I usually go in the morning..this time the shadows were all the opposite way around. I made 3 very quick studies, trying to get the shadows and the sun. I worked on 6x8" boards, 2 were white and 1 was pink:

These paintings are about my male and female sides...I think they are saying that they are both present in me and working well together. I feel the nearest pool, the one at the bottom is the female, you can see her head (light green), face, breast and body. The diagonal rock/mountain on the left is the male. They are coming from my subconscious, I only see this later when I get back home, I am not aware of painting figures when on site.

Peter Lanyon painted like this too, he also found figures in his landscapes. These paintings are deeper than just 'landscape views'. I have been painting here since the end of December 2011 now, almost 9 months. It's very rewarding when one has a good day and one likes what one has produced! I feel like I at last understand what I'm doing, it has more meaning and I feel confident to show them now.

The answer lies in LIVING IN THE NOW and when the sun shines and one feels like going back to do some more painting, one organises oneself and gets out there quickly and down to work. I make sure I'm organised and well prepared, this comes from practice too, by going out painting every day.  But the reward is wonderful, as you can see from the above, I'm still on cloud 9 and am thinking about blowing them up to huge ones....I think painting quickly too is the answer...but it's harder when they are large paintings...we'll see.


I've been thinking about how I climb down to my spot too, this is very important, the climb down through the virgin forest. It is not a difficult climb (like the one down to the 3rd/4th pool!) and only takes 15 minutes. The dogs love it too. I think it has something to do with climbing down the umbilical cord to get to the womb. I did a painting like this from my sketches, see below:

5x7" oil on ply

8x 10" oil on board.

I did these from a charcoal sketch from the viewpoint. The yellow orange one shows the umbilical cord and the foetus. The way down to where I paint is along the umbilical cord and it is along that line, by the foetus that I stand and look down to the pools below. I am beginning to put all the pieces together now, it is very exciting. Understanding, or having a story behind one's work is very important, but it takes time and patience to unravel it all.

Down by the waterfall again

 I went back to the 7 cascades and did some more studies: then worked in the studio with my pigments..
had a lovely time!

8 x 10" oil done on site .sketch.

Oil on canvas 65 x 50 cm studio Stage 1.

Oil on canvas 65 x 50 stage 2.

Stage 3. I redrew the composition, it was too high. 65 x 50cm. Finished painting.

This is the original sketch done on site 10x8"