I hesitate to attribute to a tree any such thing as character, but there are trees around my home that are as recognizable to me as old friends.
Off the top of my head, I can bring to mind two fine examples of Aruacaria aruacana, the 'monkey puzzle', in gardens. Add to them, at the side of a country road, the ivy covered oak that looks like something out of a Disney animation. Then there's the handsome cedar on the front lawn of a local National Trust property.
They draw the eye, and give pleasure. I have drawn, and painted, and photographed them.
Over the past few weeks I've ransacked old sketchbooks and pored over folders of paintings to gather together the best tree pictures I have made. They are collected here, in a book, for your viewing pleasure.
Algernon Blackwood wrote a story, The man whom the trees loved, about a painter who specialized in portraits of his favourite trees. While I share that character's affection for his subject, I hope that I'm not only a tree painter, just as I hope to evade his fate. (The trees steal him away.)
I also hope this small book gives you some of the pleasure I have enjoyed in making the drawings and paintings that fill it. I have always found the countryside to be a place of beauty and pleasure, and the trees in these pages have played a large part in that.
Off the top of my head, I can bring to mind two fine examples of Aruacaria aruacana, the 'monkey puzzle', in gardens. Add to them, at the side of a country road, the ivy covered oak that looks like something out of a Disney animation. Then there's the handsome cedar on the front lawn of a local National Trust property.
They draw the eye, and give pleasure. I have drawn, and painted, and photographed them.
Over the past few weeks I've ransacked old sketchbooks and pored over folders of paintings to gather together the best tree pictures I have made. They are collected here, in a book, for your viewing pleasure.
Algernon Blackwood wrote a story, The man whom the trees loved, about a painter who specialized in portraits of his favourite trees. While I share that character's affection for his subject, I hope that I'm not only a tree painter, just as I hope to evade his fate. (The trees steal him away.)
I also hope this small book gives you some of the pleasure I have enjoyed in making the drawings and paintings that fill it. I have always found the countryside to be a place of beauty and pleasure, and the trees in these pages have played a large part in that.
