gallery Archives - Royston Arts Society

Peter Morgan

I am essentially a watercolourist. My work embraces a variety of approaches: rather than striving to perfect a single style or conform to the rigours of “pure” watercolour, I love the stimulation and freedom that come from using different techniques, including pen & wash and very occasionally a touch of pastel here and there.

Most of my subjects are landscapes, with a strong preference for urban and marine scenes rather than rural settings – it’s the evidence of human activity that most attracts me. While I enjoy painting en plein air, I do most of my work in the studio

Here are some of my paintings

^{(Click on one to see more details)}

My paintings are usually done on Saunders Waterford or Bockingford paper, with Arches as an occasional luxury. My paints are predominantly Winsor & Newton, supplemented by a few from Daniel Smith, and my brushes come mainly from Escoda and Rosemary & Co.

I also enjoy sketching in both pencil and ink. For the latter I use metal-nibbed dip pens, fibre-tips, bamboo pens, and indeed almost anything (twig, matchstick, etc.) that can be shaped to make interesting marks, especially when the ink is being applied to rougher surfaces.

The history of watercolour art is a source of endless inspiration to me, with Cotman, Turner, and Sargent as my personal heroes, not just because they were uniquely talented as watercolourists but also because they succeeded in spite of the prejudice that has too often dismissed watercolour as being unsuited to serious art.

There’s an obvious paradox in the fact that while watercolour painting is often regarded as being popular mainly with amateurs, it is widely acknowledged as being one of the most challenging and unforgiving media to master.

Like most watercolourists, I routinely struggle to control the process of moving pigment and water around the paper, but when it works the results are deeply satisfying – at least to me as the artist (and hopefully also to the viewer!).

Contact Peter Morgan

Fill in this form if you would more like information.

Back to Members’ Gallery

Richard Clayton

I am a self taught artist, currently living in Royston, Hertfordshire, UK.
My grandfather was an accomplished water colour painter and he was an inspiration to me when I was a young boy. Over the years, I have visited most of the major art galleries and churches in Europe and USA. My favourite is probably the National Gallery in London. I go there often to see my “old friends” and to gain inspiration for my own work.
I have also studied the history of art.
Like many amateur artists, I did not start painting until after I retired in 1999.
After a few years struggling to paint rather wishy-washy water colours, I transferred to acrylics to achieve more powerful effects.

Here are some of my paintings

For the colourful paintings, I prefer to use the “printer” colours; Process Cyan, Process Magenta and Process Yellow. These colours give a good range of greens, violets and purples as well as the primary colours.
To create a really vivid orange I mix Cadmium Red Hue with Process Yellow; Yellow Ochre and Process Magenta provide the basis for skin tones.
For the really dark areas I use Deep Violet. When I want to achieve an “Old Master” effect, I glaze the entire painting with transparent layers of Burnt Sienna. This also helps to “warm up” the painting.

Some of my more recent work is painted in Black and White. I was inspired to try this by Gerhard Richter’s powerful work from the 60’s. I use Paynes Grey and Titanium White for these paintings. They are both very opaque colours. I use two brushes for this style of painting; one to apply blobs of paint and a second brush (slightly damp) to move the paint around; to blend it and create texture. Without the need to worry about colour, I am able to paint in a looser manner with more expressive brush strokes.

You can see a lot more of my paintings here

Back to the Members Gallery