Technique
Painting the storm before it arrives
Twenty minutes on the cliff path, a primed board, and why none of those boards ever go in the show.
People ask how I paint a storm while standing in it. The honest answer is that I do not. I paint the twenty minutes before it, and then I go inside.
The board in the pocket
I carry a pochade box with a primed board, six colors, and one brush. The board is small, about the size of a paperback. I can hold it in one hand when the wind gets up.
On the cliff path I am not making a painting. I am taking notes in color: how dark the sky is next to the sea, where the light breaks, what color the foam is (it is never white).
Back in the loft
The real canvas is painted the same afternoon. I pin the board to the wall, open the window so the room stays cold, and work fast while the noise is still in my ears.
The board tells me the colors. The cold room tells me the speed.
From the studio notebook, January 2026
The boards stay in a drawer. A few of them are better than the canvases, and I am still not sure what to do about that.