I have built up a tradition of creating a piece of my work to serve as our Christmas card and these are often treasured and kept by my family and friends. I also give the original work as a present and this year my robin is going to be gift for our dance teacher Teddie if we ever get out of lockdown. She tries really hard to get this clumsy old fool to foxtrot as well as I paint, and I know she misses her pupils as the Covid crisis only seems to deepen, so I’ll try and drop it round when I am allowed to..
I have painted a Robin before but ruined it when trying to improve the background. This version was inspired by our resident robin who delights in watching us working on the garden from the comfort of one of our apple trees. The background is just a subtle transition of blues and then I used ever darker colours to create the impression of depth with the branches. I always try and use more colour than there is and I like to work from my own images, in fact I specifically take photographs to draw from.
