The Dunes

This painting was based on a study done on location in Nairn, in northern Scotland. I was fascinated by the complex pattern formed by the marram grass against the sand in the flat, overcast light of the day. When working the piece up from a combination of the plein air study and photographs, the main difficulty was finding the right balance between form and flatness in the grasses, and I found myself frequently having to obliterate detail and compress value variations in order to maintain that sense of a graphic pattern.