Outer Hebrides and Back

'If you don't like the weather', goes the Hebridean saying...'try further up the road'. What really suits the oil painter and pastel artist about the weather in the Western Isles is how quickly and dramatically it changes. With each shift in the climate new possibilities for composition, colour and light are revealed and both these media work wonderfully well as vehicles for suddenly emphasising or intensifying colour or a light effect. I've just spent 3 excellent weeks working and on holiday on Berneray and what weather we had...including the storm that cancelled the ferries. I was lucky to be able to share my time between developing drawings and paintings in the garden studio and, among other activities, swimming in the sea with my family. We also had another couple of sessions stacking our friend's peats to dry in the island breeze. Some of the smaller plein air pastel studies that I produced sitting on the dunes looking across to Harris and Pabbay will be on show together with a range of figure drawings and pastel paintings at The Christian Community, 21 Napier Road, EDINBURGH EH10 5AZ for the month of September. There is a private view on Friday 2nd September, 7 -9pm to which all are welcome. www.damiancallan.com/events