006. Richard Tennant Cooper: Warrington Road

My copy of Warrington Road

Warrington Road Painted in 1926 by Richard Tennant Cooper
oil on paper H 55 x W 71.1 cm currently on display at the National Army Museum.

Warrington Road by Richard Tennant Cooper

 I came across this picture by accident, I have to confess that I have not have heard of the artist before.

Warrington Road was a track in the Ypres Salient, which was the scene of some of the biggest battle during world war one. I was recently reading about the third battle of Ypres and the horrors of the men being caught and sucked down into the mud never to be seen again. A truly hellish way to go. The picture itself feels like the sun is coming up of a cold and brutal day and you know nothing is going to change by the end of it.

I was surprised by (ignoring the dark subject matter) how much I enjoyed painting the sky. I would of not of thought that this would be my cup of tea at all, but I found myself really getting into it. From what I learnt from the process was; That it is easier to go from dark to light and you have to be damn careful not to accidentally create colours you don’t want ie I wanted both blue and yellow in the sky and these colours create green - which I did not want.

Tea consumption was absolutely necessary to keep concentration

I had also recently added to my paints Paynes Grey, which I find an interesting pigment to paint with. Nicknamed the colour of English rain, it’s a dark blue slash warm grey that has some fascinating properties - when you add it to another colour it is like using an equaliser on an old eighties hi-fi. You don’t know what the result is going to be, but it is sure going to be fun twiddling.

I also used the same mix of purple as I used on my table in my Toulouse copy within the mud which I think works well.

One cock-up; To bring out the detail, I wanted to give using a high flowing black acrylic a try. I didn't really pay attention when buying and I bought a carbon black, which unsurprising is very high contrast. The end result is that it is has a more illustrative feel than a painting feel.

Once my 100 copies task is complete, I do want to revisit the style and theme in my own composition and see what happens.