Kendal Lane c.2008

While I tend to wait until I am at least part way through a set or project, I thought I would put this up now.

This is an idea I want to explore further, based on my Backstreets and Rooftops photographic project from some years ago in Hyde Park.

I took this image of Kendal Lane, back in about 2008, I was particularly taken with the patchwork of old and new on the wall, speaking also to my Textures of Dereliction project around a similar time.

I thought I would like to try and work on this in watercolour – I have been meaning to play with these ideas as I have a strong archive of photographic material to work from.

Here’s the result.

The challenge here (as well as the perspective) was getting the colours to remain clean, in what is essentially quite a dirty scene, and getting the intricate detailing. For this I used a combination of Charcoal, Graphite and Conté Pencils (these picked up in a small WH Smiths set in a charity shop in Ripon). The paper is 300 gsm Bockingford Eggshell.

I am quite pleased with how this turned out, and will definitely be exploring this idea as an ongoing project.