The Creative Journey

The path through creativity is not a straight line. An artist tends to paint a very wide range of topics both to gain experience but also to find his favourite topics. Then there is the problem of style to work out. Should I paint reality, abstract or something in between. We can study numerous other artists and gain knowledge of composition, colour, drama, tone, reflected lights, which medium suits us, and how loose to finish off a painting.
Looking back over the years of my own journey, I have had numerous changes of travel as new ideas and experiences guide my progress. In childhood I just loved bright colours and this continued for many years, but as I began to mix with other amateur artists I started to feel bright colours were very unprofessional, so I slowly went into my grey period. This continued for many years till a one lady said she recognized one of my paintings in a gallery. She new it was mine as she said it was very grey. That moment changed my outlook. I went back into colour, and paintings began to sell a lot better. However my wish to improve my artwork got hampered with the need to paint accurately. If I painted a beech tree, it had to look like a beech tree and not an oak, ash or chestnut. I got bogged down with reality. It took a long time to come off that road. It was during my Loch Ard project (well over twenty images) looking for something different that I decided to paint a willow tree with bright red paint and purple and blue stems. It was very popular much to my amazement. So reality was no longer important, but it has been very hard to stay on that road as you know what things look like.

A walk around the garden

The sun came out on a bright late February day so decided to explore the garden and greenhouse to see how plants are growing and early bulbs are flowering.

Framed original art

Thought it would be a good idea to let prospective buyers see paintings in their frames so added a few photos here but more can be seen on my paintings pages

Templeton Woods on television with Amelia Fox

Templeton Woods will be the focus this week on television as Amelia Fox investigates the Templeton Woods murders many years ago.

As a kid growing up in St Marys Woods in Dundee I spent a lot of time playing in the woods, so have many great childhood memories. Many years ago I decided to paint a snow scene winter landscape in oils. So one winters day I drove up into Templeton Woods and took several pictures of the trees under a blanket of snow. I needed a big canvas for this woodland painting, but recently used a large canvas for a figure study. It never worked out so it got panted over and my young lady got buried under a carpet of snow in Templeton Woods. My snow scene winter landscape painting of Templeton Woods worked out perfectly, and you would not know that a young lady lies underneath the snow.

Festive season ends so Scottish artist gets back to work

New Scottish Beach paintings for 2023

Scottish artist John Stoa from Dundee has been busy over the festive season, so three Scottish beach landscape paintings for 2023 are Coral Beach and Taliskar Beach on Isle of Skye and another beach painting of the Silver Sands of Morar. These paintings are also shown on the landscape paintings page on the website. The Isle of Skye has always been a favourite place for John with fantastic scenery all round the island. He always comes back with plenty photos of mountains, lochs, waterfalls, harbours, boats, woodlands and clean sandy beaches. Then back to Dundee for a local landscape painting of Camperdown House from the pond which is also shown on the page of romantic paintings.

The Big Picture with Large Wall Paintings

Large Wall Paintings for Sale
 Artists always get that urge to go big just for once, so when an idea for a big picture emerges just go for it. It is often a town center image with loads of detail, or just a need to use those big brushes you bought ages ago but never had a need for them, until now. The artist is forever looking at topics for his next painting. It could be a beautiful flower in the garden, a peaceful snow covered landscape or allotment shed, fence and wheelbarrow, a busy town centre, especially Edinburgh or Dundee. When deciding how to paint them, some have so much interest in them that they demand the bigger canvas. Fortunately it is now in fashion to hang a large wall art painting as the focal point in a living room. All these large paintings are available so if you wish to purchase or inquire or see them in my studio please contact me.

Allotment paintings add variety with a vibrant imagination

Allotment painting allow artists to explore their creativity by taking one topic (this one is Arthurs Plot) and seeing how many different paintings they can create. Let the imagination wander free. Nothing is off limits, not even my potatoes with bright red flowers during the summer on the allotment but then when winter arrives it is snow scene winter landscape paintings down on Arthurs plot. Then of course once we have completed an interesting range of normal sized canvases we can take the best of them to create larger wall art paintings as this market is growing stronger. Arthurs plot up at City Road Allotments in Dundee was a mess with pots, boxes, barrels, pallets, wooden planks, tiles and other allotment plot debris scattered all over the place. From the gardening point of view it was derelict, but as the artist it was fantastic as it gave us the opportunity for numerous studies as debris got moved around and in winter a covering of snow added a new dimension.

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Art Projects for Artistic Creativity

Artistic creativity in the early part of an artist’s career, has us wondering what should we paint, so we choose the topics that inspire us. I just love snow scenes, but then as a trained gardener, I find plenty attractive flowers to paint, and now with a plot on an allotment site there is plenty ramshackle sheds and fences, water butts and crops to paint. As a Scotsman I love painting our lochs and mountains, so I do numerous trips to Glencoe and Isle of Skye and bring back photos to work from.Then as a Dundonian I find plenty places to capture on canvas all around the town. Artistic creativity has no bounds. However once we decide on a topic we need to show it in a variety of views. Thus I have painted 14 Cape Gooseberries, about 15 views around Loch Ard, 20 different orchids, 20 Dundee paintings, half a dozen Forfar Lochs, and well over 100 snow scenes. Another favourite topic for me is views around my allotment site at City Road Allotment Gardens, as there is so much variety of sheds, fences, barrels, boxes and plants that our artistic creativity gets plenty of exercise.

The Forfar Loch below is still on show in the Winter Exhibition with Dundee Art Society in Roseangle Gallery, but ends tomorrow Saturday 10th December.

The two latest views of Arthurs Plot are now on show in my studio. I have now painted 8 views of Arthurs Plot, but 6 are now sold with 2 on my studio walls at home.

Visitors are welcome to pop in to see my studio gallery any time, but drop me an email at johnstoa@blueyonder.co.uk to make sure I am in.

Christmas Art Exhibitions

As we head towards the festive season, we artists join in Christmas Exhibitions, so if you get the chance, please drop into them, and see some brilliant new art for sale from Dundee's artists. There is a charity exhibition for Cancer Research in the Vision Building, 20 Greenmarket from 25 to 27 November, open 10am till 8pm, but finishes at 4pm on Sunday then Dundee Art Society is holding their winter exhibition in their Roseangle Gallery from 3rd to 10th December.Open from 11am to 4pm with more art for sale.

Special Festive Offer

John will give a free limited edition print for every purchase of a painting from November to end of December.

LIFE INTO ART EXHIBITION

Visitors are very welcome to pop into the Art exhibition in the DUNDEE PARISH CHURCH (ST MARY’S)

Exhibition started today and continues till Saturday 22 October Open from 10 am till 4.30 pm

Lady in Red Arrives in Dundee

Lady in Red comes to Dundee in Scotland. I was born in Dundee, but moved south for 30 odd years following my horticultural career before returning to my home city as an artist. We are constantly seeking new ideas to paint and there are so many interesting places in and around Dundee that a new project of showing the best of my home town on canvas was born. The link for all these paintings was my Lady in Red as she went for walks in the town center, under the River Tay rail bridge, did some shopping, relaxed in the City Square and at McManus Gallery then ended the evening with a social night out. Other paintings of my Lady in Red is as the artist model in the studio, but still dressed in red.

An Artist Life

I thought now would be a good time to start a new Blog to look at the world of art and how I find my way around this vast and interesting topic.

The Young Artist

My interest in art was established in childhood, encouraged by my father who kept me supplied with paper and pencils and crayons then many years later the magic of selling original paintings started when I got my first red dot at Darlington Art Society Annual Exhibition in 1980. I am largely self taught but constantly experiments with colour and light, tone and composition. I paint subjects from town to country, floral to figurative, snow scenes, summer landscapes, Scottish castles, mountains, lochs and still life. In early days I used pastels, watercolour and oils, but when acrylics became popular I changed to this medium. I had a long career in horticulture taking me all over the United Kingdom but became a full time artist in 1992 when my employers, Livingston Development Corporation got wound up as the new towns had become established and redundancy loomed. I have been fairly prolific and now (up to 2022) painted over 1800 paintings. All my paintings are numbered and have dates and titles on the back of the frame as well as on the artwork. I have published several limited edition prints, and often put on an exhibition of recent paintings in my Original Art studio in Dundee. I exhibit paintings with both the Broughty Ferry Art Society as well as the Dundee Art Society.

I run art classes on a Monday evening in my Art Studio in Dundee and am happy to hear from anyone looking for art classes in Dundee.

Scottish artist John Stoa from Dundee