I feel like I’ve increasingly frequently been receiving drenchings from some pretty impressive autumnal downpours of late. These merciless soakings have put me in mind of this painting, which I made ten years ago, in 2015.

The painting, made in oils on canvas board and measuring around 40 x 50 cm, was based on a photograph I took on my one and only trip to Versailles with my soon-to-be wife for her graduation ceremony. Beautiful though the place was, as is hopefully clear from the painting, the weather was not kind to us.

In an attempt to capture the dampness and sense of movement, I worked rapidly, using sketchy brushmarks, applied wet-on-wet, allowing the oil colours to blend. This can of course easily lead to mudiness and lack of clarity, which is presumably why I added the outlines to clarify the forms.

I think I sold the original painting at a Wirral Open Studio Tour event, of which I used to be one of the organisers.

When I first started out as a painter, I looked mainly to scenes of strong contrasts between light and colourful shadows, but wet days such as this can be equally fun to capture (easily said when you’re working from photos in the dry).