I've been continuing my interest in sketching the moon so here are two more examples. Each painting measures 27.5 x 28.5 cm. They were both painted in a few hours, which was my aim - to capture something of the night the moon shone amongst the clouds. Having said that, I divided the time it took into two sessions. Firstly I sketched the sky and moon, waited for it to dry, and then waited for another full moon and added the clouds. These sketch pictures are mainly inventions because the speed at which clouds change shape makes it impossible to follow their form, so in a way, they can't be painted from life. But just looking into the sky helps to make an image that has something of nature in it.
I've also been painting pictures of the moon on a larger scale and when I do I often have these sketch pictures at hand as a guide to recall the feeling of the night. The memory of what I saw can be a starting point for these larger works but that is different from trying to remember exactly how the scene looked.
