Rapacious Stillness, Great Blue Heron

10 x 8 watercolour on 140# Arches hot-pressed paper

I named this painting for a contradiction I see in herons and a character described in an Iain Bank’s novel: Mr Blawke always reminded me of a heron; I'm not sure why. Something to do with a sense of rapacious stillness, perhaps, and also the aura of one who knows time is on his side. Herons also have such elegance in their beauty and, at odds with that, such horror in their vocalization—like a prehistoric pterodactyl, echoing their dinosaur ancestors on a rapacious search for prey!