Milky Way Gallery

31/05/2026

News from the Milky Way Gallery - here's all the news for May 2026 in my newsletter, plus news of 12 new prints, website upgrades and a bit more about our forthcoming exhibition.

May 2026 Hello Art Fans, I am just scraping in to the last few hours of May with this newsletter. I've had a busy month, but not painting, weirdly! I have been updating my website, the Milky Way Gallery, and it has taken a ton of time. The other thing I did was added twelve prints from my back catal...

31/05/2026

Here is the last one from my back catalogue, so I think I am to date at last! This is a print of my oil-on-canvas painting, "The Audition," which I painted back in 1995. It features my young niece and her two close friends at the start of ballet class, holding onto the studio barre, filled with the nervous anticipation of young dancers, absorbed in their thoughts and suffering from pre-audition performance jitters.

This is a print of my oil-on-canvas painting, "The Audition," which I painted back in 1995. It features my young niece and her two close friends at the start of ballet class, holding onto the studio barre, filled with the nervous anticipation of young dancers, absorbed in their thoughts and sufferin...

29/05/2026

Sunday mornings are made for this. This print of a watercolour captures the early energy of a yacht club gathering just before the race begins. I wanted to lean into a semi-abstract style here, focusing less on the hard lines of the boats and more on the fluid, dancing reflections in the water. One of my earlier pieces, but still a favourite mood to revisit. As well as being online it is also available from my studio in Cliffe, near Selby.

Sunday mornings are made for this. This watercolour captures the early energy of a yacht club gathering just before the race begins. I wanted to lean into a semi-abstract style here, focusing less on the hard lines of the boats and more on the fluid, dancing reflections in the water. One of my earli...

25/05/2026

Here's a print from a watercolour I did of a red sailing boat out on a lake at sunset.

This was painted in August 1996, a watercolour from a photo I took of a solitary red sail out on a lake. You can imagine them gliding through the still water, with dusk gathering, just the merest ripple of the bow wave and a gentle evening wind rattling the spinnaker halyard against the mast.

23/05/2026

Happy Saturday! Here's a new print of a watercolour I did a while back of the gondolas bobbing in the water at the edge of St. Mark's Square in beautiful Venice. It's rather similar to an oil painting I did much more recently of the same subject, but it's interesting if you compare the two. But to do that, nip along to my website and select Browse All to see the prints, and you'll see what I mean.

This was painted in November 1996, from a photograph I took after visiting the beautiful San Marco piazza in Venezia. Venice is one of the few places where you don't have to visit anything in particular; you can just stroll about and take it all in. I am currently enjoying Donna Leon's series of boo...

22/05/2026

I have been updating my Milky Way Gallery. Now instead of showing the pictures as their full shape, which left lots of black space between them, they are all uniform squares, as a sort of 'sample' of the picture. You just click the picture for full details as usual, so no change there. I am also working my way through the prints adding 'on the wall' pictures of what they look like in a black frame and a white frame, in different rooms, and I am adding the options for 'no frame, 'black frame' or 'white frame'. It's taking ages! I have got down as far as The Aviator so far but I am soldiering on, eating the elephant in chunks. Oh, and there's one other big change. The second menu option is now 'Browse All', and there you can see everything on the site, or just select the things you are interested in, such as 'Nature Paintings' or 'People Prints'. I hope it's a better experience for everyone, but I would appreciate your feedback in the comments. Please follow the link and tell me what you think.☺️

Milky Way Gallery of original oil paintings on canvas and print art by Richard Mitchell

21/05/2026

I am still working through my back catalogue and here is a picture of an early morning sailing race in Norfolk.

This was painted in July 1996, so I don't remember much about it, but I think it is a dinghy race or regatta on the North Norfolk coast, probably around Holkham or Burnham-over-Staithe, where we used to stay with friends. It looks like mixed dinghy racing on sheltered estuary waters. The narrow hull...

19/05/2026

This was a large painting of Ladies Day at Ascot, painted in the nineties, with everyone in the crowd dressed in their most beautiful finery. How elegant everyone looks in their morning suits, grey toppers, and the prettiest millinery.

18/05/2026

This footprint in the sand was painted at the turn of the millenium, and gets its name from the physical connection between us and the earth, as every step shapes the sand with our own imprint.

17/05/2026

I was seated in the crowd at Centre Court in the nineties, when a sudden shower had stopped play and the crowd was quickly vacating the stands. While everyone was leaving, I was sitting there with my camera taking pictures of the crowd opposite. In those days you had to get your film developed in a camera shop, and I remember I got several of the pictures from that film printed in large format, which meant that I had good enough resolution to paint this picture. It's original was oil on canvas, but here's a print of it.

I was seated in the crowd at Centre Court in the nineties, when a sudden shower had stopped play and the crowd was quickly vacating the stands. While everyone was leaving, I was sitting there with my camera taking pictures of the crowd opposite. In those days you had to get your film developed in a....