paintings prints and stuff

Ogwen Valley in the mist, charcoal, a bit bigger than A3 Ogwen valley in the mist, charcoal plein air We revisted the valley later in the week.  The clouds were low over the tops of the mountains and the distance melted into whiteness.  The little river Ogwen wound its way across the valley floor and the single track, switchback road disappeared off over the side of the mountain. All the recent rain meant the waterfalls were beautiful.  I did a watercolour/mixed media with one in the afternoon, while the group climbed up to a higher lake.  Next post ........

Plein air sketch by Vivien Blackburn in Sketching 365 My friend, Katherine Tyrrell, spent time last year writing this excellent book, now published.  It's packed full of tips, advice and techniques.  Not only suitable for beginners but for those with experience wishing to try other media or develop their work. There are 55 artists - all good - to show examples of a wide range of approaches.  Several are friends and others known to me as people I admire. My plein air sketch of Sennen Cove, from the terrace of Rose Cottage, sharing a page with Felicity House  I had proof read it online but nothing is quite like holding the actual book in my hands, flipping back and forth and seeing images by friends and artists I admire. It's not one of those 'do as I do' books, producing clones,  but one that sets out to make you think of alternatives, observation, composition, materials to use, tone, marks, pattern and much more - all the kind of things I tell m...

Sketch in acrylic ink, tinted graphite and a touch of coloured pencil I currently have all my classes looking at trees at the moment - considering the individuality of them, looking at various artists past and contemporary.  Contemporary includes some friends and also artists I don't know but admire , these include Bridget Hunter. Glen Heath, David Parfitt, David Prentice, David Tress, Kurt Jackson, Shirley Trevena, Cheryl Culver and lots more. I don't have time to add links, sorry,  but google them if you are interested?  Past includes Mondrian, Klimt, Van Gogh, Monet etc etc etc  I really like Mondrian's trees and Klimt too. There was a page in a sketchbook where I had experimented with tinted graphite, doing a moody image of rain approaching across the bay.  It was just a tester and was quite boring.  I decided to work over it, keeping it as background and working in grey and white acrylic ink (plus a little more tinted graphite and a touch of co...

A new project, working around ideas with ink I'm revisiting an old idea and developing it.   Some time ago I did a couple of abstract paintings based on the idea of the Harlequin costume from the Comedia del Arte.   One shown below is a 30x40 inch canvas. The one above was also trying out my new Sailor Flude pen - which I really like.  It's odd curved tip allows me to draw with the pen quite upright or tip it to make broad marks- the thickness of the lines in the sketch above were all done with the one pen, just angled differently. Harlequin.   Mixed media on canvas 30x40inches This time I'm looking at Columbine as well - her costume sometimes echoed the pattern of Harlequin's.   Costumes - the Comedia company were travelling players - costumes were often ragged and patched, which was the origin of the diamond pattern now seen as traditionally Harlequin.   I have got hooked on the raggedness as well as the patterns of...

 Swithland Woods, detail.  Inktense, coloured pencil and a little ink  I sketched for a short while in Swithland Woods yesterday.   I'd taken my Inktense pencils - and lovely as they are I really really felt the need for oil paints to cope with dappled light and the ability to put back light over dark.  I'll have to get back there with my oils. Swithland Woods, S&B Beta A4 sketchbook, unfinished The sketch is unfinished because the background leaves got overworked and fussy as I tried to get the deep shade and brightly lit flashes of sunlit leaves - and the light changed dramatically, making the trees that had interesting light on them a few minutes before, simply silhouettes.  It would have spread further over onto the right hand page.   Woods are rather like seascapes though, where you have to work fast .  Oil paint would have let me do it in the time and with simple direct marks.  Pencil is so much slower even ...

sunglasses and eye drops, backlit,  ink drawing in A4 S&B Zeta sketchbook I've been neglecting my blog lately.   A mixture of a Mount Everest of marking and paperwork to do : >( and having had laser eye surgery.............. and being able to see without glasses (except for reading small print).  : >)    Yay!!!!!! I liked the backlit arrangement of clutter relevant to the surgery on my desk after I'd used the eye drops and decided to draw it.  It started off with some Herbin Gris Nuage but it didn't go dark enough for the shadows so I added FW acrylic Paynes grey ink and touch of their white ink to regain some highlights ,,,, then a small touch of Tombow pen.  The stick I used was a handle from a broken paintbrush, sharpened with a pencil sharpener.   I think I prefer the freer marks of twigs but it worked very well.  There was of course also water and a paintbrush for creating washes of paler ink. There were ...

 Playing on the iphone, very fast coloured pencil sketch A quick sketch of my youngest grandson, constantly moving, playing with an iphone.  He disappeared to the play area of the cafe before I drew his arms.  Done with 2 brown coloured pencils  in a small Derwent journal.  (2 because he insisted on having the first one to do some drawing himself, so I had to find another). Drawing active children is so difficult! they just moved constantly.   The 2 below of my slightly older grandchildren were very messy!  I attempted to catch the huge brown eyes of elder grandson and the mop of fair hair my grandaughter was trying to see through to draw and the soft curls of the 2 boys. Below the oldest ones who were so wriggly and active that the drawings aren't successful - more practice needed obviously .... constantly looking up to talk to me, brushing her hair off her face, leaning forward to draw with hair entirely covering her face etc etc...

  Cat carving and cardoon by lamplight, coloured pencil in A3 moleskine Still looking at the items on the shelf above the tv but moving them around on paper, rearranging and looking at pattern and colour.  They aren't in the positions I've drawn them in at all and I've simply used the colour of the vase, though lightening it, not wanting the vase itself explained.  The same with the wheat and hearts patterns.  Warm light from the lamp and the cool lavender shades are observed so that the whole thing hangs together. Below are the earlier stages as it evolved.  I only have a rough idea of the final piece when doing this, unlike a traditional set up, where everything is where it will be in the image.   It evolves as I go.  Major elements like the cat carving, cardoon, blue of the vase and the honesty are decided immediately - they are the skeleton that everything hangs on.   Decisions about depth of tone, lost edges, patterns...

Study for a larger work, coloured pencil in A4 moleskine, honesty It's cold, very very windy and raining cats and dogs.   I'm lucky that we aren't affected by the terrible floods affecting large areas of the county but I still don't want to go out in it!  So I'm continuing to look at still life, a subject that I rarely do as a finished painting, preferring to do occasional studies of things that interest me and concentrating mainly on landscape. The items on the shelf over the tv, lit by a table lamp caught my eye - a vase of honesty, wheat stalks and a large cardoon head, a carved wooden cat, some carved abstract birds on a tree, the lamp and a bright pottery cat.  So .... how to make a different arrangement of them? playing with colour and pattern, not simply doing them ' as is ', which didn't interest me. Switching the lamp on gave wonderful colour contrasts, the shadows having a positive lavender colour and the highlights a warm amber.  Lig...

Alnmouth beach, a rainy morning, mixed media in S&B Delta A4 sketchbook Passing showers meant that I worked sitting in the car, from a car park with great views of the sweep of the beach and the gorgeous clouds. Again mixed media, with a lot of watercolour involved.  Because it was autumn, we were travelling to the north and weather was likely to be changeable, I made a decision on this trip to leave my oils at home,  They just aren't practical if it's necessary to work in the car.  I had some non-slip matting that meant my water pot, balanced on the dashboard,  didn't land on me - useful stuff though I don't know what it's called. I absolutely loved Northumberland, beaches, castles, hills .... so much drama.

Bamburgh Castle, watercolour. pen and coloured pencil in S&B Delta sketchbook Bamburgh castle from the other side, this time well lit, not the dramatic silhouette of the previous write up.  Those sides are steep, it would be an incredibly difficult place for an attacking army to take.  It really is massive.  Do click on the link there and look at the aerial view, it's amazing. There were fascinating areas of rosy coloured stone amongst the greyer ones.  Not easy to keep track of all those windows and turrets and ins and outs :>)  It was sunny and beautiful but the wind was cold so this was done from the warmth of the car. Harry Potter was filmed here - this is Hogwarts. more to follow .....

Bamburgh Castle from the dunes.   Watercolour and mixed media in Stillman and Birn Delta sketchbook Another sketch from the break in Northumbria.   The view of Bamburgh castle from the dunes is great - it is huge , looming silhouetted on its headland above the sweeping beach. The textures of the marram grass, thistles and other plants interested me equally.  Working fast was essential  as we only had limited time up there.  To get the textures, the luminosity of the sea and sky and the looming power of the castle, I ended up using watercolours, a little grey ink, a little gouache, conte pencil, white acrylic ink and some coloured pencil. The first (very quick) sketch was from lower down and further back in the dunes, done where I parked the car, and done using grey ink and charcoal.  I used twigs to draw with the ink - it gives a lovely range of marks that are freer and looser than pens.  And they are free : >) Bamburgh cas...

Heading back to Netherton across the moor, Simonside hills in the distance, last light, sun setting behind the hills.   Derwent XL Graphite sticks in an S&B Delta A4 sketchbook I had a few days in Northumbria sketching with a friend.  Both of us were suffering with racking coughs but managed to get lots done.  This one is from a drive back across the moors in the evening in the last light.   Done in Derwents XL graphite blocks and a little of their ti nted watersoluble graphite pencils as well.   They were perfect for the wild landscape and time of day.   There is just a touch of W&N watercolour for the reds in the sky , but everything else is done with the coloured graphite sticks ( very chunky and lush) and the graphitint pencils. I took my S&B Delta sketchbook and almost filled it : >) using a wide variety of media - watercolour, XL graphite and charcoal, willow charcoal, ballpoint pen, gouache, conte pencil...

What are your favourite sketchbooks?  Obviously this will vary enormously depending on what you want from your sketchbooks and the media used. For me the quality of the paper is crucial.   I really dislike working on flimsy paper or paper that buckles with water media.  Sketchbooks are an important part of my work, for research, plein air work, thinking around ideas and keeping notes, jotting down interesting information and simply observing and practising.  They need to cope with anything from simple pencil to watercolours, oils, charcoal, pen, pastel, collage, eyeshadow .... anything !  Some sketchbooks are 'general' and can contain a mix of subjects.  Others are themed, like books I take on trips or that work around an idea.  On the whole I prefer larger sketchbooks. A4+, but do also find smaller ones handy for keeping in the car, taking to hospital appointments etc So these are ones that I have chosen to comment on - favourites - ...

  First shoes, coloured pencil and ballpoint pen in S&B Delta sketchbook A tiny size 3, my grandsons first trainers, sketched in coloured pencil and ballpoint pen.  I managed to catch time to sketch them while he had an afternoon sleep.

Sennen Cove,. against the light, evening.pen and wash I'm back from Sennen Cove with sketches :>) This one was done with a Tombow dual ended grey pen and a Derwent brushpen to create the washes.   An ideal combination for this kind of light.This is in the S&B hardback Beta sketchbook.  On this holiday I used pen and ink, watercolour, oil paint, some coloured pencil, oil pastel. and charcoal in various sketches and it has handled them all brilliantly.  I do like these books and they are now selling larger sheets of the paper, loose.  Definately something worth trying.

Winter snow and frozen puddles, watercolour and mixed media I just treated myself to a wickedly expensive brush and I'm busy test driving it.   It holds so much water!  that's something to adapt to.  It's a size 18 filbert that comes to a nice point. There is also a little Tombow pen drawing in there in a cool grey and a little of the ochre tinted charcoal from Derwent in the hedges. I did a couple of others that I'll show another day. What is your favourite watercolour brush?

Hedge silhoutted against the snow, late afternoon.  Charcoal and pastel This one started with a sketch in Derwent's tinted charcoal pencils (lovely subtle colours).  See the original sketch below. On the other side of the road was this wonderful early sunset that I'd done an iPastel sketch of on the iPad.  I thought it would be interesting to see how it worked with what was actuall a pale grey sky on the opposite side of the road, where the hedge was- so on the ipad I borrowed the sky from the ipad work and combined it with the sketch - this may well turn into a larger painting where I can play with those tangled twigs and branches :>) .  It was done in an A4 Stillman and Birn, hardback Beta book with lovely lovely heavy paper, that takes anything I throw at it.  I would love to get my hands on some A2/A1 sheets of this paper. The tinted charcoal pencils are gorgeous to use, with subtle natural colours and were perfect for the hedge and undergrowth....

Painting from memory; a fabulous late afternoon with fresh snowfall, low sun throwing apricot through and bouncing off the dark clouds and the snow. I stopped on the way home to look at the gorgeous light on the landscape.  The furrows and tyre tracks in the ploughed field made a beautiful pattern on the hillside, with smooth snow n the adjacent field. The low sun threw apricot light on the snow and shone through the dark clouds. It didn't last long.   By the time I'd driven for maybe 5 minutes it was gone, the sky was all dark clouds or grey.  So this is from memories.  I did take some photos but didn't get them out when doing this and the previous one, I started it off in the Pen and Ink app The image was then imported into Sketch Club and I painted it on a layer below with some final touches on a layer above the 'pen' sketch. I like this ability to use layers - it replicated using a watercolour wash over a pen sketch and then using a little...

Travelling home in the late afternoon the light was beautiful. The pattern of ridges and tyre marks in a ploughed field made sweeping patterns, defining the form of the land. The low sun reflected apricot colours on clouds and snow. And then a flock of birds took off from the field, making a beautiful moment even more special. I have to do some paintings from this, but for now I've just had time to do some sketches on the iPad. This is a test post from the iPad so I'm hoping it works ok.