I recently cut up a load of sheets of Bockingford paper that had failed prints on the back, and then I squeegeed the unprinted surface with left-over acrylic screen printing ink in a sort of grey-blue. I used a piece to do this portrait drawing with Caran d’Ache Neopastels. I kept the palette monochrome, I wanted the texture and marks to be the focus, rather than be distracted by lots of colour. It’s a pretty decent likeness too.
Here’s another little drawing of Sparta Puss from September 2017. I did a lot of sketching with a Markers app on my Samsung Galaxy Note 8 back then, until I got bored with it and went back to analogue. I’ve never gone back.
Two of my latest sketches from this week’s life drawing session at Swansea Print Workshop. They are quick poses, one five minutes and the other 10. I used Caran d’Ache Neopastels onto vintage paper prepared with acrylic paint applied with a squeegee.
This is the final drawing I did last week at the life drawing session. It’s a one-hour pose. I had used my left hand for most of the session, but I managed to use both for this and I think it worked reasonably well. I just used my right arm (I hurt it a couple of weeks ago) for the finer details, where I needed more control and the left hand did the donkey-work. The likeness is getting there, but still not accurate enough.
I hurt my right arm, which made drawing painful, so I have been trying as much as possible to use my left hand. At this week’s life drawing session at Swansea Print Workshop, I did some quick warm-up drawings with my left hand and then tried this longer one. After the practice I had a little bit more control of the pastels and started to do what I consider to be a competent drawing. I enjoyed the squiggliness and freedom of the marks that my left hand made; it’s not a good likeness but I’m pleased with it as a drawing.
I hurt my right arm the other week. I was being daft, trying to convince myself that I’m a few decades younger and that I could help to carry some heavy boxes that I really should have left to other, younger and stronger, people. Anyway, while it’s getting better, I’m having trouble with doing some of my artwork. At this week’s life drawing session I tried the first three poses with my left hand. It was wobbly! The first two were very difficult but the third was not too bad, I got used to making my left hand do things I normally don’t expect it to do. I drew with graphite onto vintage paper.
Here’s another little drawing of Sparta Puss from September 2017. I did a lot of sketching with a Markers app on my Samsung Galaxy Note 8 back then, until I got bored with it and went back to analogue. I haven’t been tempted to return to digital drawing, I like the feel of drawing materials against the surface of paper and I like the messiness of it.
I printed up another lino block portrait with chine collé, this time with just a small fragment to highlight the moon; my last post showed a lino print with much more chine collé. I like to use shiny metallic foils, mostly from sweet (candy) wrappings. Unfortunately, fewer and fewer confectionery companies are using foils these days, switching to shiny crinkly plastic, which really isn’t suitable. Luckily there’s an old-fashioned sweet shop in Swansea Market that still sells foiled sweets and chocolates so I can get my foils there. Husb is happy…I don’t really like sweets and chocolate much, so he gets to eat them.
This is one of my most recent series of linocuts, based on original portrait drawings. I had printed her before in black and white and yesterday, at a marathon printing session at Swansea Print Workshop, I printed her with some chine collé using gold and pink foils, black litho/relief ink by Cranfield and Hosho paper. Here’s the original without chine collé…
I spent the afternoon at Swansea Print Workshop, printing 12 portrait lino blocks onto some rather nice Japanese Hosho paper. Here are the blocks ready to go…
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