Curry, Conversation And A Missed Blog!

  Didn’t do my daily drawing blog yesterday!!!!! I went out for the annual Life Drawing Group curry, to the rather excellent Vojon Restaurant in Swansea and by the time I got home it was way too late to blog. I thought I would have had enough time as we met at the curry houseContinue reading “Curry, Conversation And A Missed Blog!”

In The Life Drawing Studio [2]

One of the things I love about being an artist is that it’s a life-long pursuit. I know little tiny budding artists only a few years old and I work with veteran artists in their seventies and eighties and all ages in between. I remember Bill Turnbull interviewing Howard Hodgkinson on BBC Breakfast a coupleContinue reading “In The Life Drawing Studio [2]”

A Left Leaning Lady Scribbled Leftily

I think I’ve mentioned before that it’s good practice to draw with the ‘other’ hand, in my case, the left. It engages the other side of your brain and makes you look at the subject and drawing in a different way. I find that I’m more analytical and the drawing is in some ways moreContinue reading “A Left Leaning Lady Scribbled Leftily”

A Baby Boomer With Red Stripes

  I like to prepare paper to draw on because white paper can be very inhibiting and slapping some bits of paper over it sort of ‘breaks the duck’ and kickstarts the creative process. Sometimes the altered surface leads me in a completely different direction with my drawing. My comfort zone is Faber Castell PittContinue reading “A Baby Boomer With Red Stripes”

Central Heating Broke! But The Cats Are Alright!

Disaster. Central heating malfunction. In the middle of winter. At the weekend. Freezing cold, pouring with rain. Had to go out to buy food, got soaked, couldn’t dry anything when we came home. We’ve battened down the hatches, drawn the heavy curtains, huddled in one room with an electric heater and filled some antique stonewareContinue reading “Central Heating Broke! But The Cats Are Alright!”

Hugo, Steampunk and a Warrior with a Mohican.

  Went to see a fantastic film earlier – Martin Scorcese’s ‘Hugo’. Brilliant, moving, exquisitely filmed. It’s very atmospheric and a bit Steampunky. Amazing visually. The drawing has nothing to do with the film but it’s also quite atmospheric and stylistically it reminds me a bit of some of Whistler’s drypoint etchings, not that I’mContinue reading “Hugo, Steampunk and a Warrior with a Mohican.”

Double Difficulty: Drawing Two Models.

  Oooh this was a tough one. We were lucky enough to have a couple model for us at life drawing group last night but what a challenge. Two heads = two portraits. Four hands and four feet = one heck of a lot of work! It’s hard to focus in on what’s the mostContinue reading “Double Difficulty: Drawing Two Models.”

A Lovely Lovely Line

Sometimes when you’re drawing you get into the physical act of it, where you’re not just trying to create an image of something, but you’re also getting into the beauty of the mark. I had one of those moments earlier today when I was working on a large drawing in the studio. This started lifeContinue reading “A Lovely Lovely Line”

Hiding Behind A Hand

Portraits are so often a way of the wealthy and powerful showing off their wealth and power and so they usually show the entire face of the person paying, hopefully, a great big wad of cash to the artist. Egon Schiele did a lot of drawings and paintings of hands covering faces and I likeContinue reading “Hiding Behind A Hand”

In the life drawing studio.

  Sometimes during life drawing it’s nice to focus on what’s around the model and we have a terrific old bentwood chair that we use as a prop and it’s good to draw as well. The drawing studio has large mirrors on one wall and this gives a lot more depth and perspective. What IContinue reading “In the life drawing studio.”