These holes at the Taxila UNESCO World Heritage site in Pakistan had been puzzling me for some time. I found out this evening what they are ….. probably. Hannah Lawson and I opened our pop-up studio at Swansea Print Workshop this evening with a Welsh / Pakistani tea and we did an illustrated talk aboutContinue reading “You Learn Something New…..”
Category Archives: Arty Stuff
Tea And A Pop Up
Back in April 2014 I travelled to Pakistan with another Swansea Printmaker to do a residency at the Zaira Zaka Print Studio near Rawalpindi. It was an amazing, exhausting and inspiring experience! My fellow printmaker, Hannah Lawson and I are bringing our experiences back home in a four-day pop-up studio at Swansea Print Workshop, fromContinue reading “Tea And A Pop Up”
The Blue Stones
I’ve been thinking about how to develop the drawings I did last weekend in North Pembrokeshire. I have seven drawings from four different Neolithic sites and I thought that one or two of them might look good as cyanotypes. Cyanotype is an archaic form of photography invented in early Victorian times by Sir John HerschelContinue reading “The Blue Stones”
The Last Of The Stones
Here are the last couple of drawings from my weekend sketching ancient burial chambers in North Pembrokeshire. This one at Pentre Ifan is drawn in charcoal, carbon and white conte crayon onto Fabriano Accademica that I had marbled with black oil paint mixed with turpentine. Here’s the dolmen drawn over a previousContinue reading “The Last Of The Stones”
Scribbling Sacred Stones
Here’s the fourth ancient burial site I drew over the weekend on my visit to ancestral graves in North Pembrokeshire. It’s a beautiful little chambered tomb called Carreg Samson, near Abercastle. The dolmen looks out across The Irish Sea from a farmer’s clifftop field in a glorious setting. It’s around 5,000 years old and is theContinue reading “Scribbling Sacred Stones”
Experiments At Pentre Ifan
I spend a couple of days in Pembrokeshire drawing dolmens. I managed to get to 4 sites and did some sketching in the field, not easy as I forgot to take my drawing board so I was drawing on grass or even the stones themselves. I tried out some different techniques. These first two drawingsContinue reading “Experiments At Pentre Ifan”
The Curate’s Egg
Tonight’s life drawing is like the Curate’s egg – good in parts. I had the most horrific foreshortening on the left hand. no matter how many times I measured it, the darn thing looked badly drawn. I used Winsor & Newton’s willow charcoal and white conte crayon onto a piece of Fabriano Accademica that IContinue reading “The Curate’s Egg”
Green Man And Apples
Husb and I went to Llanelli this evening, to the newish Theatr Fwrness to see a performance of Autumn Fires by local storytellers Carl Gough, David Pitt and Eleanor Shaw. “As we descend into the darkness of winter we gather by the fire, yet that flame which ensures our survival still reduces us to ashContinue reading “Green Man And Apples”
A Humongous Proof
Today was day 2 of a Masterclass with woodcut artist John Abell at Swansea Print Workshop and I carried on cutting the humongous piece of MDF I started yesterday. I used compressed charcoal to darken the surface while I cut with my Flexcut tools. Finally, I reached the point where I wanted to get anContinue reading “A Humongous Proof”
Humongous!
I am doing a two-day masterclass with epic printmaker, John Abell, at Swansea Print Workshop. John specialises in humongously large woodcuts, click here to see some of his awesome work. I’ve done some small woodcuts before, on plywood, but didn’t really get on with the method. Today, I was presented with a table-sized lump ofContinue reading “Humongous!”
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