Recycled Head

At the print workshop we work with some beautiful papers and always use the best quality for the courses we run. It’s surprising how many people never collect their work afterwards. Even if they don’t like the image, there’s a lovely – and expensive – piece of paper that can be used again. I’m alwaysContinue reading “Recycled Head”

Back To Basics

I’ve been trying to push out of my comfort zone at Life Drawing group for a while now. Last night I pulled out a piece of very heavy and textured hand-made paper, a bit bigger than A4, that I’d prepared with acrylic gesso overlaid, when dry, with compressed charcoal and then sealed with spray fixative.Continue reading “Back To Basics”

Vivid Pink

I’ve been re-using some experimental work I’d been doing, that I wasn’t happy with. I’ve been taking the boards, prepared with rhodamine red and lemon yellow oil pigment, to different places. I took one to my weekly life-drawing session yesterday and drew this 30 minute pose in black and white conte crayon with a fewContinue reading “Vivid Pink”

Cake And Foreshortening

So this evening I took myself off to life drawing at Swansea Print Workshop, bearing an abundance of cakes for our tea break. How civilised is that? I did a couple of sketches in oil bars that I was quite pleased with, then we had this pose to finish up with after tea and cake.Continue reading “Cake And Foreshortening”

Crazy Woman In A Sandstorm

So who was the mad woman on the freezing cold beach in a gale force wind this evening, drawing in a sandstorm? This crazy woman here, that’s who. Honestly, the things I do for my art. It was blowing so hard that my piece of card, around A3 size, was waving about like Rolf Harris’Continue reading “Crazy Woman In A Sandstorm”

Artistic License In Buckets

It’s been a gorgeous bright, sunny day, although very cold, so Husb and I headed for the beach this evening for a spot of scribbling and fresh air. I re-used a board that was a failed experiment. It had some images in rhodamine red oil pigment overlaid with lemon yellow and I wasn’t happy withContinue reading “Artistic License In Buckets”

Tatts And Transparencies

I’m preparing a whole new set of photopolymer plate intaglios. I’ve chosen the sketches I want to make plates of, mostly from my sketchbooks and now I’m drawing them onto small (A6) transparencies. These two here are onto Mark Resist. It’s considerably cheaper than TruGrain and more stable than tracing parchment, especially with wet media.Continue reading “Tatts And Transparencies”

A Fractal Scribble

We were shopping at one of those drab out-of-town retail estates and I stopped for a quick scribble of two ugly metal sheds with a tree in between. It’s not easy to draw trees but I picked up a tip a while back. The branches grow according to fractal mathematics and that’s the key toContinue reading “A Fractal Scribble”

Oily Scribbling

I went out of my comfort zone again tonight at life drawing and used my new yellow ochre oil bar to lay a scribbled base on top of an A3 card I’d prepared with 2 coats of acrylic gesso. I’d normally work with very fine pens, doing lots of linear detail. I prefer oilbars toContinue reading “Oily Scribbling”