Tired Legs and Skewiff Sketching

Here are the two quick 5 minute poses from last night’s life drawing session at Swansea Print Workshop. I was really tired when I got there, just had time for a bit of tea after work, and I decided not to use an easel but to sit down and draw. Problem with that is the proportions go a bit skewiff, it always seems to happen when I’m not standing to draw. But my legs told me that I’m just going to have to live with that.

A Chance To Own One Of My Artworks

I have some small screenprints for sale, inspired by my drawings of the taxidermy collection at Swansea Museum. I have given these antique artifacts a modern twist by combining them with images of rubbish – old fruit nets, bubble wrap and plastic – highlighting the problem of human pollution and how it affects wildlife.

To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left and to see the complete image.

20 percent of the cost of each screenprint sold goes to support Swansea Print Workshop, which receives no public funding.

Choppy Texture

Here’s the latest fake I did with Ed Sumner’s Cheese and Wine Painting Club on Facebook. Ed started the weekly lunchtime sessions at the start of Covid19 lockdown in March last year and he’s done about 70 so far. This week it’s a copy of a painting by David Hockney. I think the original shows that Hockney may be very influenced by van Gogh. I used a recycled canvas that had been painted on before; this gave me a lot of choppy texture to start with which I think fitted in well with the layered, fractured style of the original.

A Chance To Own One Of My Artworks

I have some small screenprints for sale, inspired by my drawings of the taxidermy collection at Swansea Museum. I have given these antique artifacts a modern twist by combining them with images of rubbish – old fruit nets, bubble wrap and plastic – highlighting the problem of human pollution and how it affects wildlife.

To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left and to see the complete image.

20 percent of the cost of each screenprint sold goes to support Swansea Print Workshop, which receives no public funding.

Painting My Plums A Bit More

I started to paint a still life of plums from a food photo I took way back at the beginning of the Covid19 lockdown last Spring. I was cooking like a maniac and my creativity was channelled into photographing what I was doing. The photo is from a recipe called “Hot Buttered Plums” – here it is. It tastes lovely, even if I do say so myself.

I’ve built up layers of translucent glazes of Liquitex Heavy Body acrylic paint over the original layers of opaque colours. I’m trying to get the renaissance-y look of the original photo so there’s a long way to go yet.

A Chance To Own One Of My Artworks

I have some small screenprints for sale, inspired by my drawings of the taxidermy collection at Swansea Museum. I have given these antique artifacts a modern twist by combining them with images of rubbish – old fruit nets, bubble wrap and plastic – highlighting the problem of human pollution and how it affects wildlife.

To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left and to see the complete image.

20 percent of the cost of each screenprint sold goes to support Swansea Print Workshop, which receives no public funding.

Lush Colours

Here’s the life drawing from last week’s session – a one hour pose. It took me a while to get into it – it’s late and after a day’s work so I’m usually really tired by then. But sometimes the tiredness frees me up a bit. I love the lush colours of my Daler Rowney Artist’s soft pastels. I’m using them on a fairly smooth paper, breaking the rules, because I like they way they spread into a rich swathe of colour when I rub them with my fingers. They almost become paint.

A Chance To Own One Of My Artworks

I have some small screenprints for sale, inspired by my drawings of the taxidermy collection at Swansea Museum. I have given these antique artifacts a modern twist by combining them with images of rubbish – old fruit nets, bubble wrap and plastic – highlighting the problem of human pollution and how it affects wildlife.

To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left and to see the complete image.

20 percent of the cost of each screenprint sold goes to support Swansea Print Workshop, which receives no public funding.

Got A Bit Of Culture

Husb and I got a bit of culture today. We booked a slot at the Glynn Vivian Art Gallery to see the new show, Terra Ferma by Carlos Bunga and to check in with the permanent collections, always something new to see there. I had a scribble through the door to the main gallery, with ballpoint pen into my A6 leather-bound sketchbook. It was lovely, slowly getting back to doing things in the real world.

A Chance To Own One Of My Artworks

I have some small screenprints for sale, inspired by my drawings of the taxidermy collection at Swansea Museum. I have given these antique artifacts a modern twist by combining them with images of rubbish – old fruit nets, bubble wrap and plastic – highlighting the problem of human pollution and how it affects wildlife.

To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left and to see the complete image.

20 percent of the cost of each screenprint sold goes to support Swansea Print Workshop, which receives no public funding.

I Was Ruthless

This was a 25 minute pose at last week’s life drawing session, but the first one I tried (below) just wasn’t grabbing me, so I started again. Sometimes when something isn’t working out, I keep at it and try and work it through, but this time, it really wasn’t getting anywhere. So I was ruthless.

A Chance To Own One Of My Artworks

I have some small screenprints for sale, inspired by my drawings of the taxidermy collection at Swansea Museum. I have given these antique artifacts a modern twist by combining them with images of rubbish – old fruit nets, bubble wrap and plastic – highlighting the problem of human pollution and how it affects wildlife.

To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left and to see the complete image.

20 percent of the cost of each screenprint sold goes to support Swansea Print Workshop, which receives no public funding.

The Short Poses

We start our Thursday night life drawing classes with short poses to warm up. I enjoy these because they force you to concentrate on the essence of what’s there, rather than getting distracted by details. I used black and sanguine conte crayons onto some vintage paper, size A3, half the size of the pieces I’ve been using for quite a while now, but it worked out.

A Chance To Own One Of My Artworks

I have some small screenprints for sale, inspired by my drawings of the taxidermy collection at Swansea Museum. I have given these antique artifacts a modern twist by combining them with images of rubbish – old fruit nets, bubble wrap and plastic – highlighting the problem of human pollution and how it affects wildlife.

To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left and to see the complete image.

20 percent of the cost of each screenprint sold goes to support Swansea Print Workshop, which receives no public funding.

Another Week, Another Life Drawing

Just back from life drawing at Swansea Print Workshop, this is a 25 minute pose drawn with a sanguine conte crayon. Off to bed now ….

A Chance To Own One Of My Artworks

I have some small screenprints for sale, inspired by my drawings of the taxidermy collection at Swansea Museum. I have given these antique artifacts a modern twist by combining them with images of rubbish – old fruit nets, bubble wrap and plastic – highlighting the problem of human pollution and how it affects wildlife.

To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left and to see the complete image.

20 percent of the cost of each screenprint sold goes to support Swansea Print Workshop, which receives no public funding.

Drawing On Rubbish

I tried something different for the final, one hour, pose at life drawing last week. I had these four pieces of paper that had been coated with yellow printing ink. I’d fished them out of a bin and they’d been knocking around for ages. So I loosely taped them to my drawing board and drew our model right across them, with conte crayon and Daler Rowney soft pastels. I liked doing it, drawing over the separate pieces sort of distracted me and I didn’t obsess so much about it. The rough texture of the paint adds something as well. I also like recycling stuff, I never throw anything away. I’m always surprised at the amount of stuff that ends up thrown away as rubbish in the bin at the workshop.

A Chance To Own One Of My Artworks

I have some small screenprints for sale, inspired by my drawings of the taxidermy collection at Swansea Museum. I have given these antique artifacts a modern twist by combining them with images of rubbish – old fruit nets, bubble wrap and plastic – highlighting the problem of human pollution and how it affects wildlife.

To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left and to see the complete image.

20 percent of the cost of each screenprint sold goes to support Swansea Print Workshop, which receives no public funding.

Painting My Plums

Back at the beginning of lockdown, about 16 months ago now, I lost all interest in doing art but got obsessively into cooking. I took photos of what I was doing as I went along and blogged them. Then I found Ed Sumner’s Cheese and Wine Painting Club on Facebook and got stuck into doing a weekly fake. A few people have suggested that I should try painting still lifes from some of my cookery photos. So I though, “Why not, eh?” So I’m starting with my plums. I think the photo looks a bit Northern Renaissance, so lets see if I can recreate that.

Here are the first two stages, using Liquitex Heavy Body acrylic paint onto a stretched canvas. The colours are Mars Black, Magenta and Unbleached Titanium and they’re all opaque. I’ll try layering translucent paints on top later.

A Chance To Own One Of My Artworks

I have some small screenprints for sale, inspired by my drawings of the taxidermy collection at Swansea Museum. I have given these antique artifacts a modern twist by combining them with images of rubbish – old fruit nets, bubble wrap and plastic – highlighting the problem of human pollution and how it affects wildlife.

To buy my work on the Swansea Print Workshop site please click the image to the left and to see the complete image.

20 percent of the cost of each screenprint sold goes to support Swansea Print Workshop, which receives no public funding.