Challenging

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My sketchbook has finally dried out after the soaking I had with The Plebeian Scribblers last Saturday at the Troublemakers Festival. We stood in the rain for a couple of hours, drawing in public and it was, well, challenging. I thought it might dry very crinkled or mouldy but it’s not too bad. It’s been very warm weather which helped dry it quickly.

 

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Here we are, from left to right, Chris Harrendence, me, Melvyn Williams and Patricia McKenna-Jones. I really like working with other artists. It can be a very isolated profession so it’s nice to get out and collaborate. We tried different drawing materials but we pretty much ended up using graphite blocks which dissolved into a lovely fluid line on the soaking paper.

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Photograph courtesy of Gwyl Troublemakers’ Festival

 

 

No time for slacking, on to the next arty shenanigans – coming up on July 31st …….Page_1

A Taste Of Things To Come

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An arty day, printing up a small vinyl block I cut some weeks ago. I’m working with prehistorian Dewi Bowen to produce a limited edition booklet for our event on July 31st at Swansea’s Cinema & Co. This is stage one…….

We’ve been travelling across the wilder spaces of South Wales for about 18 months with filmmaker Melvyn Williams, tracking down the wild megaliths for Dewi’s new book

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Here’s a taste of things to come ….

Life Drawing (Female Nude )

Just back from life drawing at Swansea Print Workshop. This is an older model who I really enjoy working with. I made a banana cake with a fudgy chocolate and peanut butter filling for the tea break.  I used my Samsung Galaxy Tablet Note 8 with the free Markers app for the drawing.  Now I’m tired and off to bed after a nice cup of chamomile tea. 

Pavement Plebs

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After getting a soaking with The Plebeian Scribblers last Saturday at the Troublemakers Festival I went back for more on Sunday with The Plebeian Printmakers. We worked the High Street, inking up manhole covers and other bits of pavement and road metal and took prints from them. Luckily, the rain had stopped by the time we were ready to get stuck in.

I wanted to print up some fragments of beautiful Khadi papers, maybe to use in collage like the ones below, but we also made prints in all sizes and on different types of paper and fabrics. We used child-friendly, non-toxic water based printing inks from Seawhites of Brighton that were easy to wash off.

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The Plebeian Printmakers are Patricia McKenna-Jones, Chris Harrendence, Lynne Bebb, Hannah Lawson, Nathan P-J and me. Filmmaker Melvyn Williams filmed us so I’ll post that as soon as he’s edited it.

 

 

For a limited period I am putting a new drawing from my recent sketch books on my Artfinder gallery every day.  If you’d like to check them out, please click on the image below or the Artfinder link at the top right of this page.

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Some gorgeous drawings en plein air from Patricia McKenna-Jones, please check them out 😀

 

Source: Troublemaking

Soggy Scribbling

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Here are a couple more of my soggy scribblings from the Troublemakers Festival over the weekend. It was a sopping Saturday and my fellow Plebeian Scribblers – Melvyn Williams, Patricia McKenna-Jones and Chris Harrendence – stood on Swansea’s High Street and drew for a couple of hours. We got wet. Very wet. So did the sketchbooks. Now I have to work out how to dry out an entire sketchbook without it crinkling or going mouldy.

Melvyn photographed all our drawings and put them into a short video …..

 

 

 

For a limited period I am putting a new drawing of an ancient monument on my Artfinder gallery every day.  If you’d like to check them out, please click on the image below or the Artfinder link at the top right of this page.

Like A Loaded Brush

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Yesterday I drew in the rain with my fellow Plebeian Scribblers during the Troublemakers arts festival. It was challenging! The sketchbooks quickly got soaked and my drawing pens didn’t work so I changed to a graphite stick and that worked really well. The water on the paper turned the graphite into liquid and it flowed like a loaded brush. Nice.

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For a limited period I am putting a new drawing of an ancient monument on my Artfinder gallery every day.  If you’d like to check them out, please click on the image below or the Artfinder link at the top right of this page.

Townhill Boy

Townhill Boy

Today I drew for two hours in rain with the public drawing group, The Plebeian Scribblers, along with fellow artists Chris Harrendence, Melvyn Williams and Patricia McKenna-Jones, We were doing our street drawing as part of the Troublemaker’s Festival organised by Volcano on High Street in Swansea. Being Wales, we can’t rely on getting fine weather in the summer and so it rained. And it rained. And it rained some more. This was a challenge for our sketchbooks and drawing materials but graphite sticks won the day, they liked drawing on soaking wet paper. I was drawing a rather boring wig shop window when someone stood in front of me, a Townhill Boy, and it gave the drawing the focus it needed. I put the book onto the pavement to take the photo, you can see how wet it was.

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Hunting The Wild Megalith

HUNTING THE WILD MEGALITH: A FILM, A CONVERSATION, AN EXHIBITION

Monday July 31st, 6.00 – 7.30, Cinema & Co, Swansea

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Looking happy (not) with my drawing board

Mud! Gales! Snow! Lurking ponies! Scary cattle! More Mud! That’s what you get when an artist, a prehistorian and a filmmaker go out and about over the South Wales countryside hunting ancient stone monuments.

This collaboration between Dewi Bowen , Melvyn Williams and me began back at the start of 2016 when Dewi enlisted us to travel with him to Neolithic and Bronze Age sites to research his latest book, “Hunting The Wild Megalith”.

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Filmmaker Melvyn Williams with the Bryn Maen Farm stone

Eighteen months later, this meeting of minds has resulted in my current exhibition at Swansea’s Cinema & Co, a short film by Melvyn and the bulk of the research done for Dewi’s book. On July 31st my exhibition ends but on that last evening, Melvyn will be premiering his short film, at 6.30 and then Dewi will be in conversation with Melvyn, from 6.50, about the age-old mystery of Welsh standing stones.

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Prehistorian Dewi Bowen lounges on an Iron Age settee

Here’s a trailer to give you a taste of what’s to come.

 

And the quirky and lovely Cinema & Co is showing cult 1970’s movie The Wicker Man from 8pm (please book tickets for the film online in advance).

 

And there will be cake!

Victoria Sandwich

 

For a limited period I am putting a new drawing of an ancient monument on my Artfinder gallery every day.  If you’d like to check them out, please click on the image below or the Artfinder link at the top right of this page.

When The Postman Knocked

My set

For a few years now, I’ve entered the Leftovers international miniature print exchange, organised by the lovely printmakers at Wingtip Press, Boise, Idaho, USA. Printmakers from all over the world send an edition of 14 tiny original prints, done on pieces of leftover paper, and in return twelve are selected at random and sent back, so we can build up our own print collections. I was so excited today when the postman knocked because there was a tough cardboard envelope from America with my 12 lovely little leftovers inside. They’re gorgeous, with etchings, linocuts, digital, screenprint and letterpress. I love them.

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Here’s the one I sent over to the USA, a stitched and stamped piece with chine collé based on my hero, Käthe Kollwitz.

 

For a limited period I am putting a new drawing from my recent sketch books on my Artfinder gallery every day.  If you’d like to check them out, please click on the image below or the Artfinder link at the top right of this page.