Bling, Seagull And Iconic Chair

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I did this tableau with mannequins and some of my drawings.

Day 2 at The Bagpuss Window, the newest arty shenanigans in Swansea’s High Street. Fellow artist Melanie Ezra and I have opened a temporary pop-up artspace in an old shop due for demolition (thanks Coastal Housing group for the loan). The idea of The Bagpuss Window is that we, along with any other artists who drop in, will fill the window with an ever-changing display of art, work-in-progress, inspirational objects, tools and equipment that we use…..

We’re also encouraging local people and passers-by to pop their heads round the door and interact with us. Yesterday, a couple of local lads had a chat, liked what they saw and came back today with a painting on driftwood of a blinged-up seagull for The Bagpuss Window (above left). Local artist Tim Kelly  dropped by with his porcine pieces (above centre and right) which went in as well.

I carried on working on something I started ages ago, a three-dimensional tableau inspired by the work I have been doing based on a visit to Berlin a few winters ago. I’m getting somewhere with it. And finally, a local group, Circus Eruption lent us half a dozen chairs – I can now sit down!!! They’re fab, copies of the iconic Arne Jacobsen chair, or as I call it, the Christine Keeler chair.

One From the Archives :1

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In addition to my daily blog, I have decided to publish work from the archives to let people see my wider body of finished work and at the same time, focus on individual pieces. I hope you enjoy.

Rinascere, is an Italian word meaning ‘to be reborn’ or ‘to revive’ and is the root of the word ‘renaissance. I identify strongly with its meaning ‘to revive’ in the light of current art trends which have moved away from traditional skills like drawing.

This image is from a series of my life drawings which I blogged about at the time . They use the rich, descriptive nature of the technique to it’s full. The wonderful texture of the paper accentuates the crispness of the pen and ink lines and gives added depth to the background washes, allowing the darker charcoal layer to impose itself, ominously.

The slightest of highlights, provided by white oil pastel, lift the figure out of the brooding shadows and draw the eye to the curves of the softly sleeping woman.

This drawing in Indian ink using a traditional dip pen is on handmade paper, prepared with black and sepia ink washes.

You can find out more about my techniques at the Techie Stuff section of this site.

If you would like to own this drawing is it available from Artfinder.

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To see more work on Artfinder please follow the link below.

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A Boiler Suit And A Newspaper Wall

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Today The Bagpuss Window opened for business. Fellow artist Melanie Ezra and I have taken on an old shop premises as a pop-up studio and public access artspace. We did come clearing and cleaning at the end of last week and today we started working on art. Several artists wandered in to chat about the possibility of coming in and working with us over the month and one stayed a while and made a plastic door curtain for us from old carrier bags and some police crime scene tape found in the street. More artists will be joining us from time to time to work on art and put it into the ever-changing Bagpuss Window.

 

Today I donned my boiler suit and sturdy shoes and papered a large expanse of wall with newspaper. This is the base for a large intuitive drawing I’ll be doing through our stay. I also pasted the 2 ‘Bagpuss Window’ signs I made last week to the front of the shop. We have 3 groovy little changing cubicles at the back of the shop so we’re waiting for an artist to come up with a way of using them. Husb is hoping to get a webcam fixed up in the next couple of days so we can do a live stream of artists at work. A bit like Big Brother on the telly 😀

Here’s something about this week at The Bagpuss Window.

Week 1
Week 1

Weeding And A Male Nude

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After one of the wettest summers on record, we’ve had a couple of dry sunny days, so Husb and I were off to the allotment which needed a lot of work after a month of rain. I had a huge amount of weeding facing me, everything has grown huge including the weeds. I did loads of digging and now I’m suffering.

 

Here’s the last of the life drawings I did a couple of evenings ago at Swansea Print Workshop using a Samsung Galaxy Note 8 and a free Markers app. I’ve saved the drawing periodically so it can be put into a slideshow of the different stages.

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Finger Blobs

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I drew this head at the life drawing group at Swansea Print Workshop a couple of evenings ago. I used my Samsung Galaxy Note 8 and loaded a photo of some marbling I’d done as the background to the drawing. I used the free Markers app. I wanted to break away from detailed ‘traditional’ drawing for once, I realise that I can be very tight with my drawing. I used my fingers as well as the stylus to create the lines.

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The fingertips leave blobby marks and I liked the look of the stylus lines overlaid across the finger blobs. The slideshow traces the development of the drawing.

The Bagpuss Window

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I’ve made Bagpuss look a bit mad, bad and dangerous. This is our sign.

People outside the UK might not know who Bagpuss is. Brits of a certain age have very fond memories of this children’s television series from way back in the 1970s. Bagpuss lived in a shop window which was full of curios and strange objects. Local artist Melanie Ezra and I have taken over an old shop in Swansea’s High Street, courtesy of Coastal Housing Group, and we’ll be working from the premises throughout September. It’s earmarked for demolition so it’s pretty ropey and we’re using it as a sort of pop-up studio for ourselves and some other artists, but we’re also using the window as a constantly changing display of our art, work-in-progress, materials, tools and all sorts of curious objects that inspire  and interest us.

It’s an arty Bagpuss window…….

This is what we did today. Mel did a sterling job cleaning up (I was otherwise occupied) and then we dressed the window for the first time. Sculptor David Meredith and Filmaker Melvyn Williams helped to manoeuvre two etching presses into position, lent by Swansea Print Workshop (thank you Jackie Ford).

I’ll be doing regular updates as the window changes throughout the month.

A New Male Nude

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Just back from life drawing at Swansea Print Workshop this evening. Tonight we worked with a male model who, although thin, has very good muscle definition. I used my Samsung Galaxy Tablet Note 8 with the free Markers app, but it’s a bit on the small side for a full body study so I focused on the legs, which had some interesting foreshortening.

Popping Up

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Earlier this evening I did my first ‘pop-up studio‘ at the Taliesin Arts Centre. My latest body of work, a collection of almost 30 pieces called ‘Er Gof’, is being exhibited in Oriel Ceri Richards Gallery and we (the art collective 15 Hundred Lives) have set up a temporary studio upstairs in the cinema foyer/bar. Two of us are taking turns doing a pop-up studio for a couple of hours before feature films throughout September, until our exhibition finishes on the 26th.

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I sat and worked on a piece of vintage paper that I’d prepared with a layer of gold translucent silk screen ink, applied with a squeegee (but no screen). Continuing with the theme of the work in the exhibition, I did some intuitive drawings of heads using willow and compressed charcoal and carbon. It’s nearly finished, maybe another hour or so. It was great drawing in public. The first couple of hours was quiet but 4 people came in to sit down and talk to me. I like having conversations about art. The last hour was much busier as the cinema-goers arrived for a pre-film drink. Not so many conversations but lots of people hovering and looking at what I was doing.

The cinema is also showing our short video before each film this month. Here it is, showing the three of us and how we do our work.

Back To Basics

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It’s been a very busy few weeks, personally and professionally and I haven’t been keeping up with my sketchbook drawings. I should be doing a scribble each day but I’ve lapsed. So today I went back to basics. Husb and I went to a family birthday, our little great-niece is three and we celebrated at Wriggley’s Fun farm, a lovely little petting farm a few miles from Swansea. Out came the sketchbook, my leather steampunk one, with my Faber Castell Pitt drawing pen and scribbling ensued. A lovely, elderly donkey obligingly munched away and a curious sheep stood still with knock knees and watched closely to see if I had any treats for her. I did.

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They’re only quick scribbles, a few minutes, but they’re a vital part of my art practice because these speedy sketches in real life and real time force me to focus on the essentials rather than the detail and ultimately that’s what underpins everything I do in my work.

Bruises, Plums And A Nude

Pat portrait

Today there was sunshine! After a month of monsoon we had a dry day so Husb and I tackled our back garden, which had grown into a lush jungle after all the torrential rain throughout August (apparently the wettest August since records began). It’s become so overgrown that we spotted a huge rat hiding in it a couple of days ago. We did about 6 hours and my Felco secateurs were so over-used that I now have a bruised and painful right hand. That’ll teach me. An artist without a usable hand is pretty useless! I’ll rub some Arnica cream in before bed.

Went to visit Mam-in-Law later and she’d foraged about 3 pounds of plums so I’ve got a pot of plum chutney simmering on the stove. Husb had to help me cut up the fruit because my hand is so sore. I used a recipe from Mam-in-Law’s old cookery book that was published over 60 years ago. I adapted it to modern tastes; garlic wasn’t common back then and I used fresh instead of ground ginger and wine vinegar instead of malt. I’ll be putting it into jars about 11pm, but it’s worth the effort. There’s nothing quite like cheese on toast with home-made chutney.

This is another of my older drawings, done about 8 years ago (doesn’t time fly?) when I was experimenting with watercolour and drawing pens. I like the way my brain just turned everything so psychedelic. It wasn’t planned. Maybe I should be worried…… 🙂