July 2014 wasn’t just a month of time spent on Swansea Beach. I also managed to scribble quite a few heads into my sketchbook. I never go back to these and use them in another way. I don’t know why not, other artists use their sketchbook drawings for new work. Maybe it’s something I should think about.
I did a bit of painting today, using Liquitex Heavy Body onto a canvas board and I had little bits of paint left over. It’s very good paint, I didn’t want to waste it so I scraped it onto a small stretched canvas with a palette knife. Instant abstraction. It looks a bit spidery to me. I wonder if I should work into it, see what happens, like the Surrealists did?
I guess that July 2014 was a hot summer month going by all the sketches I did of people on the beach. The slightest bit of sunshine and we’re off down to Swansea Bay in our swimming cozzies. There were a fair few beer bellies and unfortunately a few “Budgie Smugglers” (Speedo men’s swimming trunks) as well!
Not the easiest thing to do, draw in the dark, but t’s very good discipline, makes you focus on what’s there in front of you, which isn’t much.
This was at an illustrated talk by Andrew Renton at the Glynn Vivian Art Gallery yesterday, part of the excellent Tigers and Dragons exhibition. It was dark as the projector was on, but I had a scribble anyway.
I went to an illustrated talk by Andrew Renton at the Glynn Vivian Art Gallery yesterday, part of the excellent Tigers and Dragons exhibition. It was dark as the projector was on, but I had a scribble anyway. It’s good practice to draw in varying degrees of light and dark, I think. This guy was really absorbed in the talk, it was very interesting.
Here’s a #Caturday Saturday sketch from November 2014 of SpartaPuss having a snooze. I started it when she was awake but had to abandon it and restart when she dozed off.
I went out walking in the dark one evening, down to the beach (I’m so lucky to live so close to the sea) and I took a pad of Khadi paper that I had brushed with a thin layer of black ink, to give a grey wash. I took some black and white conté crayons with me and with minimal strokes, I sketched in the reflection of the moon on the water . Sometimes less is more.
Here are some people drawings from way back in June 2014, mostly in pen into a sketchbook but the last one is a digital scribble on my old Samsung Note 8 tablet, using a free Markers app. I did a bit of travelling that month, to London and Vienna. I used to travel a lot before Covid lockdown, I’ve lost my confidence since. I must try and do some more travelling, maybe this Winter?
Two blokes in short trousers at the night of heavy metal gig at Elysium last Saturday. Couldn’t resist scribbling them. The line up was fab…SUMP, Wall, Pyriah and Suns of Thunder. Very heavy, loved it.
Before Covid (remember those days?) I used to go regularly to Waterstones Bookshop café to sit and sketch as it was so peaceful. It’s taken me a long time to go back to some of my pre-Covid habits, but I hope to reinstate this one. I popped in there today for a coffee and a scribble. There were quite a few young-ish people working on laptops, possibly students studying. They were absorbed in what they were doing so I could sketch away without them noticing. I used a blue ballpoint pen into my A6 cloth-bound sketchbook.
scribblah 