I carried on with the still life painting I started a couple of weeks ago. I’m really enjoying this, I’m not being precious about it so I can just slap the paint on without stressing about it, impasto style. If I don’t like what I’ve done, I’ll just paint over it. It’s gradually building up into something resembling the original.
I’m using Liquitex Heavy Body acrylic paint onto a canvas board, although I began the painting in Daler Rowney System 3 acrylic ink.
It’s Standing Stone Sunday on social media again and I’ve chosen a strange little drawing I did of a relatively local monument, Maen Ceti (Arthur’s Stone) at Cefn Bryn on the Gower Peninsula. It’s a huge magnificent megalith in beautiful countryside and it’s easy to get distracted and concentrate on the surroundings when I’m drawing or painting. This time I made a conscious decision to do something different and played around with making interesting marks. I started with a piece of paper prepared with gesso and my homemade walnut ink and build on that background with conte crayons in black, white and sanguine.
If you want to see more of my standing stone art, please browse my digital gallery here.
Husb and I went to a gig last night, The Beat at the Patti Pavilion, a beautiful old venue on the seafront that had put on gigs all through the 1970s. Friday nights at the Patti are a fond memory of my youth and I saw some wonderful bands there. The gigs have been resumed after a gap of about 40 years! Of course I had to have a scribble.
I tried this neat trick with the two letterpress pieces I did recently at Swansea Print Workshop. After the first print, I moved the paper slightly and put it back through the press and it picked up the ghost from the remaining ink on the wooden blocks.
I played around with Letterpress again at Swansea Print Workshop this week. Last week I did a piece using Intaglio Printmaker’s relief inks and this week tried out Cranfield Caligo Safewash, both times using a rainbow roll. I found little to choose between them, to be honest. The Safewash is slightly runnier and less sticky which gives softer edges but it’s also much easier to clean up.
I used a combination of different type from the “odds’n’sods” draw, leftover letters that don’t belong anywhere else. I love these vintage and antique wooden blocks, they have so much character, they’ve lived a life and the little nicks and worn bits are so much more interesting to me than brand new perfect ones …. or computer generated.
Carrying on with the little still-life painting, I filled in the colours roughly on the bottles and took the background through a mixed pink to dioxazine purple. Once the drawing is in place, this painting seems a bit like colouring-in. I normally stress over making art, but this is very relaxing.
I started the painting with Daler Rowney System 3 acrylic paints but since bringing it home, I’ve switched to Liquitex Heavy Body acrylic. I’m painting onto a canvas board.
Last week I taught an introductory adult education session at GS Artists, one of Swansea’s finest. I borrowed a selection of decoupaged bottles for the still life and set them on a plinth in the middle of the group. I chose these instead of clear bottles so we didn’t have to cope with reflections and refractions.
I started with a few drawing warm-ups, continuous line and drawing negative space, then the participants drew onto canvas board and painted with Daler Rowney acrylic paints. I worked along with them so I could demonstrate techniques in real time. I wouldn’t normally work directly onto a white background, but as it was a basic class I decided not to muddy the waters.
I finished scraping a layer of Dioxazine Purple (transparent) over the bulk of my nocturne with a palette knife. When it dried, I started to sketch in some figures with Unbleached Titanium (opaque). I’m using Liquitex Heavy Body acrylic paints over a recycled and heavily textured stretched canvas. Still a long way to go ….
It’s #Caturday / Saturday again and here she is, Sparta Puss, lounging on a comfy blanket surrounded by cushions. What a life! I put the image through Adobe Photoshop using a Watercolour filter.
I carried on with a little bit more of my current painting, a nocturne with a fiery figure. I laid some Dioxazine Purple (translucent) onto the Cadmium Orange (opaque) ground with a palette knife and a couple of flat brushes, scraping it to let some of the orange show through.
I’m using Liquitex Heavy Body acrylic paint onto a stretched, sized canvas.
scribblah 