A Quick Sketch In A High Wind.

Drawing on a high hill.

Husb and I spent a few days with friends on the South East coast of England last week. It was cold and very windy but mostly sunny too, great walking weather and great walking country. We strolled over the South Downs with the Seven Sisters in the distance. Of course, I had to have a scribble, but it wasn’t easy in a high wind! So I kept it very quick, making a few marks with my Inktense blocks and using my reservoir brush to turn the dry medium into an ink wash.

But the best thing was spending time with old friends that we hadn’t seen in the real world since before Covid19 hit us all. It’s lovely to get out and see people again, that’s what really matters in life, friends and family.

Another one from my sketchbook

Here’s a quick scribble from my sketchbook, a continuous line drawing in ballpoint pen. The speaker was presenting at an event I went to recently and stayed quite still. These small, fast sketches underpin my arts practice, they look insignificant but each one I do hones my ability to assess proportion and perspective.

A Figure At Rest

Sitting quietly.

Just a quick scribble in my sketchbook of someone sitting quietly – and still – having a rest.

A Feisty Niece, a Furry Cat and a Film.

A great niece.

I’ve been working on this portrait of my feisty great-niece for ages. The original is a fab photo by Jeremy Wheeler of Agea Studio, and I struggled with the hand and arm, because they’re slightly blurred and I kept wanting to “correct” the image, but that just made it look weirder. Here are the stages of the painting, from the initial sketch. The underpainting went through some really strange transformations! I used Liquitex Heavy Body acrylic paints onto stretched canvas.

Here’s a short time-lapse film that Husb made of the painting, from scratch. I used a recycled canvas that I had been doing some hard-edge experiments on. At times, I worked with the photo and canvas upside down as I find it easier to get the details right that way. See if you can spot Sparta Puss – she likes to keep me company while I paint.

Feisty niece and furry cat.

Chubby Foxes.

Waiting for their tea.

Husb and I had a few days away, staying with friends on the South Coast – that’s East Sussex, not Barrybados LOL 😀 Their garden was visited several times a day by two of the chubbiest foxes I’ve ever seen. Big, fluffy and ginger, I thought they were odd-looking corgis when I saw them first. But no, they’re little chubsters living a privileged suburban life.

I put the detail below through an Adobe Photoshop filter.

Fox through a filter.

Faces In A Theatre 1

Just that. Faces in a theatre. I scribbled them.

This is NOT PPE!

I’m finally getting to grips with the lino blocks of text I started back at the beginning of lockdown 2020. I’m making mask shapes out of cotton and printing them with the words and phrases I carved into lino, reflecting my feelings and observations over the period. But these are not masks. They are NOT PPE. They are artworks and they will be exhibited in “Pitchfork” at The Workers Gallery in Ynyshir from April 7th.

The Workers is a fab gallery, in a tiny village in the Rhondda Valley in South Wales. It’s run by artists Gayle Rogers and Chris Williams and unlike many galleries that intimidate and exclude, The Workers is a loved part of the local community. Give it a go. It’s a lovely area to visit anyway.

#StandingStoneSunday … Book of the Boar!

The book of the journey of the Boar Hunt (Y Twrch Trwyth) has been in print for a whole week and is selling well, with virtually no publicity, just word of mouth via social media. The book is based on the theory that the route of The Boar Hunt in the Mabinogion includes most of the major Neolithic and Bronze Age stone monuments across South Wales. Dewi has painstakingly mapped them and co-written this book (with Olwyn Pritchard) which is not just learned but also full of entertaining stories, humour and art. Many of the works I did out in the field – literally – are in a full colour centre spread including this one, Garreg Goch, The Red Stone which is in a hedge surrounded by barbed wire. It’s one of my favourite stones and favourite paintings.

Garreg Goch.

I spent three years traipsing across the hidden (and mucky) places of South Wales with pre-historian Dewi Bowen and filmmaker Melvyn Williams, drawing and painting along the way, while Dewi researched and Melvyn filmed.

The book is beautifully printed and available for £15.00 GBP plus postage and packing. Please contact me if you want to know more. And there will be a proper book launch in Swansea on March 31st at GS Artists on Swansea’s High Street.

#Caturday Archives 18

Whose Chair?

It’s #Caturday Saturday again and here’s a drawing from my sketch archives, I guess about 7 or 8 years ago. I had a very comfy Ikea Poang chair at the time but Sparta Puss liked it as much as I did. Guess who won out on this particular evening? I drew into my sketchbook with Faber Castell Pitt drawing pens.

Modernists At The Gallery.

I scribbled this little one hard at work creating a collage at GS Artists last Friday. The group was inspired by an exhibition supporting a new book by Catrin Saran James, “Modernist Swansea”. In the background is a quilt based on some iconic tile designs around the city centre, sadly disappearing, by local artist Laura Chrostowski Jenkins – more on the artist here. GS Artists run a free weekly Friday art / craft session, the 9to90 Creative Community.