It’s #Caturday Saturday again and here’s a picture from nine years ago, before Sparta Puss became an only cat. The little fluff ball on the right is the late, great Little Ming, a one-eyed Naughty Tortie rescue cat with heaps of Tortitude. Ming died about 4 years ago, at a ripe old age. I’ve put the photo of these two little furry angels through an Adobe Photoshop Poster Edges filter.
Did a bit more work on this painting of siblings in my family today. I find that it’s so much easier to work from a photograph upside down, which is liberating because it ceases to be representational, everything becomes shapes, colours, tones and lines.
I am a lifelong union member, for over four decades, and I went to a demonstration in Castle Square in Swansea in support of those on strike today. Of course, I had to have a scribble. Here’s some of the members from the Public and Commercial Services Union, grouped around their flags.
I drew into my A5 leather-bound sketchbook with a ballpoint pen. I love ballpoints, I know they’re not fancy schmancy but I really like the way that the nib glides so effortlessly over the paper giving me the type of scribble I want.
I spent the afternoon down at Swansea Print Workshop today, doing some fabric printing. It’s rare for me – I’m a paper fiend – but this is for something very specific. I’m printing onto some items of clothing with one of my little Mari Lwyd linocuts.
Husb and I went out for a walk yesterday afternoon, it was sparkling sunshine but also very cold so we called in at a new café in the old Observatory on the promenade, overlooking Swansea Beach. A lovely place in a gorgeous setting. And toasty warm. Of course, I had to have a scribble.
I used a ballpoint pen and a continuous line method into my A5 leather bound sketchbook. I like using continuous line because everything connects up as I’m drawing, so it’s easier to get things in the right place and get the right proportions.
Here’s Maen Bradwen, or Carreg Bica on Mynydd Drummau Mountain in Neath Port Talbot. It’s a massive stone and local legend has it that it bathes in the River Neath / Afon Nedd on Easter morning. I did this while I was travelling around South Wales with filmmaker Melvyn Williams and prehistorian Dewi Bowen while he was researching material for his latest book.
I worked onto stretched Fabriano paper (240gsm) that I’d prepared with textured gesso and compressed charcoal, and used Daler Rowney soft pastels and Conté Crayons in sanguine, black and white, outside in the field.
It’s a pretty hefty stone and it’s been incorporated into a fence and wrapped in barbed wire and stands on a well-used unmade road up the mountain.
It’s Saturday #Caturday again! Sparta Puss jumped onto the table opposite me the other day and sat in front of a vase of tulips I treated myself to. They’re in that falling-over stage and when she sat down, she was framed beautifully by their purple flowers in front of olive green curtains. A happy accident. I grabbed my phone and snapped a photo. Then I had a play in Adobe Photoshop, the cutout filter. I like Photoshop, it’s fun.
I started this painting a couple of months ago (here), working on top of a recycled canvas. I’m working upside down from a photo as I don’t see the subject clearly any more, just colours, shapes and lines, that I find easier to place accurately. It’s still pretty rough but I can see it starting to take shape.
The photo was taken on Swansea Beach last summer, after dark when we sat around a driftwood fire, occasionally paddling in the bioluminescence in the sea. It features two siblings, a brother and sister in the firelight.
I started this painting a couple of months ago (here), working on top of a canvas I’d recycled because I didn’t like the previous painting. Because of that, it’s quite heavily textured, which is something new for me. I’m used to working on paper, drawing and printmaking, or new stretched canvas for painting, much smoother surfaces.
I’m working from a photograph, taken at night of two siblings by a campfire, and I find the best way to get an accurate likeness is to turn the photo and the canvas upside down. It works for me. I’m blocking in the main areas of colour at this stage, blobs really, and putting in roughly where the two figures are.
Here’s the last sketch I did at the “Cost of Living Crisis” rally in Aberdare last weekend. The old church had beautifully made Union banners around the walls. The seating was very cramped so I couldn’t move around much to see and draw, but this lovely one, from the Welsh Fire Brigades Union, was near me, so I scribbled it. There were a couple of people in the mezzanine above it, which helped to put it in context and show the scale of the banner.
scribblah 