Tag Archives: earth pigments

Dribbling Bideford Black.

I had a little bit left of the Bideford Black paint I made recently. It wasn’t a lot so I tried thinning it down with water and took a fairly wide, flat brush to make stripes across one of the sheets of paper I’d prepared with gesso and walnut ink. The Bideford Black wash broke up on the surfaceContinue reading “Dribbling Bideford Black.”

Surrealist Swirls.

I used the Bideford Black paint I made yesterday. I didn’t have any idea what to do. I’m trying to get away from always working representationally and letting my imagination take over. It’s way out of my comfort zone! I took a fairly wide, flat brush and made swirls over one of the sheets ofContinue reading “Surrealist Swirls.”

Bashing Bideford Black.

After coating some sheets of paper with my home-made walnut ink yesterday, I decided to stay with natural pigments and make paint with some lumps of Bideford Black I’ve had lurking in a box for years. I’d made paint with it before, using water (here). This time I mixed it with Nori paste and vodka.Continue reading “Bashing Bideford Black.”

Yellow Stone Blue Sheep

  Husb and I had a couple of days away in mid-Wales and drove back along the old unnamed road between Trecastell and Tafarn-y-Garreg in the Brecon Beacons where we stopped near the source of the River Tawe. We only had time for a short walk so we followed a dry stream bed down theContinue reading “Yellow Stone Blue Sheep”

My Geographic Palette #5 – Australian Ochre

This Australian Ochre is the fifth pigment I’m trying out from my geographic palette – plants and minerals from different places that I’m converting into paint and/or ink. I’m using them to develop work that I’m doing with Swansea University’s FIRE Lab project, which brings together science and the arts to do research and engagementContinue reading “My Geographic Palette #5 – Australian Ochre”

My Geographic Palette #4 – Graphite

The next one out of my geographic palette is graphite, a slightly greasy, slightly soluble solid black pigment and mineral found in The Lake District near Keswick, which is where I bought some nice chunky sticks of it and a whole load of top-quality graphite pencils. Not far from Keswick, at Seathwaite, is an oldContinue reading “My Geographic Palette #4 – Graphite”

My Geographic Palette #3 – Walnut Ink

  About 3 or 4 years now some friends gave me a bag of fresh walnuts – that’s walnut fruit – the nut is in the centre of an apple sized green fruit. I made my own walnut ink from them, please click here if you want to see the technique I used.    Continue reading “My Geographic Palette #3 – Walnut Ink”

My Geographic Palette #2 – Bideford Black

  So, day 2 of drawing from my geographic palette. This is Bideford Black, an unique oily carbon-based pigment from North Devon, where is sits in the ground next to anthracite coal. It was mined for about 200 years up until the late 1960s but lost out to cheaper competitors and the mines closed. IContinue reading “My Geographic Palette #2 – Bideford Black”

My Geographic Palette #1 – Charcoal

  This is my first tryout with my geographic palette, a drawing based on a sketch I did en plein air on a field trip with colleagues from Swansea University’s FIRE Lab a couple of months ago when we went off exploring culverts up in the Brecon Beacons.   The charcoal I bought a fewContinue reading “My Geographic Palette #1 – Charcoal”