Back To Basics

I’ve been trying to push out of my comfort zone at Life Drawing group for a while now. Last night I pulled out a piece of very heavy and textured hand-made paper, a bit bigger than A4, that I’d prepared with acrylic gesso overlaid, when dry, with compressed charcoal and then sealed with spray fixative.Continue reading “Back To Basics”

Cake And Foreshortening

So this evening I took myself off to life drawing at Swansea Print Workshop, bearing an abundance of cakes for our tea break. How civilised is that? I did a couple of sketches in oil bars that I was quite pleased with, then we had this pose to finish up with after tea and cake.Continue reading “Cake And Foreshortening”

Tatts And Transparencies

I’m preparing a whole new set of photopolymer plate intaglios. I’ve chosen the sketches I want to make plates of, mostly from my sketchbooks and now I’m drawing them onto small (A6) transparencies. These two here are onto Mark Resist. It’s considerably cheaper than TruGrain and more stable than tracing parchment, especially with wet media.Continue reading “Tatts And Transparencies”

Oily Scribbling

I went out of my comfort zone again tonight at life drawing and used my new yellow ochre oil bar to lay a scribbled base on top of an A3 card I’d prepared with 2 coats of acrylic gesso. I’d normally work with very fine pens, doing lots of linear detail. I prefer oilbars toContinue reading “Oily Scribbling”

Tired And Manky

I spent the afternoon at Swansea Print Workshop, editioning a photopolymer intaglio plate. First I cut 15 pieces of BFK Rives 250gsm paper and put them to soak in clean water. I set up my workspace around the hotplate that I preheated and put some Intaglio Printmaker’s drypoint shop mix oil-based ink in black ontoContinue reading “Tired And Manky”

Renaissance Head

Just got back from life drawing at Swansea Print Workshop. Filthy night, really cold, pouring rain and blowing a gale……and today’s the first day of Spring. Joke! Anyway, our model is great to draw, he has a very Renaissance head and excellent muscle and bone definition. I previously used up some offcuts of mount (matte)Continue reading “Renaissance Head”

Bits And Pieces

It’s tempting to try and do a complete drawing during the weekly Life Drawing sessions as I use so many of these sketches to develop into monotypes and mixed media pieces. But I also want to use the time to practice my craft and sometimes I focus on different parts of the model rather thanContinue reading “Bits And Pieces”

Cat ‘n’ Cheeses

I spent a busy morning at the print workshop, making a small edition from a photopolymer intaglio plate for the excellent Leftovers IV. It’s a little portrait of Sparta Puss, my furry feline felon. When I got back, I settled into my comfy chair with a modest cheese sandwich and a mug of tea forContinue reading “Cat ‘n’ Cheeses”

Culling!

Life drawing at Swansea Print Workshop tonight and I scribbled over a drawing I did a while back that hadn’t worked out. I used to be much more precious about my drawings and have portfolios stuffed full of them, waiting for a cull. But the last couple of years I’ve been ruthless. I’m using topContinue reading “Culling!”

Luscious Leftovers

Had a full day at Swansea Print Workshop running a session on making miniature prints, to encourage artists to enter the Leftovers IV print exchange organised by the fabulous Wingtip Press in Boise, Idaho, USA. We’ve been saving our scraps of leftover papers – gorgeous, luscious printmaking papers. I demonstrated two techniques: block (relief) printingContinue reading “Luscious Leftovers”