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.”

#StandingStoneSunday

It’s #StandingStoneSunday and here’s one I did earlier lol 😀 It’s a stone that lives in a small community on the North-East fringe of Swansea, in Bonymaen. The Welsh name of the area means the “base of the stone” and there’s a legend that it’s one end of a vast stone that travels under theContinue reading “#StandingStoneSunday”

A Simple Still-Life: A “How To” Film.

Here’s a short (2 minute) “How To” film from a recent session I ran at GS Artists in Swansea, as part of their 9to90 Community Arts programme. It was a simple still-life in acrylic paints. The film shows how I started with a couple of basic drawing techniques and then took a look at some examples of still-life paintings ofContinue reading “A Simple Still-Life: A “How To” Film.”

Charcoal Drawing: A “How To” Film.

Here’s a short “How To” film from a recent drawing session I ran at GS Artists in Swansea, as part of their 9to90 Community Arts programme. We did HUGE charcoal drawings onto big rolls of paper on the wall and the film shows all the mark-making we did. It was MESSY 😀 Here’s the filmContinue reading “Charcoal Drawing: A “How To” Film.”

WTAF? Revisited.

A couple of weeks ago I had a session on the Columbian Press at Swansea Print Workshop, using some antique and vintage wooden Letterpress. It didn’t work out too well, the letters were very dirty with a build up of ink and gunge over many years. I cleaned them up with vegetable oil and fineContinue reading “WTAF? Revisited.”

More Big And Messy.

Here are a couple more paintings done by participants at GS Artists in Swansea, as part of their excellent 9to90 Community Arts programme. We did BIG and MESSY acrylic paintings with tennis-themed life size figures. Paint was applied with sponges, bath scrunchies and occasionally even big paint brushes.

Big And Messy!

I did some teaching this week, with a group of adults at GS Artists in Swansea as part of their excellent 9to90 Community Arts programme. We did BIG acrylic paintings with life size figures and a tennis theme for Summer. And it was MESSY! Loved it! I started out by getting people to draw around each others bodies toContinue reading “Big And Messy!”

A Rub-Down With Wire Wool.

I spent the afternoon at Swansea Print Workshop, practising with letterpress again. After last weeks big fail, I went back to an acronym. The type is old, wooden, vintage and some possibly antique and I’m not familiar enough with it yet to be able to tell what condition it’s in until I’ve printed it. ThisContinue reading “A Rub-Down With Wire Wool.”

Epic Fail!

Sometimes things go wrong and I had an epic fail a few days ago when I was working on a new Letterpress piece at Swansea Print Workshop. I spent ages setting up the type, I really liked how it looked in its wooden state so I inked it up with a rainbow roll, using CranfiedContinue reading “Epic Fail!”