Playing With New Toy.

My new toy came through the post today, a box of Caran d’Ache Neo-Pastel colours. For a long time now I’ve been following the blog of USA based artist Aletha Kuschan and I’ve been so impressed by her work, particularly her lovely vibrant pastel drawings. She kindly told me what she used for them. SoContinue reading “Playing With New Toy.”

Done At Last.

I’ve finished my painting of two siblings on the beach at night watching the bioluminescence. It’s been a long haul. I don’t often work from photographs and I don’t find it easy, I prefer to work from life, but this was a good exercise. I did a lot of the painting upside down – theContinue reading “Done At Last.”

Tiniest Tweaks….

I’ve almost finished this painting of two siblings on Swansea Beach in the dark last summer. We went to see the bioluminescence in the bay and sat around a driftwood fire for a while, watching the stars. It was lovely. I took some photos and the painting is from one of those – many ofContinue reading “Tiniest Tweaks….”

Emerging ….

I started this painting a while back, from a photograph of two grown-up siblings on the beach back in the summer with a driftwood fire. It’s taken lots of layers of paint, doing a bit of work and then returning to it, again and again, the siblings emerging more and more with each layer ofContinue reading “Emerging ….”

Painting Upside Down 3

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.

Going Psychedelic!

I’ve swirled a final watery paint layer onto my two girls – this time in Pthalo Blue (red shade) from Liquitex, tipping the canvas so the paint ran across randomly. I dabbed at parts with a paper kitchen towel to reveal the yellows, reds and oranges beneath and threw more rice onto it, forming aContinue reading “Going Psychedelic!”

Layering Transparency.

After laying down a translucent ground of Indian Yellow acrylic paint (Liquitex Heavy Body), I brushed some watered down transparent Naphthol Red (a hot, bright red) and tipped the canvas so it formed runs and drips across the yellow areas. As an experiment I threw some grains of rice across it to see what wouldContinue reading “Layering Transparency.”