Time to learn and have some fun....

The friendly and inspiring Tam from Willowing.ning has created a free paint class called ‘The Heart of Art’ which I have just joined. Normally she charges for her workshops, but she has offered this free to anyone, and at the last count, 865 people have signed up – that is amazing!

It’s not the usual type of art I do, but at the moment I am trying out all different methods and mediums to see if I can find my style. So I am looking forward to being crafty, arty, sewing again and trying something new.

The class starts on Monday 18th (oooh tomorrow!!) and runs for 4 weeks.

I will post up my attempts here, and thank you Tam for being so generous. It is true what they say, by giving to others you receive back tenfold, so you will absolutely flourish!

Have a great Sunday everyone....I'm off to take up another creative challenge - post to follow soon! x

A haven of tranquility

I am fortunate enough to have a place where I can be creative...an area I can store my paints and paper and set to when the mood presents. After not having such a space for years, I fully appreciate it. But my, wouldn’t it be lovely to have one of these......

Above - centralhi.com

Below - from Housemartin blog

Above - www.channel4.com

A mature garden, a room with lots of light and a beautiful environment to let your creativity flow.......

Sounds perfect!

Have a great weekend!

Helen

The fourth one...

A while ago I blogged about producing 4 paintings in a month....I did achieve this (yay!) but the time after has been so busy that I haven't been able to blog about it. So here it is...

I decided to continue using the same scene and this time drew a rough outline of the buildings in pastel, in a colour similar to the colour of the pastel paper.

I then started blocking in the various colours to build up the picture.
I then started to add more details, correcting the lines, adding windows and some shadows.
This painting didn't take long, I would say an hour tops, but it was fun to do.

Looking at it now, there are things I would change, but that is what painting is all about - by doing you learn more than any video or book can teach.....

Have a great day!

Helen

Three out of four aint bad....

In my last blog entry I mentioned that I wanted to do one painting a week, for four weeks. Am I on track. Well kind of. One isn’t quite a painting, but more of a sketch, but illness, and having a bit of a social life got in the way.

So far I have completed three out of the four pictures and just have one more to do, which I don’t think is that bad going.

I started off painting a version of a St Ives scene, although my artistic licence meant that I opted not to put in a few buildings. I then decided that all of my pictures would be of the same scene. I find it quite interesting to paint the same scene using different materials and mediums as it not only helps me familiarise with it, but I like to see how using different mediums changes my style.

The first painting was on canvas and painted using acrylics. I primed over an old painting I didn’t like – this is well worth doing, as canvas’s can be expensive. Then I sketched out in yellow ochre the outlines of the buildings.

I selected my palette of muted colours and set to work. Here’s the result.






My second painting was created on arches watercolour paper and collage, acrylic inks and acrylic paint was used.

I tore up some handmade paper and stuck this on to the watercolour paper using Golden Gel Medium. I then started to drip inks over the canvas, using a misting spray to help the paint merge on the paper. This gets quite messy so it’s best to put down some plastic sheeting or newspaper if you don’t want your worktop to get stained.

I then dipped card into paint to create the outline of the buildings and started to build up the picture. For the beach I used a texture medium and once dry I painted over it and dripped inks and sprayed water.

I will say out of all three paintings I had the most fun with this.

The final picture was drawn using a fountain pen and Quink on cartridge paper. I then used water to give it some tone. This is great fun to do and because I didn’t draw the picture first, it really makes you concentrate on the lines. I made some mistakes but as far as I am concerned, it all adds to the picture.

My final painting in the series may well be done with pastels....I’m not sure yet!

Painting challenge

There seems to be a theme of late for people posting a picture a day on a blog or website, whether it’s a photograph or a painting. At the moment I am a member of a group in Flickr where I post a photograph a day. I am almost 7 months in and it really has been quite a challenge. Some days I find it easy as a subject will just leap out at me or other times it’s late in the day and I haven’t taken a shot! However, it’s good fun and it is really improving my photography skills, even if lately my camera has been my iPhone.

As my creative focus leans towards art I would love to be able to create a painting a day, like these brilliant artists:

Marianne Bland
Karen Werner
Lisa Daria

However, I think that it may be too much of a challenge to take on, especially as I am already taking a photograph a day. So I have decided that I will do a painting a week for the next 4 weeks, starting from now (set’s stopwatch!!!)

So watch this space.......

Ooh an update....

Painted a bit more to it, but will leave it for a while until I can work out the next stage.

A creative day...

I had a super creative day yesterday. In the afternoon I spent some time doing a sketch of a lock on a cemetery gate. It was from a photo I took when Jim and I went to Cornwall. I really want to do more sketching as it improves drawing skills so much, so this is just the start of filling my little sketchbook.

Then in the evening I wanted to carry on with a mixed media collage painting I had started quite a while ago, but I couldn’t find it.....I did however find a painting of a flower that I had started some time ago which I wasn’t pleased with. So I decided to give that a bash and see how it came out. Still not totally pleased with it.

Before: After:

I then carried on working on my latest project. I have been looking at the work of Escher and am creating a series of paintings based on his work. I recently finished my version of Goriano Sicoli, Abruzzi and I am currently working on Town in Southern Italy.

My version of Goriano Sicoli, Abruzzi:

Here are the first stages of the second painting in the series (Town in Southern Italy). Not sure where I am going with this as I have left a lot out of the original picture but I wanted to get some colour on it before I made a decision.

Have a creative week!!!