Orange lily painting.

It’s been a funny old day today. This morning I had a real problems with a creative block – no ideas were forthcoming at all. So, I decided to take a shower and inspiration finally set in. I’ve been busy painting this afternoon but this is the only “finished” piece I have. I’m not quite sure whether it’s finished yet. There’s something niggling but I can’t decide what it is yet.

I’ve also been jotting down some other ideas for pictures whilst they were in my mind. I find it helps with days when the old “Artist’s block” sets in! Although it didn’t help today.

More Daffodils - contented artist?

So, another day another dollar! OK pound, I’m British! I’ve had another lax drawing day but what I have achieved has been more to my liking- better than yesterday’s efforts.

I might touch up the background in daylight. I might switch the picture as well as the flash makes it more blue than I thought it was. That’s the trouble painting in artificial light, the colours aren’t always as you expect. I used the velour paper again. It works really well.

Yellow Daffodils in the abstract form

Ever have one of those days when things seem promising, but in the end are a disappointment. Well, that sums up my artwork for the day. The picture I did yesterday hasn’t turned out as well as I’d like so I’ve tried working some pastels into it. It’s definitely better but there’s still no Wow factor yet. I’m going to post it and then leave it for a while, see if I’m inspired. This was supposed to be a lovely bunch of abstracted daffodils in a vase. Lovely isn’t quite the word I’m using yet, but we might get there!

I’ve played with pastels today, working on 2 pictures. One portrait of Siobhan, that’s going well but is going to be slow, she can’t sit for as long as I’d like, but it’s looking good! The other, of the daffodils again, is not going at all well!

Wednesday already, where did the week go?

What have I been doing? You know, I'm not sure! How come so long has passed without a post? Let's see. Saturday I went to the wonderful MK Printmakers it's a small place which is part of Artworks-MK On the way back I went shopping and did a littl sketch of the Christmas decoration on the table when I had coffee!Then the evening we had Christmas tree lighting up in the village. Dominic went to a frineds for a sleepover so we had a "Grown up" evening!
On Sunday I battled with my biography for the Buckingham Arts trail trial. (That looks so weird!)
On Monday I had a sick child - lots of sitting cuddling- but I was able to looks trhough some new books I've just bought. I was able to select 3 pictures and email those with the biography to the lady coordinating the trial. Here's hoping.
Tuesday - shopping and housework, yuk. Had a meeting with a client about the ongoing caricature, and finally picked up a paintbrush.
Now, I'm off to paint.

I'm getting the hang of this

I did it! The live caricaturing went well. I could do with speeding up but I wasn't nearly as nervous this time! As last time, things were slow initialy but then they desended! I even enjoyed myself so maybe I'll be doing more. I must work out some stock body poses though! Practice, practice!

Today I decided to paint lilies. This is my second attempt in pastel on velour paper, a first for me. (Before you ask it is technically painting, although that still puzzles me!) It's an interesting surface to work with and doesn't smudge like regular paper.

Another productive day

I've had a lovely day - oh help I sound like a mediocre postcard! Stop it now!

Inspired by some flowers purchased on Saturday, this abstract came into being. It positively grew on the page. The photograph isn't too good, the flash has reacted with the iridescent finish, so the detail is a little lost. Night time photography is always a little fraught! Might have to redo and change tomorrow.

So, without final ado,

may I present you with a bunch of flowers, Chrysanthemums, to be precise!

I've got to spend some time completing application forms. It's nearly time to do the BAFA competition. I printed them off last night. Only when I removed them from the printer did I realise I'd printed them at 68% actual size. Fine if you're a chipmunk, but a little small for me. They are now restored to their proper size. and awaiting by scribblings. I've still to decide about the third entry. I have an idea I'm working on which might be ready in time, but I need to act fast and I'm still working out some compositional issues.

Lily

Nearly finished the latest caricature, but I will have to wait before I can post it at the client is not going to see the recipient for a while!

Between toilet training and unexpected visitors and reading I've not done anything else so here is another of the abstracts I finished on Monday. I wasn't going to post it but after some positive feedback from my friend this afternoon I decided I'd go for it!

I've bought a fabulous book recently called "An illustrated life" by Danny Gregory. I've been looking for some guidance on sketchbooks for ages and found this. Wish I'd seen it when I was doing my A levels. Hang on, there wasn't anything like it when I was doing A levels. There's a sore point. It's been slowly dawning on me that my A level art teacher was right. Practice is the "grammar" of the subject of Art. However I wasn't ready to take his advice such was my annoyance with the man. I'll have to be careful or I might be sounding regretful of missed opportunities, can't have that. Off to practice and then bed!

Cruising eventually

We started heading towards Oxford on the Oxford canal today, actually Andrew did a few weeks ago but we joined in as a family today! There was a fair bit of ferrying around before we got cars in correct locations and all safely aboard. I managed one, quick drawing, some flowers at the garden centre! I might get them posted, depending on 3G connection. If not they will appear on my return! Like so!

More mono print

Today was odd, I got distracted by trivia. Plodding on with the painting but distractions kept interfering. This is one of the mono prints from Saturday. The quality of the image is poor as it was photographed in poor light. I'll replace the picture with a scanned image once it is dry enough! That's a few days away yet.

Roses

After the bad news on Saturday I bought some flowers to cheer myself up, roses to be precise. They are such a lovely colour I've been itching to do something with them, and here is the result. A sort of semi abstract drawing using the specific colours. I wasn't too happy with it at first but as the day has progressed it's grown on me.

The children are at home so portraits have been a little thin on the ground, feeling more abstract inspired!