Author: artbychristinemallabandbrown

I'm an artist based at the Spode factory site in Stoke on Trent. I paint, draw and create digital art. Contact me at mallabandbrown@aol.com

Planning

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Now’s the time to order our hanging baskets for the year. The lady that puts them together asks me what colours I would like. Usually I don’t specify what theme I want but I’m definitely going for a rainbow theme this year. I think because there are so many different flowers and shapes and colours that would really brighten the yard. Last year was mainly red white and green so I bought in other flowers to broaden the spectrum.

Going out of the back door and seeing all this colour lifts my spirits. I usually order them and then collect them 6 to 8 weeks later. It’s a bit expensive but I have never been able to grow baskets as beautiful as hers. The summer arrives and I bring the baskets home. Then we have a riot of colour until late Autumn.

A struggle

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What are your morning rituals? What does the first hour of your day look like?

Get up and make a brew so I can take my medication. Have a wash. Feed the cats, make breakfast, eat it, stick porridge bowl in the sink to soak. Clean teeth, put on clothes, struggle with that because my arm shakes and my balance is bad and its difficult with a frozen shoulder. Struggle to pull on my shoes, sit down in my chair and probably go back to sleep for a bit. Put the radio on to a talk station. Try and decide what I need to do, start watching daytime TV to avoid the world for another day!

Sounds really boring! I don’t really have rituals, my mornings are quite mundane.

Spectra

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Spectrum on a silver/purple cushion and a pink blanket. Digitally manipulated to add symmetry and then twist and move the plain of the picture. I’d like to draw over this to try and create a butterfly shape, but I need to learn a bit more about the new app I am using. I love the rainbow colours cast by a glass crystal in a mobile I have hanging in my window. The different cloths moderate the colours and one is more sparkly than the other in the original photo. (Not shown here).

Childhood memory

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I used to climb up the sides of an old slide like this not the steps to get to the top. These was tarmac underneath that I could have fallen down onto, but I didn’t. Goodness knows why I did it. I also used to hang upside down from the top bar of the swings. I would climb up via the three legs holding up one end and then climb over. I don’t know why I stopped, maybe I was told it was not a thing girls did!

At the end of term at school we used to play pirates in the gym. They would pull the wall bars out and lock them in place and there were three or four ropes hanging down from the ceiling. The challenge of pirates was to play three dimensional tag. I would climb up the bars or a rope and if anyone tried to get me I would reach over and climb onto the next rope! I often was the last person standing (or hanging!)

Photo courtesy of a friend, hope that’s OK?

Sunset

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Sunset was Sundays #bandofsketchers prompt. As we arrived at our holiday destination one summer I was amazed to see what appeared to be a tall beam of sunshine above the setting sun. I found out later that it was a sun pillar. I think its a phenomenon where sunlight reflects off ice crystals in the sky? A bit like sun dogs. Can’t find the photo to work off so tried to remember it…

A hard definition…

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Which aspects do you think makes a person unique?

What flame or glimmer of character makes a person unique? I guess everyone has their own foibles, that could be size or shape, colour or religion or none of the above. If identical twins can have their own thoughts and ideas then everyone has the ability to be unique if they are allowed to be.

Most of all I think it is in the mind that the unique aspect lies, nature versus nurture is the phrase that people use, but life is chaotic, it twists and turns, there may really be a multiverse out there where every step in one direction or another changes the outcome of a person’s life, but some of it has to be down to how they think and react? How else can you explain the diametrically opposite results that can occur in families, or how sometimes similarities between non related people happen? All I can say is its good to be unique!

Sketch set

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Went for a meal out at Sawadee Thai taste in Stoke tonight. While we were there I decided to sketch us. I had to imagine my self portrait, and they are all a bit scruffy as I just drew on a bit of old card I had in my bag, each sketch took a couple of minutes. Apple is the Thai lady that runs the restaurant.

The food was delicious, we had red curry with sticky rice and some pad Thai noodles. Not expensive and good company.

Jupiter in a spin

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I’m getting used to a new collage app. Learning all the new plot twists (I mean the tools in it). The main irritation are the in app ads. Get used to it, I won’t upgrade and I won’t buy anything. I am app resistant!

This was a photo of the South Pole of Jupiter that I painted and decided to turn into a symmetrical collage. Matching up the pattern was difficult because it wasn’t similar along the edges, but I did my best.