New paintings and regular art updates.
Recently found on my phone, photo taken a few years ago.
One of my murals from the Leopard Hotel in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, it burnt down a couple of years ago. Portrait of Walter a regular there.. Mural, emulsion on lining paper. I had to paint it a few feet up the wall, the paintings were painted within a frame attached directly to the wall. I just noticed his hands are too small!
How to start a painting working from a blank canvas. I suggested they could start by changing the colour of the canvas. That will give you feel for how the paint goes on. Think about whether you want the canvas upright (portrait) lf on its side (landscape). You could do a gradient of colour or greys so it’s lighter towards the top or one side. Try and think of a simple subject to start. How are your drawing skills and do you want realism or an abstract subject. Most of all – enjoy!
Molly, a portrait of a woman called Molly Leigh who may have been a witch, she lived in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent. It’s the second painting I’m putting in the Brampton museum and art gallery in Newcastle under Lyme. It’s another acrylic on canvas. Included in the front window of the museum with the Orme Art Group Exhibition.
It will be for sale. I need to let my paintings go to new homes. I want them to go where they are appreciated and will be seen. I realise that as I get older I am holding on to a lot of things that could be better elsewhere. I don’t want an empty space but I’m running out of wall space.
A strange little window at Spode Works. It’s the only one I’ve seen on the site. I love the way the bricks are built in a circle. A little porthole in the side of an old factory in Stoke on Trent. I love quirky things.
This is an acrylic on canvas. Our Orme Art Group is having a small exhibition in front window of the Brampton museum and art gallery in Newcastle under Lyme in Staffordshire. This is one of two paintings I’m exhibiting. It’s on from next week I think. I might not be able to get along to it as I’m having another cataract operation in a few weeks.
Bad photo of my old cat jumping before we moved house. It’s blurry with my camera shaking Parkinsons hands.
I used to walk around with her purring, draped round my shoulders. She would follow me everywhere. Once when I walked into a friend’s bungalow via the back door she sat by the door for ages, I’d come out of the front door and my friend had found her waiting for me!
She would jump across from one gatepost to the other when I tapped the wall. I got several photos of her doing this and used them as the reference for the painting. I actually won a small prize in a local exhibition for this painting.
A little exhibition is coming up in September and I am not sure what, if anything, I can paint. My vision is quite odd now, a bit doubled, a bit blurred.
I’m thinking of possibly painting cats. Just some simple and gentle and nice! With a bit of character. Not a generic cat… Not a pretty cat, a growl tiger, curmugeonly, interesting cat… I don’t know, golden eyes? But first I need to fish some paints out!
Describe your life in an alternate universe.
I would be happy and healthy.
Another reality, another world, options widen out. I changed my lifestyle and health. A small butterfly flicks it’s wing in 1974 causing an earth tremor in ’89. No cycling at night, no accident. No drinking late into the night in my 20s, no regrets.
Take a job drawing canal landscapes in a different city. Stop being afraid to do more art, maybe I should have not done a long term job over many years that increased my stress levels?
Some of this happened, some didn’t, it depends what reality I have my feet in? Doc Martins and a punk lifestyle, low heels and a suit, multicoloured, paint splattered happiness?
Yes, changing my mental and physical health would have been my choice.
Us together. portrait of hubby 2017, me self portrait 2020. The small portrait is also him a few years ago. Acrylic on canvas. I always intended them to hang together, just decided it was time.
Top painting by Theodore Gericault of a French peasant woman. I used it to base my picture on. The bottom painting is my portrait of Molly Leigh. I know mine is a bit rough round the edges, but I wanted her to look wise with a glint in her eye. I hope now I’m getting my sight sorted out things will improve. I will try and keep posting here but I may have to be careful how much I do.
My portrait of Molly Leigh the Burslem Witch. Painted after my mural of her at the Leopard Hotel in Burslem burnt down a couple of years ago. Acrylic on canvas.
It was used as a prop in the Who is Molly Leigh? opera that was on last week. I was so proud and excited to be able to display it in public. I like creating narrative pieces of art as well as portrait so of people which I would say is my speciality. I’d like to poss create further portraits of Stoke-on-Trent famous people… Just a thought.
Mallaband-Brown