New paintings and regular art updates.
They say when one door closes another one opens. I’ve now got some of my work at Etruria Industrial Museum. I’m so pleased. It’s for three months and then it will be changed. I do hope I can sell some work. I have done so many paintings over the years. I will have to donate them to charity at this rate!
Feeling a bit less stressed. I’ve got my report in with a day to spare! Gives me time to try and solve another problem tomorrow! If only life was easy. I think I’m going to have another sleepless night while I worry about that. Then next I’ve got to finish putting my Illustration portfolio together. I have almost a month so time to do some more experiments and trials. I want to write some limericks for it too!
I went to our Art Group today. It was good to kick-start myself back into painting again. Struggled a bit because of my shaking arm. I’m like a wobbly jelly.
It was going to be a different painting, but when I got to the venue there was no WiFi available so I couldn’t find the reference photo I wanted to work from. This painting took about three hours so far. I’ve got to work out the reflections and the sky.
Image from an edition of The Yellow Book by Aubrey Beardsley. I’m drawing images with strong black and white areas for my report and portfolio. I admire Beardsleys skill with lines and curves. Everything is slightly exaggerated. The blocks of black and white are so strong. But there is a delicacy with the details. It’s so neat and precise. I can’t remember if this is art nouveau?
St Michael slaying a dragon type demon. I’m looking at the history of dragon images and illustrations as part of my college course. I was writing about the symbology and semiotics of dragons at three am. My mind is a little boggled, but I think I’m getting on top of it. Only a few thousand words to go. I definitely think blogging has helped my writing skills. Plus as I suffer insomnia it helps keep me occupied when I can’t sleep.
Such strange creatures
Monsters of myth
Seen in the morning
In the valley in a mist.
Draco, dragon, leather winged
Sharp of teeth
It’s head fringed
With scales or feathers
Glistening claws
How ugly they are
With ferocious Jaws!
Detail of a dragon wounded by St George. Held on a line by a Princess it had captured. In this oil on canvas by Paolo Uccello, painted around 1460, the dragon, a mythical beast has been challenged after capturing a towns people including the Kings daughter.
As I’m doing my report I am noticing different things. In this case, the dragon only has two legs, and its leathery wings have white circles on them like a butterfly or moth. The long curling tail seems to balance its head and body. This dragon is more birdlike than serpentine. It could also resemble a dinosaur, perhaps a pterodactyl even though Uccello would probably not have seen fossilised bones. But in one of those strange coincidences this could be a type of evolution. An artist expressing a current idea that will eventually change to more modern forms of dragon.
You know the feeling, an egg timer or a circle twirling. The second hand of a clock ticks..too..slowly…
Life nowadays is frenetic. Be There Now! See this Ad! Watch this Vid! Even our phrases are shortened to cram more information in. Life begins to make your head spin. And if you don’t keep up? You get left behind. There is a current advert on the TV (television) with someone attacking and smashing their router because their broadband is too slow. Do you remember Dial Up Modems? Whir whir diddle diddle, a strange tune to listen to as the modem selected the digits of the Internet service provider?At least thats what I imagined it was doing. When if you got ten emails in a day you were overwhelmed. Now? thats nothing. We are superglued to our screens.. (not really).
Before that. Dial up phones with a circular dial that you had to turn to get the numbers dialled. 0 took ages as your finger was placed in the 0 hole and then you pushed the dial round till it reached the bit that actuated the number…hard to explain to you youngsters out there.
Seriously.
LET GO OF YOUR MOUSE OR EQUIVALENT.
GO OUTSIDE
LOOK AT THE SKY, OR A TREE…
SEE?
You can survive without it!
Mural at Fenton Town Hall by an unknown artist. It is painted in tiny squares (like pixels) and based on a plate design of an oak tree, cottages and a tumble down fence. I’ve seen it before about two years ago. Now it’s much more complete. It’s a huge picture. Very interesting and beautiful.
I had been told by staff there that it had been painted by a particular artist. I’m afraid that was not true and I’m happy to set the matter straight and confirm it was not painted by her.
I can’t find the photo of a finished painting. It had more detail on the wooden supports between the panes of glass. The paint was peeling off and chipped and that’s what attracted me to the image. I’m the final version you can see me and my phone reflected in the surface. It’s an image of the Spode factory site. Stoke on Trent, Staffordshire.
Mallaband-Brown