always an artist

Posted on March 31, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged Art, artist. drawing, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1891, Germany, head teacher, Memory, Painting, School, Thinking2 Comments

Daily writing prompt

When you were five, what did you want to be when you grew up?

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I always drew for as long as I can remember and I knew I wanted to be an artist. I stuck drawings up on my bedroom walls as I got older, i would copy pictures of Asterix the Gaul, or draw Elizabethan people with ruffs round their necks and wonderful clothing. When the walls got covered I strung string across my side of the bedroom and hung my drawings and paintings on with clothes pegs or sellotape. As I got better at art I was asked to do a painting for one of the deputy head teachers who was retiring. I remember painting portraits of some of my school mates as if they were in the school playground in clothes that would look very old fashioned now. Eventually one of my paintings got sent to a display of childrens art in our twin town in Germany. That was a big highlight of school life. Luckily I got to go to art college, and here I am, still doing art all these decades later!

Spooky Stonehenge

Posted on March 29, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged Art, Digital art, Digital drawing, Drawing, Salisbury Plain, silhouettes, Sketching, Spooky, Stonehenge2 Comments

I did a digital drawing of Stonehenge on Salisbury Plane ages ago and I’ve tried to add a misty, foggy, mysterious effect over the top of the original drawing. Because I drew it in layers, the image in the bottom layer shows the stones and this stayed in place so I could distort the upper two layers of black that I had added and then a blueish grey with a smudging tool. The overall effect is slightly spooky, I could imagine shadowy figures or spooky silhouettes detaching themselves from the stones and moving towards anyone visiting the ancient site. What ghosts of druids reside there?

Digital doodles

Posted on March 29, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged Art, Artrage oils, Design, Digital art, Digital drawing, Fun, Layout app, Pattern, Photodirector, Sketching3 Comments

Spring and flower themed digital doodles using ArtRage oils. Then edited in Photodirector for one of the four images and layout app to create symmetry for all four. Finally I stitched them together in layout and have published the variations on my Instagram account. I could imagine this as a woollen blanket.

Rose doodle

Posted on March 29, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged Art, Digitally manipulated, Drawing, Felt pens, Filtered, Life, Photodirector, Rose, SketchingLeave a comment

Gold felt pen doodle coloured in with more pens then filtered through photodirector. Made up of dashes, squiggles and dots. I do like playing with images. I tend to use the same filters quite frequently. I may try variations on a theme. I added the thorns afterwards. I decided to leave a white background rather than adding another colour to it. Felt pen sketch.

David

Posted on March 29, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged #bandofsketchers, Art, David, Drawing, Felt pens, Michealangelo, Renaissance, SketchingLeave a comment

Tuesdays #bandofsketchers prompt was renaissance. Since the statue of David by Michealangelo has been in the news lately I thought I would try and draw his head. I really need to get some new felt pens or fish my watercolour paints out of wherever they are hiding.

Digital drawing

Posted on March 28, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged Art, changed my life, conference, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1889, Digital drawing, Drawing, drawing tablet, Life, new skills, Sketching1 Comment

How has technology changed your job?

When I first started using technology in art it was at a conference and there was a stand with a digital drawing screen. It was a large flat screen with a stylus attached with a wire. There was a limited pallette and you drew by picking brush sizes and colours. I have always been an artist, but because it was a science based conference no one knew. I started drawing a horse I think and the people on the stand were surprised by what I could do. But I was hooked. As soon as I could get a small drawing tablet I did. I even had a digital drawing I printed off exhibited in a local Open Exhibition because it was not something they had seen before. Since then I’ve got bigger and better tablets, drawing with styluses attached with wires and then wireless ones. Now you can draw on a phone screen with your fingers. I’m glad I went to that conference.

Tears

Posted on March 27, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged Art, blubbed, Choir practice, Crying, emotional, Life, Music, Sad, SingingLeave a comment

I just came back from choir practice.

We were singing quite a sad song and suddenly things got a bit too much and I found tears in my eyes and rolling down my cheeks. I know I was tired, and my arm was hurting, but I’ve never really done that before. But I stood my ground I could have gone out of the room but I wanted to carry on singing, so I kept my head down, tried to dry my eyes, and kept going.

I’m glad people let me get on with it, I know I would have got even more upset if someone had come over to speak to me and really blubbed! Emotions, it’s bad how they can creep up on you.

Settled

Posted on March 27, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged #bandofsketchers, Art, Butterfly, Colourful, Daisies, Drawing, Felt pens, Life, Poppies, red admiral, SketchingLeave a comment

Red admiral? Settled on a poppy flower. Internet image, couldn’t find the author. Hope it was OK to base my drawing on it. Sundays #bandofsketchers prompt was Settled. Felt pens again. I loved getting the bright reds and greens, a really jazzy contrast of complimentary colours.

Next Saturday

Posted on March 26, 2023 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Acrylic on canvas, Art, Artisan sale, Drawing, Fine Art, Life, Orme Art group, Painting, Sketching, spring sale, Whitfield centreLeave a comment

Orme Art Group is having a Spring Artisan sale. There’s going to be a variety of stalls, from wire weaving, soft furnishing and painting and prints. I hope to be demonstrating minature painting, and selling some of my mini works. I also have a few glass necklaces for sale.

I don’t do craft fairs very often anymore, I went off them when covid was (still is) about and I’ve had to pluck up courage to do it again. I like space around me, not crowds, but this will be with friends so I should be OK.

The Whitfield Centre is a community centre and the people there are very friendly. I hope visitors will be impressed by the variety of work for sale and I hope we get a good attendance.

Thunderbolts and lightning!

Posted on March 26, 2023 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged Art, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1886, Drawing, Dream, Electricity, Exciting, lighter, Sketching, Thunder, Weather42 Comments

What is your favorite type of weather?

No thunderstorms in my sketch, just heavy rain. I have memories of several ⛈ thunderstorms though.

Years ago I dreamt of meeting some friends in a thunderstorm, a few days later we cycled over to visit our friends. We suddenly saw them coming towards us, we met up, pleased that we had got together. Then it started raining.. Hard! We ended up sheltering under a bus shelter while it thundered and lightning struck all around us.

Another incident was visiting a friend and a storm started a couple of miles away. We sat and watched it move across the sky while drinking red wine. As it passed over a beautiful rainbow appeared in the sky.

Finally during a particularly vicious night time storm I stood on our back doorstep trying to catch an image of lightning on my camera phone. I did, but I can’t find it on my phone to show you so I’ve posted this drawing instead. X

Mallaband-Brown

Tag: Art