Where I live,
Who I am,
What I do,
How I think,
Where I work,
My companion,
What I trained as,
My books,
My life,
My I.
My me!
Tag: Canvas
Owl
A year ago I was painting this owl. I was working towards a couple of craft fairs, including one at Endon Well dressing. Now things are quiet and I just don’t have the motivation to paint, although I am doing drawings every day. I just can’t be bothered to faff about getting my paints out and I need some canvases, I shall have to buy some more.
Today I’m taking stock
Mid way through our thirty day challenge in Urban Sketchers Stoke-on-Trent. The subject was ‘taking stock’.
In front of me on the floor is a lovely carrier my friend sent me for Christmas. Its covered in decoupage pictures of me and my friend from years ago, and little cartoons drawn on top of the photos. The box contains all by little bottles of metallic acrylic paints, gold, silver, copper and bronze, but also metallic red, blue, green and brown. There is something nice about adding a bit of sparkle. In it too are packets of brushes, cheap but strong. Finally I have four or five tiny canvases on easle. They were going to be the centerpiece of my craft stall this spring. Instead they lie their forlorn, still wrapped in plastic, waiting for me to find inspiration in these bleak times.
I must paint and keep busy. But all my time is taken up by social media!
X
This was me.
Me at 18.
I have no idea where there paintings are now, but thus was me at 18. My work was part of a group exhibition for my foundation course in Art. Why did I have curly hair?
I think the picture I was holding was in watercolour or black quink ink? The top picture is my mirrored image, with desks in the background. I don’t have the article any more, it’s got lost in the mists of time. I posted this somewhere on line and kept a copy of it. I can’t say the exact date it was taken… How I wish I could go back to those days!
Calling these finished
Well, they are a bit random, but I think I’ve done enough to these. Added some highlights and shadows then silver and bronze colours. The first is now called puddle, like a stone dropped into water, the second is simply called autumn leaves. I might do some others like this but it’s knowing what to do and how to use the modelling medium.
Supplies
I’ve got a few tiny canvases in for the next lot of pictures for craft tairs I’m doing. I’m seriously thinking about doing some more seasonal scenes, or autumnal ones. I may use reflective or metallic colours on them to give them a different feel.
The problem with getting canvases is that I can’t always get the size I want, they are not always well made, and sometimes the wood is so hard it’s difficult to put screws into them to put mirror plates on them. Also a lot of laces just sell box canvases. They are OK but they are very deep, so they are hard to frame so you have to paint the edges to make them look neat.
These are only small but I paint on even smaller matchbox sizes. I will post more photos when they are painted.
Canvas
Value pack. When you are creating art it’s good to use quality paints but I don’t spend too much on canvas. I’m not being mean, the stretched canvases are serviceable. It’s just that I’m not made of money but I want to paint.
Plans for future pictures:
Green men and women,
Winter men and women (images within trees)
Astronomical objects from moons and planets to novae and Galaxies.
Animal and human portraits, perhaps integrated with nature.
Architecture.
As you can see I’m planning to use a lot of canvas…..
Been out most of today
A couple of friends visiting my exhibition at the Waiting room gallery today. I’ve spent most of the time sleep deprived because of my hubby waking me up in the middle of the night worrying about something, then the cats decided to break my favourite glass bowl. When I finally got a bit of sleep it was time to do things like running round trying to organise things including visiting the vets about our stray cat in the garden problem (has he got somewhere to live), getting organised about a performance next weekend in Newcastle-under-Lyme, visiting the shop to get snacks and drinks for my solo exhibition. (who knew no one seems to sell little bottles of beer anymore, they used to be all the rage? Then the main dual carriageway, to where the exhibition is, was coned off and closed to traffic! Got there a few minutes late feeling like a wet weekend in Whitby (which is actually beautiful before anyone asks). A few hours chatting to people about painting. Now to rest. Tomorrow is busy too!
Got to paint,
This was me in 2007. I might be helping to paint a mural again soon, but I also need to paint a picture of what Spode means to me. I’m not sure what to paint as I never worked in the factory and only know it as it is, I was blogging about that a couple of days ago. Well today I went out and got a largish canvas about two feet by two and a half feet. I’m thinking of finding some old cracked paint or dusty glass, maybe a reflection. I will go and take photos tomorrow. I want to add some metallic glints to whatever I do. I need to make plans…..
Experimenting
These are two small canvases that I worked on yesterday. I used a modelling medium on them to build up textures One had leaf shapes built up on it, and the other a spiral of shallow spikes.
I also bought some brusho. I’d never used it before. It’s a dust or fine crystals that you can either sprinkle on a wet or damp surface or sprinkle on dry and then add water. The colours change when you add water. For instance lemon yellow looks orange in the pot. You also only need to use tiny amounts. I ended up with a paper plate under the canvases to catch the drops. I tried to get the colours to surround the raised sections then used some acrylic colours to delineate the edges of the shapes.
I’ve left them with Etruria Artists at the warehouse to dry out.
