New paintings and regular art updates.
I didn’t show photos of my hubby when he was alive, but here are a few of them that I painted over 40 years of us being together.
The exhibition is now going to be on next week aswell. I’m pleased because it will give people time to get there. The closing night is now the private view. This Friday 6.30 to 8.30pm.
My art is for sale, except for ones of my hubby, they are my memories of him, I don’t think I could part with them.
Have I mentioned that I have an exhibition at Spode, it can be viewed this Friday between 6.30 and 8.30. It’s at Acava Studios, up the yellow stairs, at Spode Works, Elanora street, Stoke upon Trent, ST4 1QD (I think).
If you are in the area and would like to come along you are very welcome.
It’s eclectic and interesting, with one work from 1982 that is an oil painting on an old cupboard door because I couldn’t afford a canvas. There are several portraits of my hubby from over our life together.
I’ve also included landscapes and portraits, abstract paintings, views of Spode works, and views of a nebula and Jupiter and Mars. There are also watercolours and batik prints. I’m interested in a lot of things and I hope this exhibition will show my explorative fine art practice.
I’m finding old portraits
Portals to a previous time
Not photographic images
But paint on canvas
You made me smile
You made me laugh
And cry too
So I hold onto these
Small tokens of love
With all my strength.
X
From the Internet ‘Kintsugi, (literally gold seams) is a traditional repair method that takes the broken or chipped parts of cherished vessels, glues them back together with a Japanese lacquer, and paints the seams with gold or silver powder.’
I’ve taken that idea to create this possibly last portrait of my hubby. It’s called ‘Mend Him’, and it’s my wish to put him back together again. It’s a bit rough and ready, but it expresses my feeling of loss. I think it captures his tiredness as he got older… I started this a few months before he died.
I miss him so much and if I could I would mend him, turn back time, use any power available to restore him to his best. X
I’m holding a retrospective of my art at Spode studios next week. It’s because I am leaving the studios after 7 years this April. I have enjoyed my time there but circumstances mean that I cannot continue there.
The retrospective will run from Monday 4th March 2024 to Friday 8th March. There will be a closing viewing of the exhibition on Friday from 6.30pm to 8.30pm.
Most of the works will be for sale. Please join me if you can at Spode Studios, Spode Site, Elanora street, Stoke upon Trent.
I went to a palette knife workshop today. The subject was a painting of rocks amid heather on local moorland.
This is my piece, I just want to add some shadows to the white cotton grass at the bottom. We started with a lime green acrylic wash to knock back the white of the canvas board, then we had to outline the rocks. We painted the top part softly with a brush and added in pink tones at the top and pale green grass with hedges painted in gently,
Then we started with the palette knives. The small pallet knife to shape and layer the rocks and then a bigger palette knife for the grass and finally blacks purple, red and pink for the heather. You have to use the sides or flat of the knife to get various textures.
It was a really enjoyable workshop with a teacher called Jo Watson. The workshop was with the Orme Art Group.
#bandofsketchers prompt was experience. I had the experience of doing this. I think the painting we worked from might have been Derbyshire or Staffs moorlands?
Artrage oils drawing from several years ago. This is the free version of the app. You only have the oil pen tools but it certainly can be used to create interesting effects. I like this a lot, I used the metallic option to give it this sheen. If you tone down the metallic effect the colours become paler and you can draw over the darker parts (where I have outlined the bird) as it seems to be more opaque and covers over the darker areas.
Write about your dream home.
I need more space. I could build a small studio on the side of my house if I had the money and planning permission. It would be somewhere that didn’t affect the fruit trees in the garden. I would move all my art equipment and works in. That would make more room for all the other things we collected over the years.
I’d also insulate it and add better windows and doors. Maybe underfloor heating.
My income is too low so this is all a pipe dream. Unless of course a Millionaire or Billionaire reads this and feels like making a generous donation? (or I might win the lottery). I would take over the empty house next door to offer accommodation for friends and family and make a gallery downstairs. Then I’d also add a lift to save my knees and hips that are starting to ache more and more x.
Working on this but the twigs are too thick and dark. I might try and thin them down or paint over them and make them lighter. I need a thinner brush, just a few bristles. Hmm…. And daylight, it’s hard painting under artificial light.
Orme Art Group Exhibition in the display window at the Brampton museum and art gallery until the end of March 2024.
Orme Art Group is a group of local artists that meet up in Newcastle under Lyme in Staffordshire. We have annual exhibitions but also try and get our art displayed in other venues. The groups art is varied, colourful and interesting. I think we compliment each other and create beautiful pieces of work.
The Brampton museum and art gallery is in Newcastle under Lyme and has a variety of displays and exhibitions and has a lot of local historical information and knowledge. There is a vintage cafe in the museum so you can get a hot drink and hot and cold food and cakes. Worth a visit.
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