Arrived today

Note cards from my friend Martha in Colorado. She’s a brilliant artist and loves the Sand Cranes that migrate through her valley twice a year. She has cards for sale through her Etsy shop I think.

I hope she doesn’t mind me using her image. I think it’s so atmospheric. I like the different positions the birds are in, so well observed. And the sky is blustery and lively. It’s great to have something like this from such a talented artist. I’m definitely putting one of them in a frame. Is so sensitivley painted, I love it.

Painting and drawing

What do you wish you could do more every day?

I used to paint and draw a lot more than I do now. I feel though that recently I’m quite blocked, stuck, nervous of creating. Yes I sketch every couple of days, but my easle is resolutely empty. The paints in their boxes, the brushes lying fallow. The trouble is my physical health. My left arm keeps shaking and I have pain in my elbow. I’m still waiting for a full diagnosis. I don’t think it’s anxiety, but not painting makes me anxious….

I just saw a painting/art competition online, but the entry needs to have been created after 1st January 2023. The painting I had in mind, and it was a good one, was from a couple of years ago, so it was not suitable. Also the entry date is tomorrow, I’m not going to have time unless I get my paints out NOW and paint all night..

I have a list of paintings to do for friends and family. I feel oppressed by that. I should feel glad. I need to break the block.

Need to take better photos…

Three pottery paintings I did a few years ago. The one of the jug is going to a new home soon. ❤️

I took them to a joint performance of our Clay chorus and the Starfish choir because we were singing a song about the Willow pattern (this is based on a Spode platter) and also a ship called Hispaniola bringing pottery clay from across the seas that had been written for us by Mark Whitter. I was very proud to have my work appreciated.

I am making cards from these if I can so I need better photos to show them clearly .

Mill

Small ‘Mill’ painting sold.

It was very good to hear that my small painting of Etruria Flint Mill had sold to a friend yesterday. It was another in a new style I am experimenting with. I’m using more lines and textures to emphasise  the patterns in the bricks and sky and trees. The image is based on a photo of the Mill and Industrial Museum, but I added more white to give a feeling of when it was in use, and the site was dusted with the crushed bones and flints that went into Stoke-on-Trents bone China, their attempt to replicate Porcelain. The canal is brown with rusty water. If you visit Kidsgrove which is to the North of Stoke you can see the canal there is often very orange. The Trent and Mersey canal runs through the Harecastle Tunnel which is another interesting part of our industrial heritage.

I have other work for sale at Arts and Minds Gallery at Harper Street in Middleport opposite Middleport Pottery, Middleport, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire.

#motion

One of the art groups I’m part of put a prompt of #motion on their Facebook page today. I thought of this painting. Acrylic on canvas called Georges from a few years ago. A painting from memory of when I jumped in the sea fully clothed and swam out to a wild dolphin at Challaborough? In Devon. There were people on the beach and people in wetsuits further out. Georges kept swimming past me because I was somewhere in the middle. He’d got lots of scars along his body. I found out from a poster the next day telling people not to swim with him as he was too friendly and had been cut by boat propellers. You can also catch illnesses like pneumonia from breathing the air from their blowhole.

Playing with silhouettes

A previous digital drawing of a fence against a colourful background. My Sketch app on my phone has silhouettes of trees and plants that I rarely use. I also added extra texture and overlays in Photodirector. These are a couple of the art apps I have on my phone that I use frequently and don’t want to remove if I have to get the Jetpack app. Am I irritated? Yes. Must stop going on about it. Creativity isn’t important after all is it (sulks)…. Sorry!

Baker St Park, with flying dog!

A cloudy sky (with an odd dog shape- I’m not changing it) flys above a park. The grass is shaded by the long shadows of trees. The sun is bright, but starting to set. I used various techniques taught to us by Jo Watson, an artist who comes out and teaches charcoal workshops.

Most of the group used images supplied by Jo, but a few of us chose our own images. This drawing was based on a photo of Baker Street Park in Penkhull, Stoke-on-Trent.

I really loved learning about charcoal, I’ve used it before, but not been in control of it! ❤️

Stag and thistles

A stag and thistles against a Scottish Saltire. The Penkhull Panto is not having scenery this year except for some smaller A2 panels that I painted a few years ago of various scenes from around the world. I offered to paint something representing Scotland and found various images of Scottish jewellery depicting Stags and Thistles in a semi celtic design. This is my interpretation of the idea. The blue and white of the saltire is a good background to the design. I used two A1 boards glued together for strength (£10) and it is painted in acrylics with some silver metallic pen highlights. I hope they like it.

Final photo

I asked for a photo of my beach painting from the lady who bought it (it went to the person who had commissioned it and I had forgotten to take a picture). She was really happy with it. I tried to get that feeling of water washing on and out, flowing over the sand. A few dark rocks sit in the bottom right hand corner and I really tried to get bright sunny colours into it. I found the blue hard to get right, so I used a turquoise hue to get that marine feeling.

Autumn and Spring painting

Sometimes I just have to create something different. I don’t do many paintings of abstracts, I find them difficult to do. I don’t want to have to write a long explanation of what the painting means. I love all sorts of art, but it’s hard to pin down what would be my favorite. This autumn /spring painting is acrylic on canvas. With colours that represent the seasons. The shapes are meant to represent middle age, complexity, confusion, a city scape, and the spring is simple nature. See I said I hate describing what I’m doing, and yet that’s exactly what I’ve just done! Maybe I should do a Winter/summer one?