New paintings and regular art updates.
Imagined Islands, edited by Huw Lewis-Jones looks like a lot of fun. Lots of different maps by illustrators in different, fun, styles. I think it will help me get a feel for the map project I’ve got to do for college. In the meantime my cat seems to want to help me by interpreting the word ‘archipelago’….
Narrow boat in the bottom of the canal lock as the water started to fill it up. Seen on a walk today.
I couldn’t stop to see the lock fill up fully as my friend had walked further on and I don’t like walking along the canal on my own.
It was quite warm today for a change and the breeze had dropped a bit. We carried on along and I half expected the narrow boat to catch up with us but we got to the next lock and it was still well behind us.
Great to feel sunshine on my face properly for the first time this year. I even took my coat off!
I was depressed by the amount of rubbish floating in the canal today. It was in an area close to Stoke Town centre.
I saw many old plastic bottles, they were dirty, as if they had been stored somewhere outside and then dumped together into the canal later. There were bits of broken wood and even an old set of mudguards from a bike floating on the surface. It makes me angry, because this section of canal is part of our city. How disgusting that stuff can just be dumped. Then further on towards Dolphin Boats but on the other side was a burnt out motor scooter. No one seems to care. I tagged in the Canal and Rivers Trust. I hope they can arrange a clean up.
As I walk I’m looking at trees, I’m waiting for the buds to burst, the leaves to stretch and expand. But we need some rain now to get the buds to swell. Then I will have more idea of what these trees are.
Oak before Ash,
In for a Splash.
Ash before Oak,
In for a soak….
The old rhyme of what to expect from the weather this Spring…
Also the weather has been very windy after a quiet start to March.
The saying for that is :
In like a Lamb
Out like a Lion.
(it can be vice versa), old weather saws that my grandma told me…
I drew this years ago. A celtic style cat. I did a full colour acrylic painting afterwards but I don’t have a photo of that and I think my sister has it now.
I was trying to think of a subject for an illustrated map we have to do for college. I’ve been visiting a local lake recently and there is a hedge maze there. You cannot see the shape of it from the ground and it would be interesting in mapping it out, but I don’t own a drone camera! Then I thought the map might be based around ideas of the Staffordshire Hoard found in this area a few years ago. This was coins and gold sword ornaments and other pieces of treasure. I might base my map on these Saxon patterns. Then I did my original thesis on pre Christian celtic art, and that’s where the idea of a celtic cat came from.
Decisions…. What to draw…. Hmm
Today’s sketches…
Today’s sketch portraits, I used cut up mono prints that I had made for the print workshop earlier in the week. I glued bits down then added black calligraphy pen and fine liner, then graphite from a graphite stick. I had to unstick one bit of paper and redo it because it was wrong and overlapped bits of the drawing. …
Gnarley trees in the graveyard
Stand and wave hello
We walked beneath their boughs today
Watching them slowly grow.
Allowed to reach maturity
Their girth spreading wide,
Leaves will be opening soon
Bringing them back to life.
Spring and Easter come again,
The end of winter strife.
Tonights #bandofsketchers prompt was between. OK, my choice was between Cadburys Creme Egg cake and a nice hot cross bun…. Er, yes….. Both? I used a little Watercolour box I found on top of the microwave. It’s several years old and only has ten half pans of paint with a tiny brush. But it’s good quality paint.
When I was a child I looked forward to Easter, not for religion, although I did understand about Christianity, but because of the Easter eggs we used to get (I was a child, forgive me).
As I got older I realised that Easter wasn’t on a set day, like the 25 December for Christmas. But it seems to be that it has to run Friday Saturday and Sunday and is linked somehow to the Jewish Calendar? But also to the phases of the moon, so Easter drifts a slowly, then jumps around. Any time between late March and April if I remember. It used to make the Easter break at school a bit odd too. If anyone knows the correct reasons let me know?
After a morning on college work we finally got out in the sunlight for an hour.
Instead of walking up the hill we took the car to the top, then walked around the circumference on it. We walked down, then climbed back up again. Rushing because I thought I had another lecture at 5 (it was actually 6) we managed to get back to the car and home by ten to.
My hubby encountered this charming cat, fluffy and friendly, on top of a wall in between a row of terraced houses. The cat was purring loudly and having a lovely time, it was a shame he had to leave it as we walked on up the hill. We only managed a couple of miles, but it was great to escape for a while.
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