New paintings and regular art updates.
One of my murals from the Leopard Hotel in Burslem. Stoke-on-Trent. Sadly lost in a fire. Brindley, Wedgwood, and two other people involved are depicted meeting at the Leopard to plan the work. It’s been several years since I painted it and I can’t remember the other names so if anyone knows please tell me. This was emulsion paint directly onto lining paper on the wall.
I’ve just been told the other two were Erasmus Darwin and Thomas Bentley. Thanks to my friend Greg Stephens for the info.
My grandfather carved this ship from wood, probably in the early 20th century. It had no masts so I put the the bamboo sticks into it when I was young and I was going to try and put sails on it. It has thin strips of cardboard nailed on along the sides. I painted it up because it was so shabby.
This was a watercolour sketch I’d done about 4 years ago and I’m mourning the fact that I could still draw and paint neatly.
Things have got in the way and I have hit a block with my painting of a teapot. I mean both physically and mentally.
You can see some of what is obstructing it. I need to move things, it’s just that I am mentally stuck. I think its the low light levels as this seems to get me every year. One day soon I hope have this finished.
Yes it’s a lampshade. Made up mainly fake bivalve shells. Yet another odd old thing my house is decorated with. I often wonder what will happen to my stuff when I’m gone? Do I specify that all my art (lots of paintings) will be shared out to family, donated to a local museum, my old school? Maybe someone will like it enough to buy it if it were sold in an auction? Is it persuasive enough for people to like? I won’t be there to find out.
Memory of a prop for the Penkhull Mystery Plays, I think this was a couple of years before covid?
The inventor of the spark plug, Oliver Lodge, lived in Penkhull and there are two local streets named after him, Oliver and Lodge Roads.
I can’t remember exactly what happened in the show but we had to try and make this pretend engine start with a starting handle and inserting a spark plug into the top of the engine.
I do think the prop and scenery people were fantastic. I got to paint some of it and make some of it but there was a great team of volunteers including making things from willow and papier mache, seamstress and stitches and making towers and buildings from bits of two by four and 8ft x 4ft flats of hardboard.
Hopefully the Mystery Plays will return in the summer of 2025.
I went back to an app I like because I had used it to texturise images in the past. I’d stopped using it (photodirector) because a lot of the options had changed and I couldn’t find the one that did this (adding wavy patterns to my original artwork). But I had another look and found what I wanted under “art style” I think. You then have varied options to alter the texture and colour. This was my favourite stye. The other thing is you can go back and put it through the same or another texturiser again. So pleased I found it.
Before covid (bc) I painted a series of pictures of places the cast of the pantomime I was in travelled through to get to Gretna green in Scotland (they had no sense of direction). This was one of the destinations.
This popped up on my Facebook memories. Imagine 8 or 10 people walking along and each painting being moved across the stage behind them. It was fun.
A small painting I did about 7 years ago. My friend bought it from me at a craft fair. I don’t remember why I painted this subject, it might have been Halloween. I don’t know where the idea came from, but it feels likely that I was thinking of spooky stories. Its one of my small canvases from when I was doing more craft fairs. Just found in my memories on Facebook.
While I was at the group art exhibition yesterday I did some painting. One of them was this small oblong painting of an apple tree at sunset. This is a little work in progress. I’m trying not to muddy the colours. The sky needed to be light and fresh. More to do? More leaves, maybe a little better blending of the blues. Acrylic on canvas.
Autumn puddle, a rather strange painting I finished today. Acrylic on canvas.
I started by picking up some leaves and tried to paint them and get the colours right. It then got left while I was not feeling well so I decided to try and do more work on it. I think I’ve not done too badly. The leaves are now floating in a puddle reflecting a blue and white sky. Should I do more to it?
Mallaband-Brown