New paintings and regular art updates.
I’ve just started this poppy painting. It’s on a black canvas about 12″ square.
I’m hoping I will be able to build up a depth of colour and detail because of the dark canvas. It’s acrylic on canvas and is going to be big and bold. I need to work on the colours in the poppy but also in the greens of the foliage. I should finish it in the next few days. This is like a practice piece as I have another two black canvases to work on. Not sure what the subject will be.
I’ve finished painting for the penkhull mystery play, here is the willow pattern backdrop together with a school sign (set in the 1840’s). Im not the only maker, this is my friend Mark. There are others but my phone is playing up so I can’t find the pictures . Mark did the, ‘do not touch display’ sign. ( the play starts in a museum in 2019). So having a rest for an hour.
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Started with a large flowerpot covered in glue and paper (Papier-mache). Then painted it with a base coat of pale orange / brown acrylic paint when it was dry. I had put a slightly smaller pot inside to bulk up the sides and it gives a nice ridge around the top as if the Potter was starting to thin out the sides. I’ve painted light and dark bands as I wanted to give it texture, partly to hide the crinkly nature of the paper and also to make it look like he is putting ridges around it.
I’m not 100% sure of the colour, perhaps it should be darker, it’s like a pale terracotta I think.
I did this self portrait. I don’t do many and haven’t done one recently. Maybe I should. At this time I had the front bedroom as a studio, until we got too much stuff and I moved my painting stuff out. My tee shirt was a recycling one but I haven’t seen it for years. I’m not sure what I think about this, but it’s another Facebook memory. It’s a bit blurred. I still have the original upstairs, will have to find it out.. Almost twenty years later.
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this is the scenery I painted last year. Two eight by four boards attached together to make an eight foot square panel.
In some ways painting on calico is more difficult because of the way the paint sits on it. However at least I’m not struggling to line up the two sections. I do love doing this. It makes my year.
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A few years ago we did a mystery play which had to include the four horsemen of the apocalypse. This horse was made by my friend Kate and I painted it and another one in a Picasso style to give it an angular and aggressive look.
As time goes on and we get older we are doing less complicated making, basically because we are spending less time doing it. For myself I would like to do more. Anyway I’m off in a bit. Lots to do…
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My friend Kate has made this mask for the mystery play. I’ve got to paint it up to look like my hubby.
It was about 30 degrees centigrade this afternoon when we were rehearsing. I think it must have been really hot and uncomfortable in the mask. Hopefully the weather will be fine and mild when we do the play in a fortnight.
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I’m doing some backdrops for the Penkhull mystery play. I have calico to paint on, rather than static flat paintings that I usually do. This years backdrops are going to be rolled up and dropped down for the appropriate scenes.
Today apart from painting two willow pattern birds on papier mache I painted an eight foot by four foot backdrop of the church.
The problem was seeing the church through the trees. These mature lime trees have grown tall in the intervening years since the Church was built in the 1840’s. The backdrop is minus the trees. There was apparently a quarry and marl pit at the top of the hill which eventually filled with water and was a duck pond before it was filled in. There was a school on the land before the church was built and it was rebuilt at the top of Trent Valley Road (now the village hall). At the alter end of the church on the outside there were pigsties. I think these must predate the church.
More information about the village of penkhull can be found in books by the local author Richard Talbot.
More painting news will follow when I paint more.
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I was going to get up early today and going on a community walk along the local canal, but I got up late. I also considered going to an Urban Sketchers event at the Chatterley Whitfield nature reserve. But again I was too late. In the end we went to the Villas which is just down the road. There was an event called art at the Villas. The show was almost at the top of the road on the right hand side. The road is unadopted so go carefully driving up there. We parked at the bottom and walked.
The house we went in and its garden were full of interesting art. There were prints, original tee shirts, paintings, ceramics and a warm welcome. They were also accepting donations for charity. If you feel like visiting its in the Villas up the hill on the right off London Road, Oakhill , Stoke-on-Trent.
Since I was there and had missed other sketching opportunities I did a quick drawing of the garden and summerhouse in the distance.
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Today was all about making and painting things for the Penkhull Mystery Play this year. I reused two boxes from previous plays. I was asked to paint them black and then to use gold and yellow paint for the decoration.
The idea was to create boxes which would look like they had been decorated with Chinese lacquer. I didn’t know whether the idea would work, but it seemed OK.
Other work to do include sticking paper plates together to make them strong enough to be passed between 50school children and painting two large papier machè birds that represent the birds on the willow pattern plate.
One box has a landscape on the top of it, the other has a circular coin like shape on the top.
Mallaband-Brown