Tag: Pencil

A few more paintings

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Over the years I’ve done many paintings and drawings, in oil, acrylic, watercolour, pencil, felt pen, charcoal. And I don’t stick to one style, these are a mixture of figurative and abstract, from 1981 up to about 2008. I don’t think I have ever got bored with art.

Some of the art is very patterned, for instance the spiral cat painting, or illustrative, like the tree drawing and the cross hatched picture of the potteries. I find myself using similar techniques when I do digital drawings.

I draw from my imagination, from life and from photographs.

I have occasionally copied paintings, but I always state the work is after the original artist, in other words I make reference to them originating the work. I have only done this on 2 or 3 occassions when someone has asked for a similar picture to one they have seen. Art is a creative business, and the authorship of it should be respected. One concern I have is over copyright. By publishing my art here I realise I am putting it at risk to some extent, but there is the dilemma of wanting to share creativity with others. I doubt anyone would want to copy mine .

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Conwy sketches

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If you decide to take a day trip to Conwy, north Wales, on the other side of the estuary to Llandudno and the Great Orme mountain, can I suggest you don’t take a cheap sketchbook, an ok blunt pencil and a couple of old biros with you because you have forgotten your good drawing tools?

Firstly it doesn’t make drawing easy, particularly if you choose to walk along the battlements of a castle. If the sun does decides to shine then you can’t get dark enough shadows to show the foreground trees and you can’t get the subtlety of shading on the mist shrouded mountains in the distance. Each sketch becomes more random and quick. The only good one you give away to “Eric the storyteller” of snowdonian folk tales because you managed to capture a reasonable image of him.

Off down to the smallest house in Great Britain, built 400 years ago, now there is a house to draw. Luckily you dredge up an old black felt pen and make tentative marks. How to show how tiny the house is? The clue is to draw the welsh lady by the door, passing on wisdom and history. She is a good figure to add for a sense of scale. Mission accomplished while queuing to enter the house, the felt pen has run dry, but the image is clearer than the previous ones.

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Found…2011 sketchbook

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I’m having a clear out/spring clean, and I found this sketchbook underneath a foot stool that isn’t used very often.

I always have to look in to see what I was doing, this was an orange book with nice thick cartridge paper, spiral bound so you can flip the pages and not end up trying to draw into the crease between them.

So I saw pictures of landscapes and some portraits.

I had clearly dated them so I know they were done over a couple of weeks in June 2011. I dont remember my health then, but I must have taken the week off from work and gone up to Yorkshire and also North Wales….

While these are black and white pencil sketches, I think they give enough detail so that you can understand the views I saw. I dont think they are that accurate,  but I sometimes prefer drawing to photography. I have joined a group of urban sketchers, but I dont get out often enough these days.

The portraits are just about OK. I feel like they are all flawed in some way. Perhaps I had done them too rapidly ? I don’t think the fact that there is a drawing of a pint of beer in there is of too much importance. I must have been feeling in need of refreshment, the drawing by the river was at a pub in Saltaire and I think I drew the landscape while we stopped for lunch and a drink.

The sketch of the lighthouse is at Talacre beach in Wales. The figure at the top us actually a sculpture of a person. I dont think its safe to enter and in any case I think the door is locked.

I will keep this short. I dont want it to turn into one if those  “slides of landscapes I took on holiday” moments!