Monochrome airbush

I began this piece as a pen and ink drawing. The photo I was working from was full of swimming light and shade, and I was struggling how to represent this and the cluster of snowdrops nestling behind the iron fence. Almost out of desperation, and some restlessness I'd been feeling recently about my work, I had cut a very simple stencil out of greaseproof paper and dug out the airbrush I bought almost 2 years ago now. My first attempts at depressing the trigger resulted in a blot of jet black ink (I used black Acrylic ink for the tone in this drawing). Luckily I wasn't aiming the airbrush at the drawing, and managed to make a more subtle stream of ink through the stencil. I found the effect interesting, and began to experiment with several new pieces.

I had combined two photographs and made a quick drawing from them.  From this I made a tracing and cut a very simple stencil.  I masked out the area which would roughly form twigs and leaves with masking fluid and made my first airbrush impression.  I made a second tracing and cut another stencil for the darker areas of the tree images.  I liked the image so far, but have stalled a little here as I'm afraid of ruining what I've done by going forward too hastily.  I actually began a second version of this piece, which I will post about later.

This new way of working is actually much slower than my usual method, which is more instinctive and driven by a need (almost) to cover paper with marks.  I do more thinking between working on the images themselves.  Write myself lists in sketchbooks and on post-its. 

You can never have too many post-it notes...