Preparing for an exhibition

The exhibition I'm going to hold at the library is in 2 glass cases at the top of the stairs in the main foyer area of the building.  I held an exhibition there in 2011.  The cases are surprisingly spacious and so I've been planning what material I have and how much I will need to fill that space.  Like before I've made a plan in the back garden with string and various bits of paper cut to the size of existing pieces...

Then I've drawn a plan showing these pieces in situ, marking in red things which I don't have yet (titles, accompanying text etc...) so I know what I've got to get ready to take with me in December.

I've decided to theme the exhibition around the flower drawings I've been doing this year, and to split the 2 cases into work done in dip pen and ink from my photographs in the left hand case and in the right hand case I will show the drawings I've made from life.  These are done in sketchbooks, in fibre pens of varying thickness.  I will show prints of the pages from the sketchbooks and the sketchbooks themselves.

I've made a timetable and hopefully I'll have everything ready in December.

Here's a piece I finished earlier this month.  It's called 'Tearful Rose' and it's in coloured acrylic inks applied with dip pen.

Sunflowers and wayside poppy

I've been working through the course I mentioned in my previous post.  I'm finding this really helpful and it has shaken up lots of different ways of thinking and ideas that I hope to develop. 

I'm not rushing through it, as I've got quite a few other things on my plate at the moment (IT course, general DIY jobs, my part-time job at the library and the exhibition I'm planning to hold there in December).  Also my main purpose in doing this course was to motivate myself into other ways of approaching my work, of levering myself away (or at least get breathing space from) my dependency on photographs.

Our garden is a tiny oasis in the urban environment in which I live.  I've spent quite a lot of time there through the summer, and now summer is drawing to a close I'm making as much use of it as I can, enjoying the huge sunflowers I've managed to raise this summer.  Some of them are well over 7ft tall!  I've never managed to get them so tall before. 

My routine has become to work for about an hour or so from the course then, with the principles gleaned from the course still buzzing in my head, to work an hour or more drawing from life.  These drawings are done in fibre tip pens of varying nib size and they're done quickly.  Here are a couple of small ones I made last week.

Indoors I continue working with dip pen and increasingly coloured ink rather than my usual black Indian ink.

This piece is very small (about 13cm x 11cm) and I made it deliberately with a few aims in mind:-

• I wanted to finish something quickly, ideally within a week
• I wanted to produce something primarily in line that I can experiment with perhaps adding colour either onto the drawing itself, onto a print of the drawing or onto a digital image of the drawing using Photoshop.

I'll post progress of this when there is any!

Chilly sunflowers

It's hard to believe that just 3 weeks ago I was sitting in the sunshine attempting to cool down with orange ice lollies and filling my glass with ice cubes before adding water that melted the ice cubes within minutes.  Today I sat in the garden wrapped in sweater, cardi and body warmer as I tried to draw the sunflowers I've managed to coax into some sort of life this year, despite snails, wasps and gale force wind.

It's been so windy!  One poor sunflower snapped in two, others have toppled in their pots so many times that they crushed and snapped their lovely heart shaped leaves.  For much of this week I've spent running about in search of a sheltered part of the garden, wedging the pots with bricks, other pots and whatever else I can find to stop them toppling! 

And now, I attempt to draw the survivors.  I feel I owe it to them, if just to record the proof of the fact that some of them have actually survived and grin at me with their lovely yellow faces.

 I love these Teddy Bear sunflowers, but this is the only bloom I've managed to coax into life so far.

This is a Little Leo.  Just like me.

I wanted a break from working with fine dip pens so I've been trying out these marker pens.  This one is a chunky nib.  The sketch book is A3 size.

I bought these Sharpie markers a few weeks ago and I think it's about time I tried them out.  This is on an A4 sketchbook.  The Sharpies are spirit based so they bleed through to the next page in this sketchbook.  I like the mirror image they cast through the paper.  The left hand image has bled through from the previous page, the right hand image is the new Sharpie drawing.  I think it might be nice to experiment with combining the two effects on the same page.

Another double page spread with Sharpie drawing and bleed through from previous page.

I used the chunky marker pen for the foreground sunflower and a finer marker to roughly sketch in the background.

I had some great news yesterday.  I have had a drawing accepted for this year's Open Exhibition of the Society of Graphic Fine Art.  It's a drawing I made in 2010, so it falls just within the 5 year span required by the Society for entries.  It is, I think, one of my best pieces, I exhibited it a few years ago at the RBSA and at an open exhibition in Worcester.  It's called PW PW 2001.

DOG ROSE

Here is a small pen and ink drawing I've been working on, it's almost finished. It's more stylised than my usual work, and I gave the flower a coat of iridescent ink before drawing on top of it with dip pen and ink.

And here is a new seed I planted yesterday.  It's a rose bejeweled with rain/teardrops.

 

I regained some of my time 4 weeks ago when I was made redundant from one of my 2 part-time jobs.  I am still trying to get on my feet at the moment, but I dived into my new treasure box of time by signing up for and begining various courses and projects.  I've signed up for an on-line IT course with Vision2Learn and a Photoshop course with Wolverhampton College.  I  had my eye on a couple of on-line art courses but couldn't afford them, so I invested a little money in purchasing a course in book form.  I think I need to free up the way I approach my drawing, developing the imaginative side in a more obvious way.

I made a start on it last week.

I'm hoping to use some of the concepts I encounter in this book in my serious artwork.  Time will tell...

One other project I've been dwelling on and working towards this year is an exhibition, which I am hoping to mount of my work later this year.  Hopefully around December time.  As I have focused on flower drawings mostly though 2014 this will be the subject of the exhibition, which I hope to hold at Wolverhampton Central Library. 

Prize Exhibition

I have 2 drawings in this year's Prize Exhibition at the RBSA.  The exhibition runs until Saturday 12 July.  You can view a short film of it here.  You can see my picture in the corner in one shot, and then just after it there is a short of the wall with Frou Frou hanging on the left hand side.  I've not managed to get to the gallery to see the exhibition yet, but hopefully I will get to see it within the next couple of weeks.  It looks good from the film.

Here is a quick sketch I made of the lovely plant known as Lamb's Ear.  I bought one of these plants after looking for some time for one, I've seen it in gardens and loved the silky silver texture of it.

Mine's in a container and I've had to treat it for a fungal disease, it keeps going spotty!  I don't know how long it'll last in the polluted Black Country air. 

And here is some more progress on my rose drawing.  All is done in FW Acrylic Ink, red for the rose, payne's grey and black for the background. 

I'm still listening to Wolf Hall while I work.  So I guess this drawing will be forever linked in my mind to the ambiguous character of Thomas Crowell and the bloody glamour of Tudor England.

Flowers Against A Wall

Here's the finished pencil drawing I began a couple of weeks ago. 

And here's recent progress on a new pen and acrylic ink drawing. 
 

Working as usual from one of my digital photographs, and working directly from the screen this time (as I did with the pencil drawing above) I lightly sketched the rose in pencil, then added a wash of pearlescent acrylic ink.  Over this I began working in red acrylic ink, occasionally sketching in pencil to guide my pen marks.  I'm working on heavy watercolour paper.

Listening while I work still to Wolf Hall.  And enjoying the lovely sunshine.

OVER THE BROADWAY MOON!

I was really over the moon tonight to learn that I have sold the piece I had on show at the Broadway open.

I'm really really pleased about this, it is a much needed confidence boost at a time when I can really do with it.

Whoever has purchased my drawing THANK YOU!  I hope you get much pleasure from it.