New things

I am working on quite a few different things all at once. This is an experimental abstract piece, using inks and soft pastels.

‘You’ll remember me’ Soft pastels and inks on Pastelmat A3

The coursework for Painting 2.1 (Ideas Lab) through OCA is really fun and I’m having a great time messing about with stuff that I wouldn’t normally do. Here are a few images of latest work that was done using various media on canvas panels and monotyped paper – Glitch.cam app, encaustics, shellac, soft pastels, acrylic enamels, polyfilla, inks, tracing paper, A3 Lightbox …

Digital Felling

Not what it seems

Pull Up a Seat

Boudicca’s Way v1

Down but not Out

Encaustic trees and leaf

Boudicca’s Way v2

Boudicca’s Way v3

Rock Pool

I’ve been without wheels for over a year but yesterday, I was gifted with a Ford Focus Titanium! I promised myself that the first place I’d visit would be the sea. Well, the weather is not playing ball today, so my trip to the beach will have to wait a couple more days. The Norfolk coastline is not too far away from where I live (too far to walk though). I think the idea of going to the water was on my mind when I started this little painting. It began like this:

WIP

But it has ended up like this:

‘Rock Pool’ Mixed media on stretched canvas

I used enamels (gold, sapphire blue, red, white and yellow), resin pigment inks and acrylics. It is signed on the lower right hand corner with my initials and measures 10″ x 8″ x 1/2″ or 25.5cm x 20cm x 1 cm – I’ve put it in my shop here.

WIP x 2

I’m busy trying my very best to do art every day at the moment, it doesn’t always end up being anything I can display on here but I’m working, that’s the main thing. in any event, I am busy with these two pieces at the moment, they are both about 50cm x 40cm on repurposed stretched canvas (that was a process in and of itself let me tell you!).

‘Out there somewhere’ WIP 50x40cm mixedmedia on stretched canvas

‘Out there somewhere 2 WIP 50X40cm mixed media on stretched canvas

I have used acrylics, pastels, inks, alcohol, red tissue paper collage. The tissue paper was used by OCA (Uni for Creative Arts) to package up my coursework manual. I knew i’d find a good use for it one day.

Surf’s Up

‘Surf’s Up’ 7″x5″ Encaustic wax medium on Encausticbord

This little piece was inspired by the wonderful Norfolk coastline. I used superior grade encaustic beeswax and damar resin medium (sourced and imported from the US), as well as resin pigment inks and encaustic paints. The wave effect was produced using a thin application of imported shellac which was then heated to produce the delicate lace-like patterns as seen in the close up image below.

close up of texture effects

I am falling for this encaustic technique – so will be working on some more pieces this week, while I have the house to myself!

You can find this piece in my shop. I. don’t charge for shipping or packaging.

Playing in the garden – mixed media monoprint

Playing in the garden Inks, oil and markers monoprint on 250g A3 mixed media paper 2020
(Actual size of work is 18cm x 30cm)

New this week – ‘Gold’

We are settling into our new home and I’m beginning to find more space and time to paint.  This week I completed two pieces, this is the first to get up on a wall:

Image cropped :

“Gold”

Acrylics, sand texture, gels and inks on stretched canvas.

Size:  70cm x 60cm x 2cm (approx)  or 27½” x  23½” x 1″

 

Some new work

Well, we have at last settled into our new house.   My painting space is very limited but I’m managing to scrape a hole big enough for myself and the paints … the large one below [abstract seascape) was painted mostly outdoors, great fun that was in 32 degrees C, trying to keep the acrylics wet!

The others were kinda commissions – Bay scene (Devon) was requested by the lady of our house and is now enconced in our seascape themed downstairs bathroom.  Photo is crap, ‘cos there’s not enough room to stand back and get it in the camera frame properly.  Never mind.  The poppies was requested by a friend of mine, hope she likes it.

 

‘Seascape with sand texture’

Acrylics, inks and texture paste (sand) on stretched canvas.

120cm x 100cm x 4cm

 

‘Bay- Devon’

Acrylics and inks on stretched canvas 100cm x 39cm

 

‘Poppies and wheat’

Acrylics and inks, gel pastes, structure pastes on stretched canvas.  45cm x 35cm

View below is minus the reflection.

New mixed media

There are many things influencing my outlook on life at the moment – some very positive (like moving to our own house very soon – yay, no more renting!) and others not quite as positive (like waiting to find out if we will be able to permanently care for my baby granddaughter – we will only know the answer to that one at end of July).   My youngest son is also now seriously making plans to move over to the UK to be with us all – so that thought is very much at top of mind all the time and I was thinking about that a lot when I started painting this abstract.   It was great to get back to canvas and something larger than the work I’ve been doing lately.

I used a lot of layers in this work, using inks mixed with structure gel and acrylics mixed with gloss gels and other medium.  It was a cathartic experience,  no matter what happens in life, family are the most important – at least they are to me.  And sometimes family comprise people who are not your blood relatives.  I hold them all close to my heart, they give me light …

 

‘DIVE’

Acrylics, inks, gels, structure gel on stretched canvas.

69cm x 59cm or  27″ x 23″

View of the work on one of my easels:

Texture close ups  (lots of texture!):

This work is available to purchase.

New mixed media

Quite some time ago I started working on a series of paintings relating to the South African landscape, for some reason I didn’t finish that work.  I decided to go back to one of them over the weekend and this is the result, might still do a bit more tweaking (as always!).  This area holds a very special place in my heart (and psyche).  It is one of the most beautiful parts of the world, glorious in any weather.  This is a view of the ampitheatre from the river below. (My own reference photos)

For this one I used acrylic inks, soft pastels, then oil pastels on mixed media paper.  Paper size is 16.5″ x 11.5″ (A3), painting takes up all surface of the paper.

 

Commission – completed

The brief I was given from my client was to paint her a picture of her field, which lies behind her offices and home in a rural area of South Norfolk.  She wanted a representation of the field in winter and depending on how that went, would probably ask me to do another painting of the field in summer.   The field or meadow doesn’t have any major features in it, other than a small coppice of trees and a separate area for her rescued chickens.   I knew that she didn’t want me to include the chickens in the finished painting, so I couldn’t mess about with that idea, which was actually what I wanted to do!  Chickens make excellent subjects for paintings!

I did have a few issues with the process of painting the required picture and had several different ideas of how to approach it.  So, I decided to present her with three versions last Friday and let her decide which one or ones she wanted to keep.

The first one is a realism approach taken from a photograph.  I wanted to capture the wintery light and bare branches, the grass was still quite luminous and deeply green.  This is on stretched canvas – 19″ x 16″.  Acrylics over inks.

 

The second painting was more like the kind of style I enjoy doing, especially when it comes to depictions of trees.  Also on stretched canvas, same size (19″ x 16″) but portrait style.   I used an acrylic ink underpainting, topping it off with oil pastels and oil paints.

 

The third painting was totally abstract and processed using gels, inks and acrylic paint on an artist canvas board.  This is about twice the size of the stretched canvas paintings.  I forgot to take a photo with my Canon before I took them to the client, and only have this mobile phone photo.

My client was so thrilled with all the paintings that she’s decided she wants all of them!  She is going to get them professionaly framed and then I will return to her home and take photos of these paintings in frames.  I am overjoyed that she really liked all the work, her husband especially liked the middle painting.  She has also decided to feature the paintings in prominent areas of her home – originally she was only going to place the paintings against a wall in one of the corridors leading into her house.

New oil pastels painting

Golden glade – watersoluble oil pastels and inks

‘Summer Glade’

Oil pastels, oil paints and ink on A3 paper.

(pictures on right, to show detail)

I was going for a loose feel with this one, the underpainting seems to set it all off sparkling.

New series – flower studies.

These are the first in a series of flower studies.

All on A3 double gesso-ed acrylic paper.

‘Cosmos – mixed’

Oils blended with glazing medium on acrylic inks background.

‘Daisies in sunlight’

Acrylics on acrylic ink background.

 

Oil pastels and paints – blended with glazing medium on acrylic ink background.

‘Cosmos -2’

‘Pastel poppies’

Oil pastels blended with glazing medium

Yee-ha

Yesht, so I have managed to eventually get myself sorted out with a bit of space to paint in.   I tried it out today because the rest of the family have gone away for the weekend, so I could make as much mess as I liked and actually get to concentrate on something for a whole day. Wonderful.    I made a little video of the process I use to make paintings on stretched canvas (that are considered abstract) … I don’t work like this all the time.

Anyway, hope you enjoy and I’d appreciate comments on my video if you have the time (or inclination) … be brutal, I can take it.  [Yeah, right] This is the finished product:

‘Sea and Sand’

21 ½” x 18″ x ½”   [55cm x 46cm x 1.5cm]

Acrylics and inks on stretched canvas.

 

 

New soft pastels

‘Trees and grasses’

16″ x 12″ or 406mm x 305mm

Soft pastels (Rembrandt, Reeves, Faber-Castell) on Daler Rowney acid free Ingres coloured paper; 98lb or 160g/m2

 

‘Seascape and sunglow’

16″ x 12″ or 406mm x 305mm

Liquid acrylic Inks ; Soft pastels (Rembrandt, Reeves, Faber-Castell) on Daler Rowney acid free Ingres coloured paper; 98lb or 160g/m2

A couple more ink studies

‘Clouds and mist over the Highlands’

9 ¾”  x 6 ¼”

Ink, salt, alcohol on watercolour paper (cold pressed)  – from my own reference photo beneath.

“Abstract landscape”

9 ¾”  x 6 ¼”

Inks, salt on watercolour paper (cold pressed)