I don't know what.....

It's been a mixed up week for me and I haven't really gotten much accomplished art wise, so yesterday I sat down with my fineliner and sketchbook and just let whatever happen...it's weird admittedly but I had fun. The whole drawing is a fair bit bigger, they are actually in a claw foot tub, but the rest of it was kind of embarrassing...more embarrassing than this! :) But it did kind of give me some ideas for a new piece...cheers!

Shaz and the blog as a tool :)

Having a blog has been a wonderful art tool for me. It's made me more disciplined in taking photos of paintings, during their progress as well as when finished. It's also made it easier for me to 'see'. We all have ways to trick our eyes into being 'fresh' when we are painting, using a mirror, turning it upside down, putting it somewhere you aren't expecting to see it, turning your back on it, walking away and turning quickly back round, putting it out of sight for a few days and so on. But I have begun to realize lately (probably everyone else already uses this but I am slow when it comes to tech stuff) when I post photos for my blog I get a whole new way of looking at things. This one for instance is bothering me and it wasn't until I scrolled through the photos and got to the third one, that all of a sudden I could see one of the problems...Shaz's chest and shoulder, is totally wrong...and it's make her neck look too short! Also the edge on the back of her neck is too hard and her neck is totally straight up and down, instead of the graceful curve that I intended. OK so there is many other issues with this one so far, but I am still in the resolving stage, at least this gives me a starting point :)Cheers!

last of the spooky stuff

Ok I know I have been painting a lot of stuff lately around things that are no longer with us, but in my defence, this one was a commission...The subject of the painting was called Billy and was very special to his family. This one is mainly pastel, though I have included a vintage Lonfellow verse along with a feather and some leaf skeletons. I also dropped some gold ink at the end and added a little crackle paste (which hadn't finished crackling when I took the photo). I have included some close ups of the texture on his horns, which is so much fun to do :)

arts and crafts

Mr Finch

Since I was little I always thought of these things as the same. To me they were the domain of the creatives. Somewhere along the line it became popular to separate the two and I find it a little bit disturbing. To me, personally, the application of the 'Craft' into individual creative expressions makes the 'Art'. Personally I find no difference between painting with oil and knitting, if it is purposed into the creation of an expressive and original piece of 'Art'. There is just as much technique in using needle and thread, clay, bits of paper, oil paint... ad infinitum to create. Kids understand it, give them a stick and they draw in the sand, a handful of seashells, and they arrange them in pleasing patterns.
At some point, as is the way with adult humans, they have compartmentalised creativity into neat little packages of 'fine art' and 'craft'. I have seen a lot of crappy 'fine art' and some incredibly inspirational 'craft'. Ok, so there is some questions about longevity and archival materials, blah, blah, blah, but lets look at history: just for interest...check out what some of the post modernists used as solvents and mediums when money was tight (I am not mentioning any names here).  My mediums of choice (pastel/acrylic mixed media) are well accepted, however there is still some bias against pastel, many see it as a drawing medium only. Also, acrylic took a long time to be taken seriously. Really, it is a mystery to me where this snobbery came from...I always thought of the creative community to be one that had no boundaries and embraced new ideas, without bias. To me, I still love the Impressionists, the post modernists, the old masters, the Romanticists, the  neoclassicists, the luminists , AND the knitters, scrapbookers, stampers, sketchers, collage artists, fimo modellers nananananannaa. I heard this somewhere (and if I hadn't just had 4 glasses of red wine I could tell you where)  IF IT LOOKS GOOD IT IS GOOD :) Happy creating, and have a look at Mr Finch

Shaz

This will be a first...I am going to attempt a mixed media dog. My muse is Shaz, a beautiful greyhound that my out-laws rescued about 8 years ago. I have already put in a background of collage, gold and copper leaf and acrylic paint but I fear I have broken my own 'first fule of mixed media' - don't add texture too soon! Anyway, I will have to work with it. So far I have only drawn in my charcoal sketch - I think I need to let this composition percolate for a couple of days, somewhere in the mix I want to add a tennis ball to represent her 'new' life as a happy family pet. I am tentatively calling this one 'Repurposed'