This month's topic on Making a Mark is flowers in art. There are some wonderful links in this post; anyone with even the slightest interest in flower painting should take a look. I've been continuing to experiment with loose approaches to flowers, using lots of water, and as part of this have produced a few studies of lavender. Here are a couple. They're not really loose and watery enough, now I come to look at them again. Still, that gives me an excuse to have another go!
When the rain drove me inside yesterday, I did a quick sketch of this chandelier inside the spookily now almost deserted old Radcliffe Infirmary (mentioned in the previous post). I couldn't take long because, ironically, the lights weren't working! It's not particularly accurate, but then it was a pretty complicated thing to draw in the gathering gloom! Plus, it's pretty wonky IRL, so who's going to know? The little tower in the corner is on the roof of the hospital's chapel.
Tonight I had the chance to spend about half an hour making a sketch of the fountain at the front of the old Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford. It's an historic site: the hospital opened in 1770, but it closed in January this year, with all its functions moving to a new site in Oxford. The original building is very interesting, but behind it is an ugly sprawl of buildings that have been put up over the years. The site has been taken over by Oxford University, who are going to turn it into teaching and research facilities. They'll have to preserve the original building, but I expect the rest will go.
Time for a return to graphite. I like to use lots of different media -- watercolour, pen and ink, coloured pencil -- but I still find it hard to beat graphite. The control and subtlety of tone that one can get are unrivalled (at least, I can't rival it!). This is a bit of hawthorn, very common around here.
Here's another version of the girl that I posted a while back, this time with added pigeons! The vague shapes on the upper right were supposed to represent a flurry of feathers as more birds hurried over!! The fact that I've had to tell you this shows how well that worked! :( Part of the reason for doing this was to experiment with a new squirrel mop that I've just got from Jackson's Art Supplies; their own brand ones are currently on sale with a 60% discount, so I couldn't resist. I've never used a squirrel brush before; I'm amazed both by how much water it holds and by how soft it is.
Yesterday I attended a workshop in botanical illustration at the Harcourt Arboretum (part of Oxford University's Botanical Garden) run by Valerie Price, an artist trained in scientific illustration who has done work for, among others, Kew Gardens. Although you might not guess it from the very loose paintings I've posted here recently, I've always been fascinated by this type of detailed, highly accurate drawing and painting. I very much enjoy doing this style of work, even though I'm nowhere near being capable of the incredible detail the real experts can achieve. It seems to be unusual for people to enjoy producing both very loose and very detailed work; I suppose it doesn't really make sense to try to work in different styles, but after all I'm only doing it for fun, not to make a living!
My experience of taking classes in watercolour is that teachers invariably want you to work larger, wetter and looser, so it was a refreshing change to take a class with someone that thought my number 6 brush (the second smallest I own!) was "rather long", who stresses careful preliminary drawing involving painstaking measurement, and for whom A4 is as large format as it gets! I wouldn't want to work like this all the time, but I really enjoyed the day.
This was the result of my day's work...a single flower! But I'm quite pleased with it; I think it has a good feeling of transparency. It's mainly done using W&N opera rose on Fabriano Artistico cold pressed paper. Oh, and the flower is a lavertera.
Yes, it's another rose! I think tomorrow I'll have to try something different. Like a yellow rose, perhaps. :) Again, this is on a 1/4 imperial sheet of Bockingford NOT.
It's hard to resist painting roses at the moment, as thy are everywhere! So, here's another version. This style is largely inspired by the work of Jean Haines. Anyone interested in her work would also do well to check out the internet forum that she's recently set up (and which I've mentioned before), the Watercolour Haven. This is on a 1/4 sheet of 300gsm Bockingford NOT paper (as was the previous post).
I've not been able to post much so far this month, thanks to pressure of real life (boo!). But I hope to put that right with a flurry of posts over the next few days! Here is a watercolour of a Nigella, a lovely blue flower with delicate leaves and attractive seedpods. I'm trying to work in a very loose style. This was done in five minutes or so.
I had the chance to go out and draw for a hour or so this evening as the sun was going down, and what better way to spend the time than draw one of my favourite subjects: a tree. I call it a "study" because that sounds like the sort of thing that proper artists do, but really, I just like drawing trees! I had to rush a bit at the end as it was getting dark, but it was a lovely evening to be out drawing.
I'm planning a painting of a young girl feeding pigeons. This is a quick study of the girl. I don't have a lot of time to do much art at the moment as I'm buried under a big pile of exams that I've got to mark! I know what I'd rather be doing, but I should be finished with the marking this weekend. I've still got that portrait to finish too!
Summer has returned to Oxford this weekend, thank goodness. And with all the rain, we've been having, when the sun comes out everything in the garden grows like mad. All our roses are out, pink, white, yellow, orange; patio, bush, climber. I never feel as though any attempt I've made to paint or draw roses have really worked. This year I'm having another go, using a very loose, watercolour style. Still not really right, but I think this approach could work if I keep at it.
EDM challenge 8 was to draw a watch. I've got a few watches; this one I bought on my recent trip to Switzerland. It didn't seem right to come back from Switzerland without a new watch! I really like it, though it can be a bit difficult to read because the hands are silvery metal that don't always show up very well against the pale face. It's done with my .25mm rapidograph.
Challenge 78 is related in that it is to draw something that is a souvenir of somewhere you've been. In 2005 we were lucky enough to spend a summer in California and, during that time, make a trip to Hawaii. We've been to California quite a few times -- in fact Liz and I lived there for a year before Sarah was born -- but this was our first time in Hawaii. This is a Kukui Nut Lei; we all got one at the hotel we stayed at on Maui. It was a wonderful trip. The only downside is that Sarah now wants to spend every holiday there!
I've decided to do a watercolour based on the graphite portrait of Liz that I've been showing here. This is a new challenge for me; I've never tried painting a portrait before, so it's a bit scary. In fact, I didn't even have much idea how to mix a good skin tone; in the end I found the yellow ochre a alizarin crimson are commonly used, so that's what I've tried, with the addition of cobalt blue for shadows. This is just a first wash, there's a lot more to do.
I think I might declare this finished. At any rate, I'm going to to leave it for a few days and then come back to it. It didn't turn out too badly in the end, though I don't think I'll be using this type of paper for drawing on again. I had to resort to using my .3mm mechanical pencil to get into the small crevices in the paper!
Here's another update. At one point today I almost gave up and started again on different paper as I'm having so much trouble with this. It would be great for something that had lots of texture, but I don't really want my wife's skin to have lots of texture! In the end I thought I'd keep going; it will be good practice for another version, if nothing else. I've started work on the hair as well as changing the right eye yet again and doing a bit more work on the mouth.
I've not had much drawing time this week, so I haven't made much progress on this drawing, but I thought I'd post what I've done so far. I've corrected the eyes, though I notice that in the process the irises are now not round. But that's easily fixed. The mouth needs more work, but as I said, that's the hardest part! And the hair...I might not have mentioned that Liz has curly hair...
Here are a couple of torches. I'm amazed I could find two; normally torches are one of those things that I can never find when I want one, even though I must have bought loads of them! These are both done with a Rotring Art Pen.
I'm very upset because Liverpool were cruelly robbed of victory in the Champions League Final by AC Milan. (I'm talking about football, or soccer if you're in the US, in case you're wondering!) Although I live in Oxford, I'm originally from Liverpool, so this is a BIG DEAL. I didn't think it would be a good idea to work on my drawing of Liz in this mood! However, I needed something to take my mind off the pain, so I did a couple of quick sketches. Quite why I thought it would be a good idea to draw a burning candle using sepia and black ink, I'm not sure...just shows what my mental state is like! The shoe is a memory of a holiday in Hawaii in 2005. You couldn't get them in the UK at the time, but now they are everywhere, so I don't feel so special wearing them! But they still remind me of being on the beach in Maui...heaven! These are also my responses to EDM 1 and EDM 110.
