Saturday 24 December 2011

Drawings: Some Christmas Holly

Pencil on Cartridge Paper

I created this piece today, especially for the festive season, of some holly leaves and berries. Drawing Santa or a snowman didn’t really seem ‘arty’ enough but I thought I could get away with this simple but seasonal sketch.
I used pencils to draw with for this piece, creating a rough sketch first to get an idea of the composition, before adding details like the veins and shadow.
One last thing to say and that’s Merry Christmas!

Friday 23 December 2011

Drawings: Jugs and Jars

Biro on A4 Cartridge Paper

This is a still life piece that I have just done for a drawing project on my art course. I was focusing on the ellipses of the lids and cylindrical shapes of the various vessels.
I used some biros pens to create this piece, varying the tones by use of cross hatching. I used the hatching strokes almost like contours, following the shapes of the cylinders; I find this helps to give the objects some body.
After finishing this piece I then altered my view of the objects slightly and created a second piece from my new position to see how the shapes and ellipses changed. I think I prefer the first piece but I found the process of doing the second one quite interesting.
By the way, I realise that there aren’t any jugs in this piece but that is the name of the exercise.

Biro on A4 Cartridge Paper

Tuesday 20 December 2011

Sketchbook: Rainy Archways

Indian Ink in A4 Sketchbook

I created this piece in one of my sketchbooks a while ago of the inside of a ruined cathedral. I really liked the drama of the place, this great gothic ruin in the rain, forming huge puddles in the middle of the stone floor.
I used some Indian ink, beginning with a light wash and working some darker tones into it while it was still wet. This let some of the tones bleed into each other. I quite like the effect, all the elements working together to create quite a simple but likeable piece of art.

Thursday 15 December 2011

Sketchbook: A Wintery Watercolour Tree

Watercolour in A5 Sketchbook

I’m being a bit inconsistent with my last post, but this time I thought I’d be faithful to the current season and put up a rather more wintery looking piece. This maple tree caught my eye with its bare branches looking almost skeletal, just looking at it makes me feel cold and shivery.
This was just a quick sketchbook piece so I used watercolours, sticking to yellow ochre for the light patches and a dark brown for the shadowy tones.

Tuesday 13 December 2011

Paintings: Summery Tree


Acrylics on Cartridge Paper 14"x13"
Bit of an antithesis to the current season but I am putting this piece up as a reminder of how colourful and alive the trees were in summer compared to now, and because I quite like it.
I used palette knives to apply all the paint on this piece, this was the first time I’d used them on paper, so it was an interesting experience, I still prefer using them on board or canvas though.
To start the piece off, I used some blue acrylic mixed with white to show the patches where that warm, clear summer sky would be peaking through the foliage of the tree. I then started on the branches to get the shape of the tree before beginning the fun part; the leaves. I went a bit crazy with these which is probably why the final result is a lot rougher than I had anticipated but I am not too disappointed with it. I put quite a bit of yellow into the leaves because they often seem to have a yellowish gleam to them where they reflect the sun.


Sunday 11 December 2011

Still Life: Fruit in Ink

Indian Ink in Sketchbook

This is a piece I created quite a while ago of some fruit I arranged on a chopping board, I was reminded of it because of the artwork I put up a few days ago where I was looking at the artist Paul Cézanne. I actually did this piece in a sketchbook, quite evident from the page fold in the middle, but I wanted to put it up as a still life piece.
I did this piece of work using Indian ink where I started by adding some of the details using a fine nib, concentrating solely on the shapes, following the body of the fruit almost like creating contours. I then mixed some water with a couple of drops of ink that I put on as a wash to try and create a mid tone. It is a very simple piece but I think it makes quite a nice piece of art.

Friday 9 December 2011

Drawings: Cezanne Skull

Charcoal on A5 Paper
There isn’t an awful lot to explain about this piece, but I really wanted to put a piece up before the weekend. It is simply a skull I drew from a painting, ‘Pyramid of Skulls’, quite a famous Cézanne piece of four skulls stacked in a pile. I used charcoal because I wanted to try and play around with some of the tones, but as I said it is quite a simple piece.
Also as you may have noticed, I’ve played around with the design of the blog a bit, hope you like it, might change it completely again depending on how I feel.

Wednesday 7 December 2011

Back Catalogue: An Eerie Ruin in Watercolour and Mixed Media

Mixed Media on Cartridge Paper

Been a while since I put anything up on this blog, I shall try not to leave it so long in the future.
This is a piece I created a while ago as part of a project on Ruin and Decay that I think I have mentioned in one or two previous posts. I chose this ruined tower that I believe was part of a castle keep perched on top of a little hill as the subject for a mixed media painting. It had quite a serious, almost spooky feel to the place that I wanted to try and communicate in this piece.
I went quite ambitious with the scale of this piece being just a little bit smaller than A1 size. I roughly plotted out all the bits of shadows and darker areas in some Indian ink and then diluted some more to create a wash. When I was happy with this layer I proceeded to work into it with some watercolour paints, trying not being too strict with my palette. I also added some marks in crayons and some chalk, and finished it off with some last details in ink with a thin brush.