La Toilette No 1 and No 2

I enjoyed using my oil crayons and watercolours to paint these expeimental works on black paper. I used white gouache to create a strong contrast and add strong design elements to the composition

Not Chosen for Exhibition... Ah well!

Poole Open 2014. I enjoyed the challenge but was rejected and now dejected! Anyway, I enjoyed painting it and it has pleasant associations for us so will be hung on our wall. I like the dog too!

Here's my entry

Charente Maritime Pastels

I was looking through my portfolio today and found these pastel studies of scenes in the Charente Maritime. 

I though they made a rather interesting set of work

The sunflowers were captured in the evening light. 

The third landscape is imaginary and was preparatory work for a larger painting.

Poole Open Competition ...Dog Studies

I have just entered the Poole Open 2014 Competition. I painted people enjoying themselves on the shore of Poole Bay. It was interesting to work on as it was quite a large canvas and I had to distort the perspective of the bay to get all the images in that I wanted to show...boys kicking water and splashing each other, people messing around with boats, Jen in her ladies team canoe racing boat, Jon windsurfing..

They are tiny 3.5" x 2.5" studies


I wanted a dog in the foreground with a stick or ball so I did some small studies... I really enjoyed them as a subject but it was a challenge to get them looking friendly and not evil, especially as they were showing teeth.

They are painted in acrylic on heavy watercolour paper.

Competition judging is on friday.



Heres a larger a3 pastel study of a dog I did a couple of years ago in my sketchpad when I was practising drawing fur. There is an owl's eye too that I found in my sketchpad which I did at the same time. Amazing feathers on an owl.

Mosaic

Heres a mosaic I started to work on but abandonned based on Van Gogh's work. I liked it but wanted to produce my own scene of an Italian lake (which I have nearly finished). So I disassembled it and re-used the expensive Venetian Smalti (bought whilst on Murano) or my new scene.

And here's another mosaic group project that I am involved in, The barbeque fire and scene with the pond and birds is my creation. Its a question of whether it will be finished before the winter weather destroys it.

Murano painting and Textile ramblings

What a lot has happened since I last posted. There has been so much going on but I've managed to paint. Here's the latest I am working on from our trip to Venice in early summer. Its of Murano....

 

And here's a tapestry I made on my Masterweaver loom (which is really an 8 shaft caplable of taking textured yarns in the warp and not for tapestry at all). Think I might sell this loom soon but nobody knows what a Masterweaver is so who would buy? Hubby wants me to keep it.

 

I don't weave much now. I finished my 5 years at Art college with a Masters in Textile Design and spent quite a few years earning my living in the textile world, selling yarn designs, knitting pattern designs, bespoke woven lengths, knitwear (Harrods-shawls and ponchos) and translating knitting patterns and my favourite....textile art... here's an example of my textile Art made for Lloyds Bank Stourbridge about Blackcountry Industry.

  and here are some of my huge 30cm beautiful tassels made to match fabrics and commissioned by a local shop.I made lots of these and signed and dated each one. I wonder if they will ever turn up on an Antiques Roadshow one day?

I won't ever be able to make another tassel like these as I used to twist the yarn for the ropes using the height of our three story Victorian house (which we sold).

Lamb Drawing

I love Henry moore's drawings of sheep. I am working on drawing studies towards alarger work. Here is a minature credit-card sized study in a variety of Derwent pencils, onyx, graphite, charcoal, watercolour, carbon and chinagraph.