Open Art Competition WIP Update

Yesterday was another creatively busy day for me, although I managed to make time for a nap and to meet Anita for my regular fix of Costa Coffee hot chocolate! In the morning I primed my Footprints piece with gesso. As you can see, I decided to coat all of it and not just the sea area.


It took quite a while to dry, so it was quite late in the evening when I painted it.


You might have noticed there is a little white area around the crisp packet corner. This is a potential disaster area. The plaster is quite thin over the top of the crisp packet, and it's been threatening to crumble away (there isn't a whole packet under there by the way, just a corner, to give the impression that the rest of it is buried). I have applied a thick layer of PVA glue and I am hoping that when it eventually dries it will hold it in place. So I wait, with bated breath.

Next step (I hope) - apply the sand!

Yesterday

Yesterday was an incredibly creative day for me. As exhausted as I was after mixing all that plaster and applying it to the wood, I had the urge to do some drawing last night too.




This is Seaneen. Isn't she beautiful? I love her little face and big eyes.

Ok, so maybe my first portrait wasn't a fluke? But I still only have the confidence to draw them in my little sketch book. Looking at my drawing now, I can see things that I should have done differently, but every new piece is part of a learning process and I'm sure/I hope I'll improve with practice. I think what I need to work on next is hair - I'm so lazy when it comes to the hair!


Back to the Footprints piece tonight. I shall prime the sea area with gesso and decide what to do about the sand area.


Edit, Friday morning: Well I didn't do my gesso-ing last night; I was too exhausted. But I decided to give Seaneen some shoulders instead of leaving her head floating around on the page!

Open Art Competition WIP

Remember this piece?


At the time of posting it I explained that it was a prototype for a larger version on wood, and that I wouldn’t start it until the following week because I was waiting for materials. Well that was over two months ago! The larger version is supposed to be my entry into the Open Arts Competition run by the local council for our area. Seeing as the entry date is this coming Monday I decided to pull my finger out and get started on it!

I got the piece of wood out on Monday evening, ready to make a start, only I noticed it didn’t quite look “right”. I got the tape measure out, and sure enough the piece of wood was wider at one end! This is a problem because I wanted to get the piece framed, and I don’t know anywhere that makes wonky ones! The other problem I had is that I was running out of time and I wasn’t sure if the framers could frame it before next Monday.

Aha!

I decided to buy a ready made frame and then buy a piece of wood to fit that! You can imagine my delight when I went into the shop and stumbled across a frame with broken glass in it! Seeing as I didn’t need the glass I thought I would try my luck at getting a discount – and I got it for half price!

Next step was getting a piece of wood to fit, so I took the board out of the back of the frame and took it to a timber yard to get a piece to match. I got home and tried it in the frame… success! So far so good!

I primed the wood this afternoon with PVA glue, and this evening I have mixed and applied the plaster (remembering to leave a gap at the edge so that the wood will still fit into the frame), and moulded the contours. I have made an incredible amount of mess but I have had so much fun!

Now I wait ‘til tomorrow for it to dry. I’m undecided whether to prime the plaster with gesso and then paint it a sandy colour before gluing on the sand (in case some of it comes off in time), or whether to just glue the sand straight onto the plaster. You will no doubt find out tomorrow!

This is how it looks so far:


It measures 50cm x 75cm - or 19.5 inches x 29.5) I now wish that I had put the footprints at a slightly different angle so that I could fit more on! (They look like weird footprints - but they're mine!) The rubbish in the sand is the "modern twist" that I had mentioned previously. Both the Coke can and the corner of the crisp packet sticking out of the sand have a logo on them of a person putting rubbish in a bin. The other piece of rubbish sticking out is a polystyrene box.

Found Art Tuesday

Ok, I realise that this is an incredibly lazy piece of found art, but please don't be too hard on me - I've been feeling poorly and I've had a very busy day! (I drew this yesterday, so my busy day has nothing to do with it, I just want some sympathy!)


This was for the "Forget" theme a couple of weeks ago. I knew instantly what I was going to draw, I just hadn't got round to doing it. How did I come up with this idea so quickly? Because it has actually happened to me! Thankfully I hadn't shut my front door behind me before I realised that my legs were a bit chilly, because I didn't have a key to get back in!

By the way, that's "Tuesday" written on her pants!

Clarification

I’m having a slightly paranoid moment, so please bear with me with this post.

In my post about my first life drawing class I said that I have never been able to draw faces, and this is true. When I wracked my brain I remembered that I had drawn a few faces previously, but these were very quick sketches drawn in crayon or chalk, and it was so many years ago that I had completely forgotten about them. But I’ve never been able to draw faces in pencil. This is why I chose to draw my first portrait in my little sketch book, rather than a larger, separate piece of paper, because I didn't expect it to be any good.

It’s not unusual for me to feel excited about a completed piece of my own art, especially when I feel I have accomplished something new that I didn’t know I could do. Often this feeling wears off later when my eyes are opened and I realise it’s not actually that fantastic. So when I completed my first portrait, although I was very pleased with the outcome, I wasn’t sure if it was really any good or not. This is why I asked if anyone could recognise the person.

In the mean time I have shown the picture to a few people who have recognised the person straight away. This has left me worrying that people who read this blog may conclude that my statements such as “I can’t draw faces” and “can you tell who it is?” are displays of false modesty. Let me assure you, as pleased as I was with the outcome of my portrait, I am genuinely shocked that it is good enough for people to recognise who it is.

Now I’m too scared to do another drawing in case it’s not as good!

Practicing Faces – Guess Who?

Last week I spent my time meeting up with a couple of friends who would usually be at work, so I spent no time being creative at all. I have, however, been studying pictures of faces as that is something I need to work on, and a couple of days ago I bought myself a set of pencils, ready for my next life drawing class. Last night I decided to have a little go at drawing a face – can you see who it is?

(My husband told me "That's really good, I could see straight away who it is - it's Popeye isn't it?" !)


Actually, I've just realised this is my first proper drawing of a face, ever - I've just impressed myself! :)


Drawn with my shiny new 6B sketch stick, in my pretty little sketch book!

My First Life Drawing Class

Ok, so yesterday I went to my first life drawing class ever. Since I first started painting in January, everyone has been telling me I need life drawing experience and that it will really help me to progress. My friend Anita occasionally models for classes, and she really put my mind at ease by telling me exactly what to expect.

It’s taken me a few months to get used to the idea of staring at a naked person, but just as Anita promised, once you start drawing you don’t see “nakedness”, you only see a subject – lines, shape, tone etc. In fact, the most nerve wracking thing for me was drawing in pencil! The last time I recall using a pencil was when I was about 15!

I started by drawing the outline, but I was really nervous about trying to add shade. I tried a couple of times by starting with the shade under her arm, but it just looked like she had a hairy armpit! John, the tutor, came to the rescue and lent me a softer pencil, and once I realised I could smudge the pencil it was much easier. It actually took me less time to shade the drawing than it did to draw the outline!

Now, the head was a different matter entirely. I must have drawn her face 50 times and then erased it again. In the end John drew that for me just before I started the shading. When I think about it, I have never been able to draw faces. That is obviously something I will need to work on.



B and 2B pencil on A5 heavyweight paper