Pen and Ink

Hi there!

This last post marks the end of the current session of Life Group Drawings, as this Monday now sees us have a break for a few weeks. Trouble for me is that when it starts up again I have other commitments during the summer, so it may be a couple of months before I can get back into it. Never mind, can't be helped.

Not a very long post in typing terms for you today, except to say that these 2 works are done using  waterproof ink pens on Bristol Board - which is basically a slightly thicker, smoother paper surface, but one which I do find very nice to work on. Try it sometime.

  

 Personally, the one on the left is my favourite of the two, and I have to admit that I am rather proud of that one. The sketch on the right is not bad, but the model's shoulders look a little twisted to me now, plus the gown and it's folds were starting to cause me a problem. In the short time given, there is only so much you can get down, and I didn't want to become too bogged down with the gown. I suppose in the end I got a little too involved and didn't concentrate on the model and her shoulders enough.

Ink colours are sepia, sanguine and black; I think that these three colours are enough to cover almost any situation that I am likely to encounter. In fact, the sanguine is almost like working with the coloured materials of some of the Old Masters - just go look at some of Da Vinci's works to see what I mean! Not that my works are that good of course, but it does give you an extra something.

Tell you what though - I have some old parchment coloured paper somewhere, and I may just have a go at seeing what the two look like together!

Right - other than an acrylic that has been waiting for completion for months, I have no more news, except to say that I do have a page on Facebook, and thank everyone who has joined that too. All your support certainly does help me, and as I have said before - I do appreciate it. Thank you!

So until next time - enjoy your art, whatever it is.

Paul

Patience + Practice = Pleasing

Welcome everyone - hope you are doing fine.

Firstly I have to welcome a new follower - Sam; thanks for making the effort and joining Sam, I hope you get something out of reading some of the posts and maybe have a go in your own time.

Since posting the Eye Of Horus circumstances have restricted me in some ways, and the work I have been doing has suffered as such, so things are a little slow. Two watercolours I have been asked to do have had a few practice runs to try and get them right, but I have just not been able to. Patience is one thing I do have, and it will enable me to get there in the end.

That is something you must all have too - if it's not quite right then don't worry - go back later and look at what you could not master the last time and have another go. If you are set on doing one particular subject, say landscapes, and you struggle with trees - then work on them. The advice is - practice on what you CAN'T do - not what you CAN.

That's one reason I go to the Life Drawing Group, to improve my ability and style of drawing the human body; if it's something you cannot do then keep having a go until you are satisfied. In my past postings the one thing repeated is that practice time is never, ever wasted.

Even simple things can help you, like last year I sat out in the garden and found this "bug" sat on a plant - so I got my pens out and had a go at sketching it. No it's not perfect by any means, but the point I am making is almost anything can be a good subject to have a practice on - and in this case it's modelling fees were free! Plus, with wildlife - they could move at any time, so it also helps with getting your subject down onto your surface as quickle as possible.

In this case, as an opposite to the bug, one day I was sat indoors on a dull day and simply decided to have a go at this small piece of drawer furniture.

Yes - some of the wooden mount the main subject is fitted onto are not exactly straight, but that is another thing to learn to draw as you develop.

There is plenty of shading on this sketch, highlights and darks - tonal values and probably more than enough information to have a good go at when I feel like putting it on to paper properly. The only thing really missing is any reference to colour: the wood, the knocker, the plate. If needed they could be made into any combination I wanted.

So keep having a go at whatever you fancy, whenever you feel you are up to the task of taking it on. Any subject, no matter how large or small is there just waiting for YOU to interpret it in YOUR way.

Until next time - whatever your art - please enjoy it.

Paul

The Eye of Horus

Welcome to you all.

Here is my latest completed work - an acrylic version of the Eye of Horus - hope you like it!

This work I have done on canvass textured paper which is A3 in size, using Reeves Acrylic paints, and lovingly applied with my favourite brushes for this type of painting - Rosemary & Co's Shiraz synthetic brushes!

At the moment it is neither framed nor mounted, but I have been working on it over the last couple of weeks and some of my friends said they could not wait to see it - so here you all go!




Hope it's something you like, as I have toyed with the idea of doing a series of works on ancient people's in countries I have visited.

Anyway - as usual - whatever your art, please enjoy it.

Paul

Watercolours and Waterproof Ink

Greetings!

Hope each and every one of you are well and thanks for logging back in to the blog.

I am pleased to announce that I have a new member - Carol; a very warm welcome to you and I certainly appreciate your efforts, hope you enjoy your time here.

As for things new, I now have a Facebook (FB) Group - EdrickArt - where I hope to attract people to have a look at the website and blog. It is already doing quite well after being started this mid-week. To those people who are already aware of my sites etc I apologise, but in the modern times in which we live (says he sounding old), you just have to make the most of the opportunities that are presented to you. Hopefully I will not appear to be too much in people's faces, but if I am, then I apologise - I am only doing my job as a non-techie amateaur artist trying to show my work

This blog contains below a little mix for you to hopefully enjoy.

The first two works I am showing  here are a couple more of my sketches I did recently in Kenya.
This first is a study of two small palm trees, situated alongside a good sized pond with hundreds of small fish in. A small A5 sized waterlour pad, student's quality paint and cheap synthetic fibre brushes are all I used for this. Who says all your materials have to be expensive - especially if you are taking them abroad!
 

This is a waterproof ink sketch done on a small A5 pad of cartridge paper. It depicts a local fishing vessel, anchored up at the side of a small reef that stretched out along most of the local coastline.

It's worked using a combination of sepia and black coloured inks, with plenty of the white cartridge paper left to give the impression of highlights in the bright sunlight. Most of the boat was drawn using an 01 sized pen, with some details done with a heavier 03 size.

This is done in waterproof inks on cartridge paper, using sanguine, sepia and black coloured inks.
It's strange how when you draw in pencil and then rub out and re-draw and work away, it can take you ages to get it right. But do the same thing in ink and for some reason you don't seem to make as many big mistakes. Any corrections look like part of the original work - which I find quite wierd. Perhaps we should all work this way all of the time!

This next work is obviously along the same lines, and is also of the same pose (bit of a giveaway if you look closely!) Same materials used exactly, but on this one I have tried to give it a bit more substance by giving more support to the figure. On the above work you can see a suggestion of a bed or pillow, on this one you see them. I also had some trouble with this pose with the folded under left leg, no matter how I tried it just wouldn't come good, but never mind - it shows we are all not perfect by any means, and just need to keep practicing!

Right - I think that's enough for now, so I will try and concentrate my efforts on tomorrow's events - hopefully it's back at the Life Drawing Group, this time with our male model. So, until next time - whatever your art - enjoy it!.

Paul

Life Drawing

Hello everyone.

Last night I was back at the Life Drawing Group, held in a nearby town. Despite having every intention of going with my soft pastels which I have not used in what's seems ages, as my lift was on it's way, I changed tack and decided to go along with the ink pens I had been using on holiday. As a back up though, my pastel gear was packed in my bag!

The opening quick starting poses I took on with the ink pens, simply to loosen up, but enjoyed it so much I just carried on working on every pose with them. Although the pastels were laid out to one side, they never got touched, except to put them back away!

One thing I must put my hand up and admit to, is that portraits as such are not my forte. In fact, I am not happy with the vast amount of faces I do. Loose figures are more my type of work, and the Life Drawing Group is helping me with this type of figure drawing in a big way. Below is one of the ink sketches I did last night.

Hopefully it shows that even though there are things you cannot tackle to your satisfaction, or just genuinely struggle with, you can still produce something that is starting to look reasonable and is maybe a base for a future work.

The very fast warm-up sketches help to get us to loosen up and focussed on the task in-hand. Admittedly they almost always turn out to be very poor indeed, but no matter - they are there for a purpose, and do their job.

This is one of the first sketches that I did after doing the warm-ups that I thought had some potential. Hopefully it gives a nice image with some interest for people looking at it, but - if you look closely you should notice from some of my previous postings that I have committed one of the faults that I tell you to try and avoid!

Yes, the model is not sat on anything - she is "floating in mid air" - not anchored to the "ground" or any base. Our model Suzanne was actually sat on a wooden cube with a large soft cushion on top. No excuses - I failed miserably!



Right then, enough for today, another posting tomorrow probably. This afternoon I am helping at the children's art group, then tonight it's a relaxing session at the adults group. Before I went away I had started an acrylic on one of those Egyptian eye symbols - sorry, I don't know what they are called - and so I want to try and finish, or at least make good progress on it.

So, until next time - whatever your art - enjoy it.

Paul

Kenya Travels

Hi everyone, and a warm welcome as usual.

Hopefully I can rub off some of that flippin' hot Kenyan sun on you all  - up to 33C at times! Far too hot for me, but there's enough shade about, so it's no problem really.

As promised last week, now I have got myself all gathered up and back together, I have managed to scan and upload some of the sketches and watercolours I did whilst away.

I hope that it gives you some idea of how I like to work - a mix of little watercolour rough works and some fairly detailed waterproof pen work. All my sketches I like to do in pencil first, correcting any mistakes with the soft putty rubber, then go over them with the ink pens which are waterproof. This stops the soft pencil from smudging, and helps my sketches survive until I get back home (at least!). Some I keep purely as pen sketches, some I use alongside watercolours - pen and wash.

OK then - here are some pages taken directly from my sketch and watercolour books I used recently.

This detailed sketch shows part of the natural foliage roofing used on the buildings - it lasts about 5 years I was told. Once there is a break or hole in it, then damp gets in and gradually spreads. Always a problem when there are monkeys around I would suppose! The ridge is covered with overlayed pieces of tin, each about 3ft long, and painted in a reddish brown colour, which the sun burns off, no doubt rather quickly. 

This ink pen sketch shows a small variety of nests from Sociable Weaver birds, a fantastic, gregarious, mainly yellow little bird, which once you sit down and they see you are not going to disturb them, quickly get on with their business. It really is amazing just how close to them you can get, and I was lucky enough to sit and watch one bird make the best part of his nest from scratch. Truly fascinating, and I think one of the main wonders of nature.

I like to travel with 2 small pads - one watercolour, and the other a small A6 sketching pad. A small travel watercolour set, and a small selection of waterproof ink pens, putty rubber and a couple of 2B pencils with a small collapesable water bucket complet the set. Water can always be found locally. So there you are, hope you get some inspiration and ideas from the rough field stuff I have done, and have the patience to wait until I have put some of them into action.

Until next time - whatever your art - enjoy it.

Paul

Jambo!

Hi everyone!

I'm just typing a quick post to let you all know that we have returned from 2 weeks away in Kenya (hence the word Jambo, which sort of means "hello, how you doing?") so once I get my stuff sorted it will be service as usual, probably after the weekend.

Yes I have tales to tell, pictures to post, and lots of catching up to do, so till then, whatever your art - please enjoy it responsibly!!!!

Paul