Artists Blog

My little kingfishers have made it into next year’s calender, supporting the Whitfords Volunteer Sea Rescue. And they herald my birthday month of March – I’m so pleased. The original painting was 41cm x 51cm (16″ x 20″), and when I saw it reduced to such a tiny image, I thought I’d give a real miniature drawing a go.

This is approx 2″ x 1.5 ” in size, drawn with pencils and a smidge of white ink. The kingfisher still towers Godzilla-like over the kangaroo & emu on the 50c piece. The colours are a bit off with night photography, the yellow is nowhere near as bright. I learnt that you need VERY sharp pencils to make this work, and a good pair of eyes. I always vow to draw during daylight hours, but here I am again almost midnight…

A day of constant thunder, lightning and rain. So much lightning that the airport was closed for hours. There was low sunshine making a welcome appearance late this afternoon, but it is a brief reprieve – hail and squally thunder for tonight. Whilst waiting for the storm I pulled out the pencil tin to sketch some Rainbow Lorikeet feathers. I also used an ancient mechanical pencil I have had since highschool. 3 decades on it’s still going strong.

I haven’t played with pencils for ages. They were my weapon of choice all through high school – I was rather scared of paint. My technique is very similiar to how I paint – lots of light glazes of  transparent colour.

During the brief sunshine this afternoon I spied a visitor I haven’t seen or heard from in a while. Can you see him?

Yes, my old friend the Motorbike Frog is king of the fish pond.

To hear how he got his name, click Motorbike Frog.

Perpetual twilight was the order of the day. Here is Beaumaris Beach at lunchtime today.

Time for a cup of tea whilst storm clouds brew…

There’s always something special about using a new writing or drawing implement for the first time. I’ve just finished an ink sketch with a new pewter and feather quill I bought at our last Calligraphy Guild meeting. As you know I’m a sucker for anything feathered. Drawing a bee at night, even with the aid of a real specimen (sadly drowned in the pool) & magnifying glass, wing vein patterns are a true challenge. A dragonfly was very helpful for the finer details.

At the Guild party I was also honoured to recieve a beautiful hand turned pen holder made from the Native Box tree sourced from the Goldfields. Thanks Gaye, it is truly beautiful and I feel complelled to get into my much negelected calligraphy this week!

Bees everywhere in the garden – such an inspiration watching them work so tirelessly. This is one of my favourite bee photos from my garden. Going back through my collection I realised I have dozens of them!

Hope you all have a creative happy week ahead!

You may remember last month Jez suffered a serious accident. He had just completed and exhibited Part 1 of his Yr 12 Major Art Work, the ballpoint pen self portrait (above right and below).

Last week he exhibited Part 2 at the Art Awards, and yesterday won the People’s Choice Award. Below are more detailed images, please excuse the uneven lighting.

It’s been a huge year for him, with only a week left of High School and Final Exams looming.

Working from photos taken standing clothed in the pool and bath, it was atfer his accident that he decided to add the “extras” to his final piece. It really gave him so much to think about. You’ll see what I mean from the last reference photo below. I still can’t look at that image without feeling overwhelming fear.

Fingers crossed for smooth sailing through exams! 

This week my local beach was full of interesting things. It’s been a while since I’ve seen the floating Violet Shells – these were used in days past to produce the colour purple. A quick sketch with purple ballpoint pen was fun. Sadly I dropped and broke one of the shells, but it did show me how luscious the purple is inside.

 There was also the most amazingly delicate coral formation, like porcelain filigree work – easily the most beautiful ocean treasure I’ve found in a long time.

Whilst I was peering into the rockpools there was a buzzing in the distance.

Quickly followed by more giant Man Bees. They seemed to be everywhere!

They were doing fancy turns, racing each other and just enjoying the freedom of birds. But with propellers.

Then off they went, one after the other, up the beach and out of sight.

It was a lot more peaceful when they had gone….

It’s been a very difficult few days.

My son Jez had a serious accident on Friday and is in the High Dependency Unit in hospital. He’s doing OK and is keeping his spirits up.

 Just a few days ago we attended the opening of the Angelico Exhibition in the city where his ballpoint pen self portrait is on show.

I won’t be around for a while, but will let you know how he’s getting on a bit later.

Thanks everyone.

8″ x 8″ Coloured pencil on drafting film

I have had a sheet of drafting film and a box of prismacolor pencils sitting in the art supply cupboard for a year now. I finally got them out and had a play.

The polyester surface easily took the pencil, and was just as easily removed if required, leaving no marks or indentations. I think drafting film and pencils are my new best friends – thanks to Karen Hull for the recommendation!

On a more solemen note, my thoughts go out to all of those suffering the Queensland floods. Friends who are stuck with empty shelves and mud everywhere – stay strong and keep fighting.

We’re so excited to see Jeremy’s work featured in the current issue of Fine Art and Decorative Painting magazine (Vol 18 No 5). Apparently he is the youngest contributor to the magazine that they’ve had.

Jez’s graphite portrait, “Dad’s Derby Day”( featured in an earlier post), is now detailed in an 8 page step-by-step tutorial.

He’s shyly over the moon.

Hang onto something long enough and it’ll be cool again one day.

My 60′s Minolta SR1, bought as an old second camera back when I was a teenager (1/4 century ago!) has now found it’s way into my teenage son’s hands. “Wow! Why didn’t you tell me you had this before!” he said. Now armed with film, he’s becoming familiar with all the manual camera settings that were so frustrating back then. Manual focusing for one. More on that later.

At a recent garage sale I picked up an old A3 leather portfolio and a tiny hardback copy of a how to sketch book from 1950. Beautiful gestural drawings from the ballets of New York and London in the 40′s.

It brought back all the memories of life drawing sketches at uni – 2 and 1 minute sketches, the terrifying 30 second capture, and drawing without looking at the paper. I wished I had kept some now, but thought at the time they were best left at uni.

“Economy of Line” is something that has stuck in my head from those days – I need to practise it more. This little treasure of a book (picked up for 99cents), is adamant that you should not sacrifice movement for detail in your sketches. If using your eye to take a “snapshot” of an image to draw from memory, capture the essence of action, not the superfluous detail.

Later on the Swan river, another ballet was taking place.

So many passes in front of the city – she must have practised for over an hour just whilst we were there.

The Swan river is a great place for the camera. I with my digitals, and Jez with the fully manual (but cool) “antique”, below. I’ll share the results once we get the film developed.

The sun is just setting on Queen’s Birthday long weekend, and it was full of wonderful things.

The Calligrapher’s Guild of Western Australia held a workshop dedicated to learning a beautiful hybrid writing “hand” – a blend of Celtic and Italic.

The Guild President Gaye was our esteeemed tutor, and patiently explained time and time again “to look at the internal white spaces, not the black lines”.

Symmetry in our “arches” was what we were striving for, but it’s a whole lot harder than you may think! The abundance of information was absorbed all the easier with the imbibing of delicious baked goods and soothing teas.

There were beautiful calligraphic implements being used, like this glass calligraphy pen,

and this Italian “weighted” pen with a heavy decorated brass ferrule – how could your writing be anything but wonderful using this! Here Guild member Trish is getting used to the feel of luxury writing.

And to prove a point, the owner of the beautiful Italian pen (Gaye our President), brought in some stunning commissions she has been working on to inspire us on to great calligraphic heights. Here is a tiny snippet of her work:

The Guild has decided to embark on a print project for the end of the year. Members have each chosen an alphabet letter (some of us in a moment of madness chose 2!) which we will excute in a calligraphic/drawn/painted/mixed media/anything goes way for the end of November. These then will be put together to form a complete alphabet which will be printed as a poster for our last magazine for the year.

If anyone wishes to joing the Guild (and you can be an overseas member), fell free to contact me and join in the calligraphic fun. Still some good letters left, but get in quick!