Tag: artist

Derwentwater plein air – First attempts

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I've mentioned before that I recently moved to Cumbria in England. This has given my spirit an excellence burst of inspiration and energy and has allowed some of my creativity to come out. I'm still making lots of colour charts ( I'll show you my most recent one in another post shortly!) but I'm also getting outdoors while the weather permits and doing some sketching with watercolours.
I visited Derwentwater recently ( home to the Derwent sketching pencils, I did visit the museum and their shop but I didn't buy more pencils…I have to use the ones I've got already before I allow myself to buy even more!) and here are some of the sketches I managed on the day. I'm really pleased with the day's outcome and felt that I've taken a solid step forward to where I want to be as an artist with this.


This is the palette I put together for my outing

  • Lemon yellow
  • Cadmium yellow
  • Yellow ochre
  • Burnt sienna
  • Van Dyke Brown
  • French Ultramarine
  • Cerulean
  • Quinacridone magenta
  • Cadmium red
  • Sap green
  • Hookers green light
  • Payne grey
  • Ivory black

I felt that I mainly ended up using lemon yellow and yellow ochre mixed with all the combinations of the blues and greens to figure out the greens. Payne grey was my favourite for the clouds and water with cerulean for the sky. Having the readymade brown was handy to have, since I was using a very small mixing tray. I tested the colbalt turquoise but felt that cerulean and the Ultramarine were enough of a range for the palette

This is the colour range that I got from the set, I wanted a big range of greens from earthy to lush but not too many blue-greens as I know that I would mainly be trying to capture the forests and shrub land on the mountains. Very limited purples too which was fine as the heather isn't out yet. I also totally stopped round say greens name when I was labelling, oops!

On to the sketches! I warmed up with some pencil sketches before just sloshing paint about for the rest of the day.

I feel that I need more practice with my tonal values and compositions as I set up my sketches but I'm still really pleased with these ones and happy to share them with you all. If you've visited Derwentwater and did any sketches, post a like in the comments so I can see your stuff!

Getting out there

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Turns out that working with Charcoal on large pieces of paper makes a lot of mess, which can be frowned upon when living with others.

So, my experiments didn’t last long but it was still good get my hand moving again and once I have a studio space set up again, I will continue my experimental mark making. In the meantime I have been getting out for walks in the Lake District and Northumberland.

I have included just a few sketches here. I mainly fell back to take photos as I explored new areas which was a lot quicker as I walked and gawped at things but didn’t help my practice that much. Plus my cameras pretty naff so the photos never do it justice.

Still I have managed a few blobby paintings as my first shaky steps back into things.

 

Gelts wood 13aug17

Rickerby Aug 2017

rickerby-notes-aug-2017.jpg

Starting Running

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It is a crisp cold day outside and i’ve delayered myself into a hoodie and running trousers to get out there and run. Everyone I pass has layers and wooly hats and gloves and i’m bizzarely happy that I look so different. I see the smiles that play on their faces, wondering that someones actually going running in the cold like this and I remember my own thoughts when I saw people doing what i’m planning, something along the lines of “I could never do that!”

I met up with my friend and we managed a simple run around the park. I want to share this with you readers, as I want to explore it in more detail; namely the ways how it helps other aspects of my life like the drawing and mindfulness i’m trying to cultivate into my routine.

I’ve read before that many runners go into a meditative state, where they’re only mindful of their run and their body. It’s just them and the road. It always reminded me of the artist, it’s just them and their canvas. Both have to focus their mind and energies into achieving something that takes skill, patience, and focus.

As we start to run and my lungs begin to feel uncomfortable, it feels the same as when I get to the first stage of drawing when i’m not sure what to do next. It’s an uncomfortable tight feeling for me and my instinct is to stop what i’m doing to releave it. When you’re running, your mind has to stay focused to keep yourself moving, to look at the bigger picture and see that this will pass, you will get to the next stage which becomes easier once you’re warmed up. Breath, move, don’t over think things. Breath some more. Keep your focus. Keep your running pattern going. Breath.

For me, the artists actions would be something like breath, relax your thoughts, step back and look, breath and close your eyes, breath and take a look, breath and make a mark, breath and carry that mark forward, breath and look again. For me it doesn’t have to be a flurry of movement and energy although that is fun as well if you’re not feeling stuck and inspiration is racing through you. Trying to stay focused and allow your minds instinct to have the room to direct your vision and marks is something i’m struggling with allowing myself at the moment. I will continue to try different techniques to help quieten my over-thinking when i’m creating. I’ll keep you all posted with how it goes!