Postcards

Here is a postcard I have designed. It was inspired by William Blake’s 'Ancient of Days' I wanted to show how my loss of faith brought me to logic and reason. I really enjoy William Blake's work and I feel a connection to his visual representation. He challenged organised religion and showed a deep understanding of biblical symbolism. 

I was concerned with copyright so I drew my own version. I used an oil wash and graphite, and then digitally added type.

The Beauty of Charcoal

I have recently had the opportunity to explore charcoal. All I can say is that it is one of the most beautiful mediums to work in. There are different types of charcoal and its important to understand which type to use to get the right effect you want. Vine charcoal is a very soft charcoal and it sits on the paper, you can move it about the paper with a blending tool like your finger or a brush or blending stick. It is easily removed too with an eraser. It’s a good base to start drawing with. Compressed charcoal is a very graphic strong tone. The charcoal sticks to the paper and it’s hard to move about but it demands you to be confident. Charcoal pencils are harder still and they are good for detailed drawing. They are what I use as a finishing touch.

 

What paper you use is important too. Paper with a slight texture holds the charcoal better, but I don’t love textured paper so I used smooth paper and I struggled to fix the charcoal when I had finished.

Having worked with charcoal, I totally understand why many artists use it in their work. It has the capacity to be bold and strong and extremely graphic or you can create the gentlest tonal range. I totally respect it and I’m very grateful for experiencing it.

Making Time to Stand and Stare

I have wondered over the marvels of nature all my life, but today, it finally rested upon me and I feel sure it’s the origins of my inspiration.

My parent’s garden was on a hill and I could see for miles from the top. I could see sunbeams through the clouds as the light traveled in straight lines through the large cumulus clouds. I spent a lot of time alone looking up, physically and metaphorically and I always found wonderment and fascination.

Life speeds up and gets more complicated, but today I pondered on the poem by William Henry Davis called Leisure. I really have the need now to surround myself with the things that influence my own creative inclinations. I need to stand and stare as I did as a child. I may not translate nature in my work in a literal way, but I will allow myself to be impressed by its form, colour and line.

The Push and The Pull

I have battled with myself and my work for a number of years. I experience a cycle of frustration and self doubt when I work. I struggle to validate my work.

I thought maybe I was on the wrong path. Sometimes when you meet resistance, its not always a good idea to say to yourself, 'If I keep pushing through this and I will get stronger'. I believe that pushing yourself can help you grow but not all rocks need moving and maybe the rock your pushing is not the right rock to push against. I have often wondered if my frustrations with my artistic endeavours are worth the effort and do I experience resistance because I need to try a different path.

I have sat many times at my desk pondering about how I feel about my work. One day I said to myself 'Why am I spending my time thinking like this? Why don't I just go get a regular job like everyone else?' I sometimes feel like a fraud. There are people out there who work so hard, they just get on and survive. If they do self reflect, its followed with a swift kick up the backside along with the words 'Get a grip of yourself'. I have to ask myself 'Am I selfish?' Is an artists life a selfish one?

I have sat with my friend so many times in so many coffee shops saying the same things over and over again, 'Im so frustrated, why am I struggling with this?' She must be so fed up with it now, but she is a wonderful friend so she just keeps reassuring me to keep going but I do struggle with myself.

I think maybe I will always feel uncertain about myself and I think I will always question my motives and over analyse the purposes of my work, I will always challenge myself... I always have. Maybe thats the point. Maybe the struggle I have with my ideas and my techniques is why I am an artist. Maybe its the way I work? Maybe my struggle is my growth? Maybe my ideas are born out of this process.

Even if I did go and work at Tesco and abandon my artistic endeavours, I would still have the internal struggle.  As I stacked the shelves I would say to myself 'What is the point? What difference does this make? And who designed this rubbish packaging?'

This is just the way I am. I am coming to accept this now, it is how I work and I think there is a lot of other artists who approach their work in a similar way. I'm still questioning, but now I accept that the challenge is not just myself, the challenge is my process.

Driven to Distraction

I don’t have much time to myself. I would like to spend more time on my work but my personal commitments will always take the biggest part of me. However, I found that when I do have time to work, I sit in my chair and fidget about with my pens, clear my desk, make a cup of coffee and flick through my music on my phone. Then I check my emails and check Facebook, make another cup of coffee, look through my sketchbooks, then fidget with my pens again. What is wrong with me? Time is ticking and I’m sat farting about doing everything and nothing all at the same time, I’m not focusing on the important stuff. If I’m honest, I must admit that I actually want to get distracted. I want to be driven to distraction.

It seems there is a restlessness inside myself that needs to be calmed. How can I do that when I have so little time and so much to do?

One day, after much fidgeting, I picked up my mark-making sketchbook and I just got some left over ink and made marks with it, I then used water to see what effects its caused. I then saw a shape so I drew a face on it. I then saw that the ink had saturated though the page so I turned the page and it looked like a little landscape, so I drew on that. It was totally free, without planning or preparation, I was satisfying a need and through play that need was fed.

I needed to see how masking fluid would work if I rubbed charcoal over it, I needed to see how oil paints would work with turps to make an oil wash. I then wanted to see how these experiments translated into a digital image. I would photocopy them and scan them in to see how it looks. After a while I feel ready to get on with my ‘real’ projects.

Reflecting on this I realize that I actually need to experiment before I can focus, the playing helps me work quicker and efficiently. I feel confident in my techniques, and I understand how they work, I can then spend time on my idea’s and making them a reality. In a sense, I feel like I am having a creative ‘work out’ and it make’s me feel better. I value my experimental experiences more and more and It’s now a necessary part of my creative process and working practice.

I don’t think I can put into words how much it means to me, except when I go through this process; I am totally absorbed and intrigued at the possibilities. I feel I am involved in something bigger than myself and loose my sense of self–importance but I get focused on discovering possibilities. I’m sure my views will evolve throughout my learning experience, but I am confident in this method of working.

This idea is nothing new, professional’s have been talking about the importance of play in the creative process for a long time. I just know what they are talking about now and they are right!

Aesop

As a child, we had a copy of Aesop's fables and I remember looking intently at the illustrations. Aesop was supposed to be an ancient Greek who told wonderful storied with morals. His storied used animals in an anthropomorphic way to describe human nature and failings. His fables have lasted generations and they are popular stories to illustrate.

Aesop’s fables are about human nature and lessons to help us through life. The tortoise and the hair fable tells us that being patient and being steady in life’s journey can bring us success. The dog and the reflection, teaches us to not envy what others have because we could end up loosing what we have in pursuit of it. All these fables are about us and Aesop used animals as a personification. I find this really interesting and an area that can be visually stimulating as I think we all affiliate with an animal of some sort.
I feel like a rabbit at the moment but I would like to be a lion really! Rabbits are vulnerable, very twitchy, constantly on the watch, and have lots of children.. just like me! But deep inside, I really want to be a lion. They sit in the sun all day and don’t worry about being eaten. They just do what they like and seem so sure of themselves. I just don’t know how to turn into a lion. I think I have lion envy!

I wanted to develop my own anthropomorphic character. I experimented with line and shape and through my character development Aesop the hare was born. I used a charcoal pencil and red water colour. I used herbal tea to colour the background. It turned grey as it dried and not pink like the tea in my cup. I’m unsure if I’ve done the right thing by putting him on the blog as I feel he is still very vulnerable, but I really like the look on his face as if to say 'Who are you and why am I here?'

I love Thumbnails

My thumbnails are really important to me. 

I’m talking about design thumbnails and not the horn-like envelope covering the dorsal aspect of the terminal phalanges of fingers and thumbs. 

Thumbnails are reduced-size versions of picture’s, they are also small, rough, design ideas that assist in the production of visuals and then onto the final image.

I personally find them a free and spontaneous way of working through ideas. They help me try to bring to life what I see in my head without the pressure of perfection.

They help me work and then re-work ideas, as one thumbnail inspires the next and so forth.

One of my problems is that I like the thumbnails more than I like the final image. Maybe I’m missing something, maybe my work needs to be free and less controlled like my little thumbnails!

Visual Journals

I have written journal's since I was about 12 years old, and I try to write in my journal as often as I can. Sometimes I don't feel like it or haven't the motivation but I always feel better when I do. The thing is, if I don't document my daily thoughts and feelings then they are lost and I will forget I ever had them.

I have a book by Danny Gregory, he is an avid visual documenter, and he suggests a visual diary to help with drawing skills. I'm sure it does, but thats not my motivation. My motivation is to document my existence. I can look back over my life and say 'Oh I'd forgot I felt that' or 'I remember feeling that!'. If I don't document these tiny moments in my life, they are lost because my brain doesn't class them as important enough to keep. If I had emotional stress or tragedy or I was really happy by something, my brain would keep it; but the tiny things, the mundane, they are lost as if they never happened. I find this loss quite interesting because most of our lives are filled with mundane experience.

I have found that if I document each day, hidden between the mundaneness, are tiny little diamonds of light that I need to keep; so I keep them in my notebooks.

Right now, I've opened my journal on the 2nd Feb 2013. I've just read a reflection about the amazing questions my daughter asks. She has the most fantastical brain and she is always asking questions like...'Why is the sky blue?' and 'Where does language come from?' On that particular day she asked... 'Who painted those lines on the road?' 

I don't remember where I was, I don't remember anything about that conversation, but I do feel sentiment when I read it and I'm reminded how I feel about her. In a sense I re-live the emotion. My brain had left that experience on the side of the road of life, but my heart had not; thats why I do it.

Drawing is harder than writing because I have to try and draw myself, looking at myself, and I find that hard. I also see in my mind how things really look, but my drawing ability doesn't support that 'reality' and it's hard. I sometimes feel that I've ruined the memory, because my brain will replace my precious memory with my naff drawing. Despite this, I have to keep going with it. I suppose its just another one of my collections.

The image above was a from an experience I had in a Charity Shop. I had seen some novelty salt and pepper pots; they were two ceramic little rabbits. The ladies in the charity shop had put them on the shelf facing each other and when I saw them, I thought about how much fun my kids would have at meal times...watching the salt and pepper fall onto their meals out of the rabbits head. 

As I was paying for them, I placed them on the counter and I noticed that the tall rabbits shape fit the crouching rabbits shape and I realised they actually fit together. The lady at the checkout said 'They are lovely aren't they, I knew they wouldn't last long in the shop'. 

I was supprised how fast my brain was working at this point, I had noticed the shape of the two rabbits and that they may fit together, and I also had noticed that the crouching rabbit had rosy cheeks and the tall rabbit didn't. Despite my internal observation I went ahead with the purchase but inside my head was the uncomfortable feeling of 'I'm not sure about this purchase anymore'. 

When I got home and opened them up, my fears were confirmed as I put the rabbits in the position the manufacturer had intended...and 'not to my surprise' I had purchased a couple of novelty salt and pepper pots in the shape of two rabbits pro-creating. I found it interesting how the subtle change of the rabbits positions completely changed how I viewed them; it put the rosy cheeks of the crouching rabbit into context...

You may think I would have put such tacky objects into the bin, but I couldn't, I hide them and when I want a good laugh I get them out. When Ive finished laughing, I put them away in their sordid little box.

Needless to say, my children never saw the rabbits!

Check Out My Other Work...

Here is an illustration I did for my course work. To see more of my work, click my illustration tab or any of the other tabs above.

Abstract or Pictorial?

Abstract Images means: (According to my free online dictionary)

Stylistically abstruse and non-pictorial  - free from representation

I searched on the internet for ‘Abstract Illustration’. Here is a good example according to the definition above.

This image below also came up in the search for abstract illustration. There was lots of these types of images. I found it interesting how the artists called their images abstract when they are clearly representational. They are stylised, but not abstract, they are not free from representation.

I had ago at my own abstract images. I made marks to music. These are marks made to Beethoven 5th Symphony. I had to listen to it about five times before I became comfortable making marks to represent certain sounds. The first ones I did were a mass of squiggles and that shows my lack of confidence, but the more I listened and the more I found the right marks. I found it helpful to work on bigger sheets of paper, this enabled me to edit it better and chose interesting marks for my album cover. I used dip pen and ink. I had two pens, one in each hand, one with a broad nib and one with a narrow one. The high notes were used by the narrow pen and the low ones were used by the broad one. I found I used the one pen at a time in certain places and simultaneously in others. Very cool experience.

This piece of music has an enormous amount of movement and is very complex. I chose a simple line that best described the movement of the song.

I was hooked and I tried other music like Cold Play and the Eurythmics.