Where has the time gone?!

Soon after the wedding, I thought I'd have time to get back to my art work. It didn't happen!

My wedding was wonderful as was our mini-moon. However, when I got back it was back to work- add to this that I needed to cover for a friend who had an operation and I was back working a full time job!

Christmas has been and gone with all the racing around that entails. It went well and I enjoyed the holiday but I'm left with this Christmases are no longer Christmassy sort of feeling.

Anyway I've drawn a picture it's called "Return To The Abyss". I was kind on inspired by a post from The Bloggess- called the Tightrope walker.

The figure in my picture is me returning to the edge of the hole. A place  I and others find themselves and desperately try not to fall in. Some times you fall in. It's hard to climb out. But when you do (and you can) you are are stronger for it. Like The Bloggess says "Depression is a lying Bastard"

For me this is what depression is like. The first time I experienced it, it was like being enveloped in darkness. You just find yourself in the bottom of this incredibly deep hole with sheer sides. The next time I knew the signs better... I could feel myself slipping and managed to catch myself before I fell in. Sometimes you fall in.

I enjoyed creating this picture, it was quick and simple but has real meaning to me. I used pastels and ink. The ink made the paper warp... I need thicker paper!

Wedding stuff

So our wedding is fast approaching. It really is quite scary how it creeps up on you! But most things are sorted including most of the things we've made ourselves such as place cards, gift bags and favour boxes.

I've enjoyed making stuff for the wedding but must admit its really dominated my thoughts recently. Will be nice to soon focus on other things. I'm sure, however, before then I'll be sharing lots of photos from the day that I've tinkered with :-)

Sickness

It's been a while since I last posted. The fact that I'm now back at work, after the school's Summer holidays, is likely related. What also may be related is the fact that in just under 3 weeks its my wedding and my brain is progressively turning to cottage cheese!!!

I've been making things for the wedding  like placecards and favour bag/boxes (I'll post pictures on here later). Not really arty, more crafty... I suppose there is still creativity involved.

Now I'm ill! Sick! My chest hurts and I can't stop coughing. However, being under the weather has inspired my latest piece of artwork appropriately titled: Sickness.

I used green and yellow ink and my own particular abstract style.

The Shattered Monarch

Wandering around the web as you do I stumbled upon and artist who was creating artwork with butterflies. Actually using butterflies! They print using a inkjet on to the wings. This is amazing but part of me thinks perhaps a little cruel. The page is here ... Butterfly Mimesis.

The artwork did however get those cogs in my head turning. Inspired I set about finding photos from Google to manipulate with photoshop. As a result, The Shattered Monarch was born.

Cat Dreams

This is a picture of my cat Elphaba who loves posing for the camera. I'm pretty sure she watches America's next top model and takes notes!

I've manipulated the photo with photoshop and included elements of a viney jungle surrounding.

I kind of think that's the way she see's the world; as this amazing  playground to explore.

Juliet

This is a still from the end of the 5th season of Lost where Juliet sadly dies. Not before, however, exploding a nuke that throws everyone back to the right point in time.

Again I used photoshop to combine textures, different photos and used different blending modes.

The awesomeness of Lost

So I'm wandering around the Internet and as usual end up at youtube. However, whilst refraining from looking for videos of cute cats, talking cats, angry cats or sociopathic cats I stumbled upon some videos that I liked ages ago... The final few scenes from lost.

I'll not go to in depth as I wouldn't want to spoil the Show for people who haven't experienced its undeniable awesomeness. But my reaction to the videos quite shocked me. Tears streamed down my face (especially the bit with Vincent the dog).

 This all lead to me losing about an hour to video clips where the shows characters remembered their lives on the island. What a truly amazing show and story! I'm so pleased we stuck with the show through the complicated parts; so worth it.

So here are the final two scenes...

With fresh inspiration I decided I wanted to create some Lost related artwork. I've every intention of doing some drawings but to begin with I found some stills and played around with them using Photoshop.

This still is of Jack and Vincent and an incredibly powerful moment in the last scene.

The Lighthouse of the Abarat

I've been using my recently acquired photoshop skills; merging texture and and photos.

This piece is inspired by Clive Barkers books The Abarat quartet (tho I think he's expanding the story beyond the initial four planned books). In the first book The heroine stumbles upon a derelict lighthouse on dry land far away from any sea. Its this lighthouse that calls forth the shores of the Abarat.

If you haven't read this book its very good and epic modern fantasy. So far two in the series have been published, I think the third book is due soon.

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Portrait

So I've just finished a portrait that someone on facebook asked me to do. Have given it a good go and am reasonably happy with the face but found the hand really difficult.

The guys hand was kinda supporting his head but at the same time slightly turned. I think I redrew it 3 times before I was anywhere close to being happy. More hand drawing practice for me!

As this piece was for someone else I'll not put it on my blog until I've asked permission

What is art?

I love this!

-not sure where this is from but I found it in the Pintrest boards

Dahlia

I a photoshop sort of mood so flicked through some magazines and had a go at merging textures and photos. All the files for the tutorial were on the CD but being me I couldn't be bothered to go upstairs and find it. So I used Photographs from the net instead and textures from media militia.

It wasn't particularly difficult nor did it take very long. I'm liking the result and already have Ideas of how I can use some of these techniques for other projects.

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Sunset

I took this photograph yesterday evening just as the sun was setting. I was in my pjs and glanced out the the window and ran for the camera.  Such a lovely cloudscape with amazing colours :-).

I sorted the light levels in photoshop but other than that it's as it was... breathtaking.

A sight like this demonstrates  the beauty that is around us a unique sight temporary unless the moment is captured by an artist.

Hands

Look at the hand! Look at the hand!

The portraits not perfect  but I'm quite pleased with the hand which I can proudly say looks quite hand like!  That's opposed to the mangled messes which normally result in me drawing hands!

I'm not saying it's perfect (I know its not) but I could pick apart a picture until I can longer see the good bits. I'm not going to do that any more than I already have. :-)

 Look at the hand!

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Abs

Sadly, this in no way a self portrait. However, I did enjoy drawing this picture.

I used a photograph from a magazine called Attitude as inspiration. The photograph  was of a full length model but I chose to focus only on one element of the photo. Drawing only on the abdominal section allowed me to play around with shading.

Also, drawing only this part of the model enabled me to completely avoid drawing hands!  Maybe that's what I should focus on next HANDS!!! I'm pretty certain if I can draw them I'll pretty much be able to draw anything. Need to get practising though because the ones I produce at the moment look like they belong to someone who's had an accident involving their hands being mangled in machinery.

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Playing With Photoshop

Went for a lovely walk today and took some photos; most of them of flowers but a few of paths and disused roads. It was beautifully sunny and bright a most enjoyable wander.

When I got home I played around on Photoshop. I wanted to make a bright looking image of a disused road that leads to an old quarry look darker... as though it were taken at night.  I think I managed.

representing

A lot of people ask what the symbols in my artwork represent. Sometimes they don't really represent anything but just kind of grew organically as I drew them; sometimes they represent an idea or an animal , and sometimes they represent people, as in this piece if artwork.

When drawing this I'm representing a situation and was very focused throughout the whole process. I definitely feel that expressing myself artistically kind of gets those emotions and thoughts out of me so I can leave them behind and move on.

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Google+ invite

Just and invite to google+ in case people were interested in taking a look.

Growth

I always enjoy doing these sort of pieces and lose myself whilst doing them.  I used pencils and a rubber to clean up.

I just let the composition grow. I wanted to create the appearance of depth so layered up parts, which I think works well.

Whilst drawing this I got the idea for next piece which has more personal meaning I'll upload that tomorrow.

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Performance art

I saw this video linked from the bloggess' blog a couple of weeks and I thought I'd share. It's  undeniably a little strange but also kind of brilliant. The costumes used kind of remind me of Lady Gaga and the baby mask is seriously scary! :-)

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Progress

This took me ages to get going on. I found it difficult to think of an initial idea. Eventually I opted for a growth and change sort of theme. I just used pencils for this.

How cool are these

I'm  finding these quite inspirational.... wondering where I could take this idea :)  Human nests

Orchid

One of my orchids. The bottles there to support the weight of the bloom.

Photography

Photography isn't something I'm into in a big way but I've been playing around.  What I'm quite enjoying is then further tinkering with them in photoshop.  

I've found that photoshop is great for sharpening images and for also blurring the background components. This is allowing me to get effects I'd ordinarily only get with an SLR camera. Photoshop also allows me to crop images slightly altering the composition and positioning of focal points adding interest to the resulting photograph

Procrastination

I think I may have actually broken through a wall! I just stopped producing any art work at all.  I didn't do this intentionally it just happened. I'm thinking our rapidly approaching wedding and some of the stress this caused is partly to blame but any how...

I've started drawing and creating finally and will upload some new artwork soon :-). Now I'm off to start some more!

procrastination

I will actually get back to my art work soon... promise.  Been busy wedding planning and lacking in inspiration

No progress with progress

The next piece I'm going to start will be called "Progress". Its quite ironic that I'm struggling to make any at the moment.

I have a few ideas battling it out but I'm not sure where to go with it at the moment.

New piece

Been working on this when I've had time this week. hopefully for a friend if they like it.  Its not quite finished here I want to even out some of the paint work and add a little here and there but it's very nearly done.

It's acrylic on canvas. The colour scheme and style being picked by my friend to hopefully go in a specific room. It was much less scary painting on the canvas this time but what they say is true... the first brush stroke is the hardest.

Personally, I'm really pleased with this piece. Just kinda let myself go and it sort of formed itself. I'm now thinking I need to do more on canvas for myself. Also wondering If I could sell some... that would be amazing!

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Eliza Doolittle

This is a piece called "Eliza Doolittle";  named after and Eliza Doolittle's album. This is part of the challenge/project I have set for myself where I produce 30 pieces based on album titles.


Now I'll freely admit that this doesn't really look like Eliza Doolitle in the photo I was working from but I did try. I loved doing the hair!


I only used pastel and this isn't something I often do but am reasonably pleased with the effect. The nose was difficult and something I could do with working on in the future.


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under the sea

A pic I did a few years ago, playing around with my style... at this point I hadn't quite finished the sea weed. I'll take another photo and post.

I did this with ink and pastel.

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Abstract Flowers

This is one of my favourite pictures. I love the way the pastel has blended on the petals. The black work was all done with an ordinary biro.

I get really lost in this sort of  work :)

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pencil sketch

One of my older works. I used pencil and graphite sticks;  the picture was I think I found using google images.


Overall, I was pleased with this piece. Not bad for a first try at drawing a nude figure. I was especially pleased with the veins on the left arm and generally with the shading. I think maybe the left hand could have done with extra work and some of the shadow work isn't quite right.


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Discovery

This is a piece called "Discovery";  named after and Tinie Tempah's album. This is part of the challenge/project I have set for myself where I produce 30 pieces based on album titles.


I being quite a while since I've last drawn an animal I thought I'd draw a cat discovering something. On the whole I'm quite pleased with the sketch though I do think the eyes are a little close together.

Blind Artist John Bramblitt

This was linked to through a Face book art page. What an amazing artist very inspirational!

Lights

This is a piece called "Lights";  named after and Ellie Goulding's album. This is part of the challenge/project I have set for myself where I produce 30 pieces based on album titles.


This piece is a photoshop composition. I found the image of the hand using google and placed the orb, which I created from scratch. I then tinted the hand using a tinted layer.


I found it hard to place the orb in a believable position. I'd like to play around with this some more.


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Older Artwork

These are some of my older pieces; there are more that I will upload and share gradually. These were drawn using photographs from the BBC wildlife magazine which has amazing animal photography in it.

"The Meerkats" is a an important piece for me because it was the first picture I drew that made me feel like I had some talent that could be fostered. It was also drawn on a day that proved to be a turning point in my life. It was on that day, I discovered that no matter how much was going on around me I couldn't control; there was a place I could disappear into to escape. Art became my sanctuary and helped me heal.

"The Badger" I drew from a tiny photo that was not much larger than a passport sized photo. I was really pleased with how it turned out.

Clive Barker

Clive Barker is my favourite all time author. He wrote books such as Weaveworld,  Imajica,, The Great and secret show and many others. His writing conjures  fantastical and sometimes disturbing worlds.

Many of his books have been made into films. From Cabal came Nightbreed a vision of incredible and sometimes frighting being who live alongside us in the shadows. Hellbound Heart spawned the Hellraiser films with the iconic villain "pinhead". More recently Vinnie Jones appeared in Midnight Meat train a film based upon a short story from Clive's Books of Blood.

Not only is Clive barker an incredibly talented author he is also a magnificent artist. His pictures are vivid and mirror the fantastical elements present in his writing. The Abarat Quartet (although there may be more books added) books, he is currently creating, he has already created through paintings.

Clive Barker is an incredible inspiration and if you haven't looked at his artwork, films or writing I highly recommend doing so.

19

This is a piece called "19";  named after and Adele's album. This is part of the challenge/project I have set for myself where I produce 30 pieces based on album titles.


This album was difficult to come up with a concept for. After looking at numerological links and wikipedia results for the number "19", I was was still left unmotivated. What I opted for, in the end, was to simply present the number 19 in an unusual or interesting way.


In a magazine called creative photoshop I'd seen some impressive use of smoke brushes used to form a bird and an image of a lightbulb. This was something I wanted to have a go at; so I downloaded some royalty free smoke brushes and built up an image making the smoke form the number 19.


I'm really impressed with the way this turned out and  would quite like to attempt a  portrait made up of smoke at some point. This, I think, would give quite a ghostly effect.


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How To Be Alone

This is an amazing combination of  video, poetry and art.

Sigh No More

This is a piece called "Sigh No More";  named after and Mumford and sons album. This is part of the challenge/project I have set for myself where I produce 30 pieces based on album titles.




I saw this title as a final sigh, it brought the idea of death to mind. Bright colours were used to represent  the soul leaving the body.


I combined pencil sketching and graphite sticks with pastel work to achieve the effect I wanted and am quite pleased with the result. The lips were tricky, there was a sheen that I found difficult to reproduce.... bit more practice needed

Musée d'Orsay

The Musée d'Orsay, in Paris, is one of  the best art galleries I've had the opportunity to visit. It's an old train station that's been converted. Not only does it look beautiful it also houses some of the worlds most beautiful art.

Most people think only of the Louvre when asked of art galleries in Paris. Yes the Louvre is wonderful, but it's vast and I feel lacks some of the atmosphere of Musée d'Orsay.

I love their collection of impressionist and neo-impressionist art. It's well worth a look if you ever get the chance.

Seasons of My Soul

This is a piece called "Seasons of My Soul";  named after and Rumer's album. This is part of the challenge/project I have set for myself where I produce 30 pieces based on album titles.


I really enjoyed this piece. The central light representing my soul and the branches growing from it representing aspects of that soul- Seasons if you will.


I normally use inks with this sort of work but they didn't lend themselves to the black card I was working on- thinking now maybe silver ink or gold would. Instead, I used acrylic paint; building up enough coats to produce the depth of blue I was after. This took some time and was hard on my eyes so I could only work on it for short amounts of time.


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The Lady Killer

This is a piece called "The Lady Killer";  named after and inspired by Cee Lo's album. This is part of the challenge/project I have set for myself where I produce 30 pieces based on album titles.


With this piece I was attempting to portray a Lady who kills rather than someone who kills Ladies. I used pencil and graphite sticks with a little red pastel for the eye. I used a painting of Elizabeth Bathory who was a 16th century serial killer and placed the knife infront.


I like some elements of this composition but don't think, now, that I needed the knife (which I also found difficult to draw). I'm not happy with the sharpness of the nose or the lack of shading on the forehead.


I may re-attempt this at some point in the future.

This is a piece called "The Defamation of Strickland Banks";  named after and inspired by Plan B's album. This is part of the challenge/project I have set for myself where I produce 30 pieces based on album titles.


It was a difficult piece to come up with a concept for. I decided to play around with Photoshop and used synonyms for defamation to produce this portrait. The photo all this is layered on being of a man who looks to have lost everything. I enjoyed producing this piece and it was surprisingly easy (with the help of online tutorials (google text portraits).


I'm relatively new to photoshop and the program at times is a little overwhelming but its fun to have an actual purpose when using it like I did for this.

Loud

This is a piece called Loud;  named after and inspired by Rihanna's album. This is part of the challenge/project I have set for myself where I produce 30 pieces based on album titles.

I used soft pastels and ink. I used a style that I developed myself that originated from years of doodling that began after seeing Chakotay's tattoo on Startrek Voyager- which is supposed to be Native American. I enjoyed creating this and pieces like this

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Creating

I'm started my blog on Tumblr but am not really that keen so I thought I'd give blogger a try.

This is a blog dedicated to my art. My hope is that it will keep me creating, growing and developing as a an artist. I've no formal art training but do have a genuine love of drawing, painting and just generally creating.

I find that sometimes my art suffers when stress in my work life increases. This is ironic as drawing is a big de-stresser for me! It just seems that when the going gets tough sometimes I push away the very thing that I need; I imagine a lot of people do that.

I've set myself a project to keep myself producing. I want to create 30 pieces of art work. I'm using titles of albums as stimulus. Slowly, I'm working through the UK top 30 album chart as of the 20th of January 2011. Currently I've completed 8 pieces which I'll share here.

I've also got a great deal of artwork that I've produced over the last few years which I'll share and blog about.