Presentation and essay.

Been trying very hard to make a start on the written work I have to complete, but struggling to get it underway.

Mainly it's probably because I've not written an essay in15 years. I've never written an art essay. I am a bit daunted. Where do I start?

I have loads of info now, lots of sources and interviews with my subject matter, Jenny Saville. I'll be comparing her with Walter Sickert. The shock of the subject, taking it away from the traditional subject matter using traditional techniques and paint to create expressions and images which contradict the prevailing view of the society in which we do and did live.

Ooh, I think I may have a start. Off I go!

Unproductive next day

I tried to get up early to go to the library to make a start on the essay.

Just didn't get there. Had a bath and fell asleep on my bed for another 2 hours, cuddled up with my dogs and cats. My hair was completely dry by the time I woke up.

I did get to the library, but that was a less than good experience. Not enough books, none of which were available, the only ones that were available weren't much use and two boys decided to have a LOUD conversation at the table next to me.

Went to the public library, which was mercifully quiet and borrowed a couple of books, both immensely useful, and came home.

I visited my sick friend, who feels like a fraud because she is feeling very well despite not being as mobile as she would like. Came home and finished the felted piece I started yesterday. What do you think? I'm quietly pleased with my first ever embellished piece.

And now off to bed again, after a small snack.

Unproductive Day 4

I believe that irony is now the colour of the day.

For an unproductive day I haven't done too bad!.

A collage and now a felt painting too. Not complete, but ticking along nicely.


Much more work to be done on this, especially as its a borrowed embellisher and I will probably have to give it sometime next week. I must have one of these. Soon!

Unproductive Day 3

So the collage is finished. Not sure if I want to add some paint on top, or maybe some oil pastels.



I'm really pleased with how this has gone. I thought collage would take me days. I may start a bigger, more ambitious one and see how that goes.

Watch this space. But only if you don't have stuff to do, obviously.

Unproductive Day 2

So the collage moves on fairly quickly. Here is the next pic with further progress. It's helpful to see it as a photo because I can analyse how it is working and then add extra layers to it without feeling too precious about it.

I'm really enjoying the process and will probably try another one later, on a much bigger scale with a much more complex form. See how I go.

Unproductive Day

Today I have done little or nothing of note. I've been watching TV on the computer, catching up on programmes I missed because I was too busy getting attacked by a large group of youths with snowballs. Sounds funny, wasn't in the slightest. Especially when they opened my car doors and pelted me inside the car.

So I have managed to start a collage, and had a Lock, Stock and 2 Smoking Barrels moment when Josh doubted that I could paint on it. Very surreal. Had accents going and the lot.

So here it is so far, more pics to be posted as it progresses, or not as the cs may be. I seem to be starting a lot of things but not getting them finished at the mo. I think I'm not really sure how to finish them off. Plus they look halfway OK and I don't want to ruin them. Or they are really not very good and I can't raise the energy to finish them cos they're rubbish anyway. Confusion about my work abounds.

So today has been about chilling, sort of having a day off and resting my brain before cracking on again.

I think I may be in the realms of self justification of a lazy day. I must ponder.

Monday none day

I've not posted for a while, mainly because I've been busy at paid work and trying to get some art work done.

I've also been out and about visiting friends and doing generalised stuff.

I had intended getting things started and finished today, with lots of ideas on how to spend my time. The problem being that after a busy working weekend I was shattered, had an appointment to go to this morning and just needed a quick lie down after I'd been shopping and organised someone to look after life drawing tonight...............

So as you can imagine, the quick lie down became a long lie down and a bit of a nap. It would have been a longer nap if I'd not been disturbed every 10 minutes by text messages from almost everyone I know. Funny how at the weekend everyone is too busy to text, but as soon as they are all back at work and I have a day off they text me and simply must discuss loads of important things with me. When I'm trying to catch a nap. Hmmmm. I smell a touch of irony.

This is me trying to nap. Photo courtesy of Josh, sometime ago. This is what I look like during a successful nap.

So an unproductive day really, but I am pretty sure the rest of the week will go better as I now feel more energetic and less taken over by work. Sort of a short break before getting on with my other job!

First Page of Travelling Sketchbook

Well I finally finished my first page for the Travelling Sketchbook Project.

I have to admit to a bit of procrastination, as is my wont.

But finally I got over the blank page blockage and completed it.

Here it is, hope you like.

As I complete the pages for the other 9 sketchbooks in the cycle, I'll post pics, as also is my wont.

Can you guess today's word of the day? Wont. Great innit?

There is an Alien Snot Monster Living in My Head

I have spent a week fighting off the mother of all colds. Only the lack of delirium and serious chills has made me not describe it as the flu. During this time I have been trying to get a start on the new painting project at college. I am also attempting to twist my head around the presentation and essay I have to write by 10th March. All with a head invaded by an alien snot monster. Not easy.

Here is a start on the painting and human form project. Let me know what you think.

Works in progress

Finished the small board painting.Ended up covering the acrylic paint with oil pastel, which I rarely use.

Using colour theory to find the right colour for the pastels to really make it pop off the page and create a stronger image.

I am, moderately and quietly, happy with this painting. Or drawing. Not sure. Never could find the distinction. If you know the answer, please, elucidate.

I also decided to scan it inverted too. I thought it looked like it would be interesting. I rather like it.

I'm not well

Eugh, I have golf balls in my throat that for some reason I appear to have swallowed partially and they are now stuck there, sore and swollen, red inflamed and kind of oozing some foulness down my throat that leaves a foul taste in my mouth that nothing will shift.

I have felt unwell for a couple of days. My tolerance for illness is about 48 hours. Any longer than this I begin to wonder why am I just not getting on with it? I'm being lazy, mardy, pathetic etc, etc.

My head feels big, I have slept most of the day. My mouth is sticky dry and my back is killing from being in bed all day.

I have wasted a day, precious in the world of "there are just not enough hours in the day".

I did finish the cover of my new sketchbook, ready to be filled and altered for my new project on the human form. I haven't used an altered book as a sketchbook for a while and I felt this project needed just that. It was a book of industrial archaeology. Fairly wordy and with a few full page images needing removing to allow room for adding pages and painting over the pages I need to be less busy.

Here's the front cover. It's from a sketch I did a couple of weeks ago. I really like this model, she is beautiful and has a natural way with her that leaves me a bit over excited and breathless. Not felt so excited about a model before, but she is really really good. Potentially a muse for my future career and fame and fortune? Yeah OK, fame and fortune? Obscurity and poverty more like.

To be famed and fortunate you have to be able to do stuff and apparently I am not able to do anything for the foreseeable future because I have these idiot tonsils that insist on staying right where they are, too big and infected for me to be out of bed for more than a couple of hours.

Pants.

The Human Form 1

First try at painting.


This is a small painting that wasn't working at all, so I sanded it down and suddenly it looked better. Needs more work to make it OK, but it now has possibilities.

The Human Form

New project about to be underway. Self directed, we have to write our own briefs and decide what the outcome is to be.

I have decided I want to concentrate on the human form, the nude and the character study. What will bring it all together is that it is going to be exclusively a painting project. I have hardly done any painting and this will be a massive challenge for me.

So, folks, please be aware this blog will be the scene of rants, complaints, desperate pleas and at least 1 nervous breakdown as I go through the gestation and birth of a new skill. Please bear with me, normal service will be resumed. I just need to sort out what is normal and if I can ever attain normality.

To coincide with this I am now officially suffering from an under active thyroid, and so will be enjoying thyroxin for the rest of my life. Having only just started on the thyroxin I will be my usual self ( forget normal, doesn't exist in my world!), however as time wears on there may be interruptions to my usual pattern of depression and activity. Let me know if I'm being weirder than you are used to. It may be the tablets.

No really, I am serious about that. Honestly.

Life drawing 3

Very successful life drawing class this week. Again very small attendance, but I have faith this will grow with time, but the model this week was new and wonderful. Here is the best drawing from the night and one I am very proud of. This will become a painting later I think. I hope!