Tuesday 31 August 2010

GARDEN OF DELIGHTS

I love this time of year, not quite the end of Summer or the beginning of Autumn. All sorts of plants are flowering and fruiting.
I have a small town garden, but big countryside garden ideas.
I am thrilled with what the garden has produced this year, although I am now sick of runner beans.
The great thing about gardening is that it is so forgiving, if it does not workout this year
there is always next year to have another go.
As usual this time of year I am planning what to plant for next year.
Winter salad has been sown and is sprouting already and I am looking out for garlic to plant soon.
This is the first year I have successfully grown tomatoes.
As I only have 2 artichokes I think I will leave these to flower and just eat the Jerusalem artichokes from another part of the garden.
And this year I will be taking these into the studio to keep them safe from the frost.










Wednesday 25 August 2010

EYES RIGHT

This is one of my life size collagraphs, the title is a homage to my eldest son who has an army scholarship and spent 3 weeks of his summer holiday doing officer training at Sandhurst.
Why am I telling you all this?
This morning I heard that it has been chosen for the Society of Wildlife Artists Exhibition on the 22 September to 2 October 2010, at the Mall Gallery, London.
Please don't think I am blowing a trumpet here, it is just that I enter these open exhibitions every now and then and more often than not I fail to get in...a similar image failed to get into Originals 09 at the Mall Gallery, also the RA Summer Show, is it luck...I think so, but if at first you don't succeed and all that. So get out your copy of AN or hit Google with Open Exhibitions and see what is out there to enter. Judges can't see our work when it's under the bed.

Wednesday 11 August 2010

ESCALATING ENAMELLING

I know, I can't seem to stop myself at the moment. I can fit these label shaped pieces of copper or steel, 4cm x 8.5cm into my kiln. It is a bit like working pages of my sketch book.
Layering, scraping back adding silver and gold leaf and then reworking.
These were directly inspired by my holiday in fossil filled Dorset.
The piece on the left started out as the piece of copper at the top of this post.
I am beginning to amass a body of enamelled work but I am still struggling with the one off nature of each piece. I can't quite shake off the printmaker in me. I think it is safe to say I am stirred by this technique...sorry!!




Monday 9 August 2010

BESIDE THE SEA

In Dorset to be precise. Rob and I have had a happy few days camping near Lyme Regis where I indulged my passion for interesting stones.
And stones are very interesting on the Jurassic coast. Full of fossils, like this star rock, each star is a cross section of a plant stalk.
But the thrill is finding fossils on the beaches, here are a few of our haul. Nearly every pebble has evidence of a former life.

I am particularly excited about this sea urchin pebble which found me. The more you don't look the more fossils you seem to find.
Inspired by seeing Ravens for the first time on a cliff walk, I came home and did some more drawing in my small sketch book.
Still experimenting and trying to let the ideas bubble up.

This corvid is carborundum with deeply etched copper plate printed together with the addition of red cotton to add a bit of movement. The etching is soft ground textures from fabric, am I in danger of including textile and stitch...?

But I can't seem to get the black bird out of my system quite yet!