I had thought I would use some drawings I had made from a visit to Slimbridge in the New Year, these eider ducks being one.
But so inspired am I by my visit to see Marley the raven, yesterday, that I have had to spend the day drawing.
It has been more like trying to make a portrait than produce an image of a bird, Marley is such a personality. I now have more than enough to get on with at Art in Action
Well my lovely friend Lesley (Printed Material) took me out for an airing yesterday to meet the very generous, Martin and Lorrie who supply the Tower of London with ravens.
Meet Marley. This is a real privilege to get this close to the king of the corvids.
And although he gave the impression he was friendly letting Lorrie scratch his head and feed him grapes,
he was just waiting to lull an easily impressed human stranger close to that beak. He tolerated my presence, letting me get close enough to take these pictures, but his intelligence gives him the capacity to trick and tease. I now have the most fantastic resource materials for some new work.
But not only were there the delights and thrills of the ravens, but Lorrie and Martin have a passion for all things wild life. This barn owl chick will be raised by hand
as is this kookaburra. A morning of natural delights, I am so grateful to Lesley, her cousin John who organised the trip and Martin and Lorrie who tolerated my gasps of delight.
Congratulations to Abbi, Jack, Jack, Tom , Mat and David for completing 28 peaks in 120 hours. This extraordinary challenge was completed yesterday at 12 noon at the top of Snowdon. To learn more about the challenge and the charities they are raising money for check out www.ukthousandschallenge.moonfruit.com/
More ink, more wax, more bleach.
I have also cut out some of the moths wing sections to add surface interest.
I do like the added colour of the orange, but
I am drawn to the faded, monochromatic quality the bleached ink gives.
Both these drawings are a means to an end and I would like to try to achieve this quality in a print or an enamel. 
The first page I have decided to keep simple so I started off by scribbling with candle wax.
Covering the page with water soluble black ink. 
Then applying gum arabic prints of moths, beetles and cow parsley in black and silver.
The second page became more adventurous...wax first then some gestural marks in Mars orange and orange acrylic ink.
Then a layer of water soluble and indian black ink, finishing off with the same gum arabic transfers.
Now I have 2 pages ready to bleach, scrape and draw into which will in turn inspire some enamel pieces.
So this morning with determination and after 2 cups of coffee I strode out to the shed to work in my sketch book. A few weeks previously when I have been feeling even less motivated I worked on empty pages putting in random acrylic and magazine transfers, the technique my daughter taught me.
Then a couple of weeks ago I went through the transfers making them bird shaped using white paint. 
gum arabic transfer working into the pages.
As you can tell some have worked better than others, but more to the point I am now up and running again. By the way, it is not a spiral bound sketch book, that is the gum arabic transfer image.
I am looking forward to Thursday when I can again spend the whole day playing with ideas.
Well, to finish a collagraph I have been working on for a while. So enthused was I by the tremendous prints made at Much Wenlock that I came home and got straight down to proofing this silk aquatint plate.
This rook looks like a youngster still demanding food, or have I been watching too much Spring Watch?
Pressing alium heads into tile cement produces these wonderful textures. 
For those of you with long memories, you may remember that I blogged about the arrival of a Scarlet Tiger moth in my garden this time last year. It must have met a friend as in the Spring we had caterpillars on the comfrey. 
We now have a whisper of Scarlet Tigers fluttering exotically around...next year how many will we have?
