House update and a new ZIA to celebrate!!

Well the house sale went through with very little to do on our part.  We are now tenants of a local housing association who will carry out some refurbishment to bring the house up to their standards.  This should start in a few weeks though we haven't had the meeting with them to discuss when and what etc. 

Here's a piece of work I did to take my mind off what was happening last week.

It hasn't got a name yet so if you have any ideas please let me know.

ZIA

I completed this earlier today.  I drew the sunflower and painted wet in wet watercolour and let this dry.  I then used tangles over the petals and leaves using my black micron pen.  Absorbing to do.

What I've been working on.

There has so much been going on in my life that I haven't been able to get online much.  The completion date for our house sale is 29/09/14 and we have been sorting out 21 years of accumulated 'stuff'.  Not that I've been doing much of the lifting etc. but boxes of things have been brought down to me and I've been going through it all.  Most of the books, children's toys, games and small items of furniture have gone to various charity shops, whoever was willing to collect them was welcome to take it.  Okay it's been hard deciding which books to let go but I reckon my days of criminological research are behind me!  I've given my huge collection of teddies from around the world to the local hospice.  Given we are not even moving it may all seem a bit silly but apparently the housing association want to put central heating in and do various other things including completely redesign the kitchen and bathroom to more suit my needs.

I have still been creating art, getting into Zentangle as it's something that can be done on a small scale.  I've been experimenting with alcohol inks too, but more on that another time.  I'm just going to share some of the pictures I've finished in the last month or so.  Remember if you should like a picture so much you want to buy it just email me with an offer.

 

This is what is termed as Zentangle Inspired Art.  I used Michelle Collier's photograph of a rose bud as inspiration and then did Zentangle pattern in separate petals, also doing various patterns as a background to the rose.  I think this has a lot of possibilities for future work, especially if I use more colours etc.

 

Another ZIA work, though looking at it now perhaps it should be the other way up?  That's one of the beauties of Zentangle, there isn't really a correct orientation.

 

I decided to play around with colours and flowers for this piece.  That's one of things I'm beginning to like, there is no right or wrong, no such thing as a mistake, just an opportunity.  Go with the flow and loose the stress.

 

 

And now for something completely different, inspired by the remarkably talented Jean Haines.  Is it a rabbit or a hare?  I used Winsor & Newton paint markers for this on with a micron black pen.  I think the markers are really good for achieving a furry texture.  A lot more practice with these and I can see oodles of possibilities.

 

 

Well that's just some of my latest works.  I'm currently reading a book on the methods used by Degas as I love his work, especially the ballet dancers. 

Derwent graphik pencils.

First attempt at using Derwent Graphik Line Painter and Line Maker from a photograph by Michelle Collier at Chirk Castle in Wales. I lightly drew the hydrangea flower head first then used the colours Brilliant and Paradise both wet in wet and dry then wetting them to draw out the colour. I then used envy wet in wet to give a faint background. I outlined a few petals using a Line Maker 0.5. The  paper is % cotton, not, 12 x 9. The pencils are lovely to work, both used dry and on wet paper. I loved the control they allow for tone in each of the colours. One word of warning the darkest blue in this occurred when a blob of colour came from the pencil instead of a thin line. This was easily used up in the picture though. I think I will use them wet in wet as this gives you a little more time to play with the effect. I may even purchase some more of the colours, I have palettes 2 and 3 together with the six pack of black Line Maker. All in all a lovely product which I can see becoming a firm favourite for me.

 

 

Ink paintings experiment.

Today I decided to try something different as I've been disappointed with the last few acrylic paintings.  I've used F&W Iridescent Inks.  Firstly I put on a wash of the gold ink which was diluted with just a little water.  When this was dry I drew the roses and painted over them with different inks

 

These roses were drawn with white ink.

 

 

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The roses in this picture were painted in iridescent copper ink, with the wording added in the original gold ink.

 

 

 

I wanted to see how the ink behaved on paper and how much you could dilute the ink and still get the lovely iridescent appearance.  They were quite simple to do.  Now I have experimented with these small paintings I can incorporate the ink in other mixed media work.

Roses again.

Roses again!  But as this is quite probably our last summer here I want to paint as many of the flowers in my garden as I can.  This one is painted in acrylics using them in a watercolour style on 1/4 imperial Bockingford paper.  Using acrylic is very different from watercolour, some good (you can paint over mistakes), some bad (quick drying time).  But it's interesting getting different effects dependent on the thickness of the paint.  I'm using Atelier Interactive acrylics at the moment but have got single tubes of various brands to see which I like the best.

Art and me

I've been going through my paintings, I keep everything I've done even the ones I don't like and those that didn't quite work how I wanted them to.  It's fascinating to see how my work is developing and I look at some with slightly more experienced eyes and think with a little tweak here and there I might be able to make something more pleasing out of them.  Others I love bits of them and not so much other parts so I'm thinking of starting work on a collage of the bits I like to see what comes of that.  Maybe also a collage of the parts I don't like so much would be interesting too?

When I first started painting just a couple of years ago (though it seems much longer) I doubted I would ever paint anything recognisable.  But with lots of practice and the help and advice of lots of art friends on Facebook (you know who you are) and watching lots of dvd's I don't think I'm doing to badly.  I like trying new things and have all sorts of art materials bought when I retired that only now am realising can be used together and don't have to be separate entities.  Sometimes I prefer a simple pen drawing and others I love to paint a watercolour rose, my favourite flower, which I honestly think is one of the most complicated flowers there is, especially the David Austen roses.  I'm trying to get the hang of acrylics, there's something about putting the thick paint on with either a brush or a knife that I'm beginning to like.  I've tried oils but it took days to dry and I simply haven't room to leave paintings out for any length of time while waiting for them to dry and acrylics fit the bill.  I'm willing to experiment with any medium but I have a sneaky feeling that watercolour will always be my first and last love.


Just a little watercolour that I did some time ago and I've just rediscovered it. I love the way the petals turn in this one.  Okay the background isn't great but I'm still learning.

This one is in pen and watercolour pencil, it's such a simple painting but nice.

Art is something precious in my life and one of the few things that can chase the 'black dog' away.

Mixed media.

A try out for a larger idea I have.  Now I just need to collect all the materials I want to use.

Here I'm just playing with an idea of maps in the background, both local and global.  Not quite sure where this will take me but at least I know I can stick things to paper!!  Oh and my raindrop stencil works.

Going abstract

Okay I'm taking a great big breath and showing you my first tentative steps into abstraction.  It's an area that has always fascinated me.  Painting for me is all about colours mingling on the surface of the paper and I believe this is something I could achieve with abstracts.  Amorphous shapes in beautiful blues and yellows, greys and blues, green and blues.  Spot the common link in there?

I'm also dabbling in mixed media but more of that in another post.

 

Sunflowers in a vase, the important part to the actual photograph was the shape of the vase and the seed heads of the flowers, everything else is just there.

 

 

This is an acrylic painting, I was just having a play with a knife blending colours with nothing particular in mind.  Sunset or a fire?  You decide.

A Yellow Rose - The Pilgrim, from my garden.

I love this rose, though I have taken artistic licence and simplified the structure a fair bit.

The main colours used are Indian Yellow and Tranparent Orange with greens mixed from olive green with varying amounts of the two main colours.  I then washed the main rose with Naples Yellow to tone it down a little.

Sunflowers

A couple of sunflower paintings inspired by Fiona Peart.  I love sunflowers and yellow so this was really fun to paint.

 

This was based on Fiona Peart's step-by-step article in the Summer edition of Leisure Painter.  I drew my own version of the flowers and painted it with Indian Yellow, Aurelian, Transparent Orange and greens mixed from olive green and Aurelian.  The flower centres are a burnt sienna mixed with transparent orange.  I dropped clean water on the leaves for texture.

 

I used the same colours as above , this basically started as a 'use-up' painting but in the end thought it turned out quite well.  The centre of the flower has salt put on the wet paint for texture.

Landscapes

Lautrec

Chateau Gandels

Greta Bridge

Venice

Just some of my work done in 2013 inspired by Allan Kirk.

Copyright issues

If you wish to try your hand at any of my paintings then please credit me with the original otherwise you are breaking copyright law.

Abstract - a departure from the norm.

I was just playing with geometric shapes and I think it looks okay.  I used watercolours for this but I'm already thinking something similar with acrylics would be interesting.

There's lots of blue in this one because I like blue.

My first acrylic painting

Sunflowers.  I outlined the flowers in clear tar gel first to give some texture, not sure it really worked though.  I think I'm going to like acrylic when used in a similar way to oils as the brush can create a textured effect to the painting.

My birthday presents

Yesterday was my birthday and my family seems to have heeded my wish for some acrylic paints and brushes so hopefully I can have a go in this medium which will be a departure for me.  I will certainly post the resulting paintings on this blog.  I've been in the garden taking pictures of the beautiful roses so that I can paint at leisure.  I'm pretty excited that I've found out my camera will take close-up pictures of the flowers.  I know lots of artists say you should paint from life wherever possible but given my spinal condition I can't seem to find anywhere comfortable to paint the flowers. I do make notes and sketches for colour, light etc. and take several photos of the flowers from different angles.  I'll let you know how I get on. 

My Escape.

I'm in love with painting as it gives me the chance to create something unique to me on paper.  Life can be very stressful sometimes what with one thing or another and art gives me the escape I desperately need.  I've never really thought about my artwork as being any good but so many people seem to like it that maybe I should share it more.  I'm resolved to put something on this blog every week.  Not everything I do turns out and I guess I have many more failures than successes but everything teaches you something.  Learn by mistakes, but don't dwell on them, just move on.

By the way if you are interested in buying any of my work please email me at jen.collier@hotmail.co.uk

Flowers Painted in June.

 A Rose from my garden, the rose is one of my favourite flowers.

Just to show accidents can be turned into something unique and pretty.  A few accidental splodges began to look like a flower so after a while this is what it turned into, abstract iris.

 Primroses painted without drawing, inspired by the great Jean Haines.  Loose watercolour is rather more difficult than it looks but worth the effort.

 Another (abstract) Iris, I wanted to experiment with colour combinations in this one, Permanent Rose and Indian Yellow.  Makes quite a nice peachy colour.

A couple more to look at.

I'm really pleased with the bottom one, it's just how I wanted it to look.

Negative Painting - method not mood!!!

A little bit of negative painting which was absorbing to do.

Artists Block

I'm still suffering from a block in creativity at the moment, despite my resolve to play with paint I still haven't picked up a brush.  Hopefully something will strike the spark soon.

I hate this time of year.

As with many others this time of year isn't good, the dull, dark days have a miserable quality that seems to invade life and I for one find it hard to motivate myself especially now I don't have work to go to.  I have managed just one painting since Christmas and it just didn't work which left me feeling rather uninspired.  So I'm not going to attempt another painting but just to experiment with backgrounds and putting paint on paper in all sorts of ways I've not tried before.  I'll read the art books I got for Christmas and watch some Youtube (not forgetting the housework etc. ;-)) with no pressure at all.  I shall see where this all takes me, maybe something will fire my imagination. 

A new year should mean a new start but this isn't always what is needed.  I started the year as I ended it; with a return of depression.  I hope it's just the time of year but if not I need to get going with my paint brushes as it's the only escape from the feelings of despair.

I made my own Christmas cards for the first time in 2013 which were well received.

I also gave my eldest daughter a couple of pictures of Welsh castles which she asked me to paint.

 

 

For my youngest daughter I painted her two cats from a photograph she had put on Facebook, she was delighted with it.