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Sewjourn weekend with the Refash Sistas

This is just a quick few lines upon my return from a lovely long weekend away with my arty crafty stitchy friends at Sewjourn.

I took a veritable mountain of materials with me, as did all the others. It’s hard to predict exactly what one will feel like working on, so it’s good to have options.

As it turned out, I didn’t use my sewing machine and my space remained largely strewn with wet painting materials. But I did do a quick collaboration with Juliet; a thing I have been wanting to do for about three years.

Her thread drawings, when in their first stages, consisting of black thread on linen, often have me positively itching to take ink and a paintbrush to them! Thankfully for Juliet, I am capable of some self restraint!

Given the time and space to finally give it a whirl, I drew a few quick birds on cotton (birds were my dominant theme for the weekend) and begged her to draw over one of them in thread for me, which she did. Here’s what happened.

soft pastel on cotton

Another soft pastel bird. We carried through with only one of the three that I drew, as Juliet had her own mountain of projects to work on.

Juliet selects a bird to work on

Juliet stretches the fabric into an embroidery hoop

Juliet at the machine. An expert at work.

Thread drawing process complete

It’s not surprising that Juliet’s thread drawings resonate with me, given my fascination with continuous line drawings. These are a stitched version of that very thing.

I threw on the black paint in a variety of ways. I varied the amount of water to see how it would react to the fabric, how the spreading would look and whether I could get a dry brush effect. Unfortunately this photo is a little blurry.

I loved the way Juliet had treated the eye. It didn’t want any paint at all.

Initially I intended it to be a black and white creation. But I felt the urge to add some colour to the bird. I think this worked well.

More on my other Sewjourn projects later.

Week 38 – Giraffe

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A quick watercolour giraffe for the 52 Week Illustration Challenge.

I’ve since Tomi Ungerer-ated hiim. It had to be done.

Dog with balloon

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Inspired by one of my greatest illustrator heroes, Tomi Ungerer. Indian ink and watercolour. With digital string as a bit of a cheat. (my last little offering for Week 37: balloons)

Two more balloons for Balloon Week

Blobs on a moving vehicle (again)

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Another journey on the train to the city. More blobs. People at the moment.

Scanning is too time consuming at present, so here we have quick photos of the two pages. Colouring will come bit by bit. Apologies for the low quality.

For tonight, a coloured threesome. I like the girl journeying in the snow best. I will have to think on her story and add it later.

It’s interesting how this process has slowed down my hand to a more deliberate, less impulsive sort of line. And yet, because of the random blob shapes that form the starting point, the figures seem to retain a little of their energy.

Bird Doodles during HarperCollins Author Workshop

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I like to think I was being wonderfully efficient with my time last Friday afternoon at the HarperCollins Author Workshop Day. (Lordy!) After doing the blobs on the train going to the event, I doodled on with these birds during the presentations as well as taking notes!

I’m not sure I needed to take so many notes, but the doodles were a continuation of some character development for a HarperCollins picture book I will be working on over this coming summer. So that seems quite appropriate really.

The bird will sort himself out without too much trouble, because he’s kind of there in spirit already, even though his appearance does morph quite a lot. But what I’m interested in particularly is how to depict the legs, making them as versatile as possible for doing all sorts of things that birds don’t generally do in the common suburban back yard (like dancing the polka), and not getting bogged down by actual bird anatomy, whilst also not offending my own sense of birdishness by having ‘knees’ facing the wrong way or anything.

I can’t seem to help that. My dad is a vet. Sometimes I look up the skeletons of the animals I am drawing.

I do want this particular bird to have big feet if possible. There’s a reason. But I don’t want them to hamper the drawings either. So I will be playing around with options and we’ll see where we get to. In this second page, you see me having the wild idea of fat legs!

I’m not sure if this could work in moderation, or whether it might offend my aforementioned sense of birdishness…

Experiments with Blobs in a Moving Vehicle (part 2)

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This is the second page of blobs that I worked on in the train last Friday. In this case, I was deliberately turning them all into dogs. I think that if I draw enough blob dogs, one of them will begin to emerge as a repeating character who could star in his own world. The nature of blobs is that none do exactly repeat themselves… they are new and special in their own blobby way, but there are recognisable types and that is enough for my purposes.

Only about half of the blobs on this page were in a state worth posting. Two were accidentally sacrificed on the McCrae Beach on Saturday as I tried to colour them with borrowed art materials and sea water. The results were worse than you are imagining now.

Yes, they were.

As far as repeating types go, one thing is apparent already. I have a fondness for whiskers.

This is Angelina the Bearded Lady. (Miniature Schnauzer) She has been looking for circus work for a while, but so far has only been offered work as a rat catcher.

This is Hamish. (Border Terrier x Dandie Dinmont Terrier) Hamish is going to let the chickens out on a blustery spring morning. He never chases them, because he knows they don’t like it. HIs favourite hen is a Light Sussex named Leonora Carrington.

This is Toby. (mostly Foxhound but his great grandmother was a Poodle) He’s a country dog. He left the foxhound pack when the others made fun of his moustache. Now he wanders the hedgerows and picks up a bit of work here and there. He is courteous to passing foxes, and they are sometimes courteous to him.

This is Theo. (Wire-haired Fox Terrier) Theo is in a hurry to pull on his coat as he has to pick up the kids from puppy school. There are 14 in the litter so he is taking a truck.

This is Gabriel. (Soft-coated Wheaten Terrier x English Pointer) Gabriel runs a delicatessen, and is renowned locally for his skill with making tarts. Once a fortnight he goes fishing and takes a picnic lunch with him which is made by his partner Phil. He enjoys taking a little time off cooking on those days. But if he catches a fish, he returns home with renewed vigour and invents a new fish dish every time. All of them are simply delicious.

This is Phil. (Irish Water Spaniel) Phil lives with Gabriel and is an indifferent cook as he gets very little practice. However he is a keen gardener and drives a lorry during the week. He’s also a bird fancier, but sometimes when he is watching birds too closely he has an irresistible urge to yap, which he finds mortifying.

This is Madison. (Cavalier King Charles Spaniel x Cardigan Welsh Corgi) Madison lost her tail in an accident when she was only 3 months old, but she is wagging on the inside.

This is Adrian (Scottish Terrier) Adrian loves listening to Jazz FM on his new radio and has been known to bite the vet.

This is Jean-Paul. (Irish Wolfhound x Cairn Terrier. His parents separated due to irreconcilable differences.) You needn’t be alarmed for Jean-Paul because he is demonstrating for 25 young pups at puppy swim school, and is not really in any danger as long as he stays in the water.

This is one of the puppies at Swim School. I can’t remember his name. He has just smelled a fart and is checking to see if it is his.

Experiments with Blobs in a Moving Vehicle

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Don’t try this at home.

It must be done on the train or, if you are really brave, in a moving car.

1. Take some freshly painted blobs. (see my earlier tutorial here)

2. Now sit down in a crowded location, preferably with somebody looking over your shoulder.

3. Take a fine point felt tip and turn the blobs into creatures. Do not wibble-wobble!

Page 1. I added the watercolour later. I will give 20 extra points to anyone who can do the watercolour bit on the train as well. (I am stingy with my points.)

Hot Tips:

• Don’t worry too much about the person looking over your shoulder. Jiggle your page sideways until it nearly bumps them in the face. They may lose interest. Probably not.

• Do the fiddly bits when the train is on the straight and not about to pull into a station. This will work best if you know your railway line.

• Make your journey a long one. If you are worried about missing your stop, you will lose concentration. Do you have an auntie who lives a long way away in the country? Go and visit her.

Here are some close-ups, because I don’t really have any more to say.

Inspector Dog. (Giant Schnauzer x Greyhound. Possibly could be categorised as a lurcher. But this one only lurches when the train pulls into a station.)

Ernest. (Maltese x Chihuahua x Pug x Papillon)

Noir Dog. (Beagle x Whippet x Wire-haired Fox Terrier)

Muddy Madge. (Petit Basset Griffon Vendeen. Yes, really.)

This is Finn. It’s always good to have a fish in your repertoire.

This is Foxy. I could have called him Finn too. His friend is Frederica.

This is Dodette. She is uncomfortable with publicity.

This is Herman.

This is Gene.

This is a Woman of Mystery. She has laddered her tights escaping… what? No. No. You’ve got it completely wrong. She carries a pistol in her pocket and is dodging out of the glow of a streetlight while she trails a criminal. You’ll have to imagine the gloomy alleyway.

This is Alberto. He likes pancakes and reading detective novels, but only if he can read them in a boat.

This is Cymbidium Night Angel. She is rescuing a puppy from Gene. Gene was going to feed the puppy to his wife and family. Now Gene and his family will go hungry. But the puppy is very happy.

I did another page of blob dogs, but perhaps I’ll save that for another time. I was on the train to go to the HarperCollins Inaugural Author Workshop Day, which was very good. It’s good to meet some of the other people in the large team who make books, and it’s always great to talk with other book authors and illustrators.

Lost Puppet Sketches

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Didn’t I say I’d find the Three Billy Goats Gruff sketches somewhere unlikely? … I was wrong. They were on the floor, under a pile of papers and sketch books.

Here’s the page of goat sketches done when I briefly considered making puppets of the 3 Billy Goats Gruff for Clive Hicks-Jenkins’s Puppet Challenge. I liked the idea of using crumpled paper to twist into the horn shapes of these fellows. But first I had to remind myself of what makes a goat look like a goat. I didn’t spend very long at it. Just long enough to get to first base. Here’s first base.

A page of goats drawn in the car at soccer training. The middle-bottom one looks more like a Labradoodle I think.

Loose squiggles. Trying to get the ‘essential’ goat.

Thinking about how nicely the horns would twist in damp brown paper…

Thinking about how I would differentiate between Big, Middle and Littlest Billy Goats Gruff. Horns, eye position, nose length, beard. No 3. should have a very long beard, but as you can see in the top picture, he has been thwarted by the edge of the page.

And of course a troll sketch to go with them. Only one.

If you like Billy Goats and graphic novels, you might like to visit Lucinda Gifford’s blog to see her great take on these characters.

Paper Dolls

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I’m not sure where this paper doll process is going in an artistic context. It’s a bit like heading off for a walk with a lot on your mind, but no actual destination. Some of the thoughts that were in my mind at the time included:

• Children love dressing paper dolls. It’s fun.

• Men have been dressing women for centuries, shaping them into an art-form irresistibly pleasing to their eyes. I can see why.

• Women have also participated. Some Chinese women broke their own daughter’s feet and bound them until well into the 20th century. (How did they feel about that?) Modern woman sometimes chooses to totter on high heels (me too), making herself both physically and psychologically vulnerable.

• People have participated in a similar art-form breeding dogs (and other animals) for a particular look. Sometimes when breeding didn’t perfect the look, they trimmed off bits of the animal.

• Men and women have done the same thing with flowers and fruit trees. Sometimes we have lost some of the original flavours or genetic material altogether.

This may all sound very sombre and didactic. But really I was just playing around on the drawing board for a few minutes, and the thoughts going through my head fed into what I was doing.

I took some inspiration from Swiss fashion of the early 19th century and sketched a woman (very loosely) and began to dress her. Piece by piece.

It’s definitely fun. And as with all my hare-brained wanderings, it’s very messy.

Did she look better before or after she was clothed in bulky layers? She certainly looked different after the clothes were added.

Don’t we change ourselves so much, with what we wear?