Tag Archives: altered books

Greyfur the fairytale kangaroo

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Here are some first quick studies of Greyfur the grey kangaroo for the Puppet Challenge as requested by the maestro, Clive Hicks-Jenkins. Lovely to begin drawing this layered fairytale character (she’s feisty and brave but also soft and loyal) but it’s quite likely I may go in another direction altogether… he he. Big Bad Wolves always appeal to me for some reason. And then there’s my old favourite, Angela Carter and her wonderful fairytale renditions. The Courtship of Mr Lyon, and The Tiger’s Bride too. Fabulous. And then there’s Puss in Boots!

It does occur to me that the design of any character would be very different for a glove puppet as compared to a shadow puppet or a marionette. Aaah! Decisions. I’ll just squeeze some sketching here and there in between my desperate pre-Christmas attempts to get further with Thunderstorm Dancing, and no doubt the puppet will evolve of its own volition in the end. Things usually do.

I am so hooked on drawing in vintage book pages now. They are so warm and welcoming. It’s hard to draw on anything else! By the way, the first sketches are done with a Prismacolour pencil in ‘artstick’ form. I love Prismacolour pencils, and the other day I discovered these blocks that look like conté sticks, but are not smudgy like conté. I’m using it for Thunderstorm Dancing and really enjoying it.

Greyfur study1 Greyfur study2 Greyfur study3 Greyfur study4 Greyfur study5 ink Greyfur study6 ink

‘Outsider Artist’ Martin Ramirez at the Library of Congress

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Re-blogged from Detour Art. Click to go there and read a fabulous post on Ramirez and the question of the ‘Outsider Art’ label.

Ramirez spent most of his life in hospital, drawing on whatever he could find. How I’d love to see this artwork in person. It is painted on a patchwork of envelopes, correspondence and advertising fliers, addressed to the hospital.

pp_and_exhib_verso_BT_ramirez RamirezXRFOct13Brostoff_klb

More Outsider Art links here:

The 13 Most Amazing Outsider Artists of All Time
Outsider Art (Tumblr)
List of Museums and Collections c/o Detour Art blog

Birthday cards

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We love to hand-make all of our birthday cards for family and friends. Sometimes the card is a hurried affair, slapped together moments before deadline; sometimes it’s a painstaking endeavour. But all the family enjoy this tradition.

Sometimes a fairly quick creation turns out well. And of course all art practice feeds into and informs the other art that you do.

Here’s a card done this morning for a friend turning 50. Her alter ego (so some of us decided in our wisdom ;-) is Sheena, Queen of the Jungle.

Later I’ll post a selection of cards made by all of us.

JWtoJRobbita2013 cover lores

and inside...

and inside…

 

 

 

Swimming again

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Swimming again, or rather, watching the swimming. Here were some of my more immediate neighbours on the spectator benches at swimming lessons this week.

My fine-point pens had died of exhaustion, so I enjoyed using a thicker felt tip instead, and later adding a bit of pencil colour at the drawing board was fun.

auburn haired swimmer

auburn haired swimmer – this little boy has a spectacular head of flaming orange-red.

blue sibling

blue sibling – she found Ollie the Octopus’s antics amusing

green sibling

green sibling – same sibling, different colour

Mum with mobile phone

Mum with mobile phone – most of the spectators spend a lot of time watching their phones. It’s a funny world we live in now. I do it too sometimes.

long-haired mum with tissue long-haired mum

Look! Stick-in-the-mud!

A cutaway book with temptingly delicious stick buried within!

Update: more mud added! (It was much too neat and tidy for such a muddy topic.)

stick in the mud with more mud lores

This book has just flown to Italy to live with David and Fran who own the lovely Jack.

Equine again

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Barnyard gossip

Barnyard gossip

Carousel galloping horse over galloping mustangs

Carousel galloping horse over galloping mustangs

Soliloquizzical Moments:

• Should I add any colour? I think I like it plain black….

(added colour)

• Yep, I think I like it plain black.

• Funny how the illustration of the galloping mustangs has made a shadow under the back leg where one would want a shadow, and put an interesting pattern over the carousel horse’s head.

• Should I add white gouache to the horse? If I do, I’ll lose the background mustangs and the flat, outline effect which interests me, but I’ll gain a milky, layered quality and a more three dimensional effect, which might also interest me.

• Should I add white gouache to the coloured bits to make them pastel toned? … maybe…

• Perhaps I should leave it as is and paint another carousel horse on the next page and add all sorts of white and stuff to that one… or this one… depending…

• Should I stop soliloquising and go and do those other urgent jobs?

Equine Soliloquy

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equine soliloquy B&W heads

Another soliloquy seems to be forming in odd moments… ‘The Tale of Two Horses’ went on the train into the city the other day as a sketchbook, and came back with several new horses in it. More will come when I have a little time.

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In wondrously poor condition on the outside. Inside, the pages are smooth and lovely to draw on.

This one is taking its own shape more easily than the last one. Sort of ambling along.

Some pages I will start by liking, and then not. Some the other way around. It won’t bother me. It’s contemplative. And because they are horse doodles, it’s a bit like climbing cosily back into my childhood for a while. (And I draw them exactly the same way now!)

Fun drawing a foal dance over other horses. Then a squiggly cameo shape and brushy, brushiness all about.

Fun drawing a foal dance over other horses. Then a squiggly cameo shape and brushy, brushiness all about.

I’ve just done a page that is more interested in pattern, shape and contrast than in horsey correctness. It was very freeing.  But I’ll play with it some more another time, and take the shapes and tones further into pattern.

This page reminds me of two things: The poodle wallpaper we found on the walls of our 1950s house after removing the 70s wallpaper; and my brief period of lessons with Richard Birmingham.

This page reminds me of the poodle wallpaper we found on the walls of our 1950s house after removing the 70s wallpaper. It could be much better if it went further away from the horse shapes I think.

The Burrowers

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‘Doug and the Dowager’ –  fineliner, indian ink, pencil and gouache on vintage book page

Handsome Hamster

‘Handsome Hamster’ – fineliner, indian ink and gouache on vintage book page

'Sylvester did not remain long' - fineliner, indian ink and gouache on vintage book page

‘Sylvester did not remain long’ – fineliner, indian ink, pencil and gouache on vintage book page

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‘Hamster Hearsay’ – indian ink, gouache and pencil on vintage book page

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‘An Armadillo in Spaunton’ – fineliner, indian ink, gouache and pencil on vintage book page

'I'm sorry, the shop is closed' - fineliner, indian ink, gouache and pencil on vintage book page

‘I’m sorry, the shop is closed’ – fineliner, indian ink, gouache and pencil on vintage book page

'The Moocher of Mystery Mine' - fineliner, indian ink, gouache and pencil on vintage book page

‘The Moocher of Mystery Mine’ – fineliner, indian ink, gouache and pencil on vintage book page

'Jon and Penny' - fineliner, indian ink, gouache and pencil on vintage book page

‘Jon and Penny’ – fineliner, indian ink, gouache and pencil on vintage book page

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'Alice's Ecstasy'

Alice is the dog. She loves train trips. She loves train trips almost as much as swimming in circles in the dam with a stick in her mouth. And she really, really loves that!

The well dressed lady is inspired by a photo of Ada Rehan. Ada lived from 1859 to 1916. Does this make her Edwardian? She was an actress and she fed her retriever too many chocolates.

The picture is possibly for Camperdown’s upcoming Animalia exhibition… only how to get it there? If I frame it, the glass will get broken in the post won’t it? If I don’t frame it, how can it be displayed? I was going to send the artwork still in the book, so that it could be displayed open on a table. That didn’t work with this one, as I ended up collaging three pieces of paper together and they are no longer in the book!

I’ll have to make up my mind by tomorrow or I won’t get anything there in time.

Well! I made up my mind. I sent the Cornish Soliloquy instead. And Alice’s Ecstasy can be purchased in my Etsy shop here. Hooray!