Latest ‘Larger than Life’ -Day Lilies

The rich colours of these double Day Lilies in the long border grabbed my attention a few weeks ago and this idea was born. I’m adding a couple of petals from a different variety coming in from the top.  Progress has been slow because this is so large I need two tables to work on and we have been looking after our lovely granddaughter Lily (a joy) and I have been doing the final checks on the new website (frustrating but we’re nearly there).

Stage 1 masking out stamens and applying base colour with a mix of Faber Castell and Pan pastels using baby oil.

Stage 2 & 3 working on the details and layering petal colours with more baby oil to blend them in. Added the base colours for the dead flower.

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Spanish Workshop

Back in the blustery, dull grey light in the UK after a fun week with everyone in Spain. These Muscatel Grapes seen in the sunny light in Spain where vibrant and translucent and I am struggling to keep the momentum going now I’m back in grey UK. Anyway I’ll share my progress to date with some photos from the trip.

These are three times life size and part of my “larger than Life’ series.

I’m laying down thin layers of colour and then gently dissolving with a minute amount of baby oil, too much and the colour comes off and smears, too little and the binder doesn’t dissolve.  this is all done with a pad of cotton wool, so high risk stuff as edges are extremely difficult to manipulate.

On the stalks I have embossed for the spots and then layered dry coloured pencil over the top.

Loads more layering and wiping!

More layering with baby oil and I can see the end in sight.

  

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Onion Progress

Apologies for lack of blogs but we actually had a short holiday travelling back through France and visiting Ewa Wnek-Webb, a Polish artist friend of mine from Teddington now living and painting in France. Since then we have been enjoying time with our beautiful granddaughter on a visit from New York and one year old now. Where did that year go!! Now I am back with my onions,briefly, before my trip to South Africa so I thought you might like to catch up on progress; even slower now we have the short winter days!!

I am testing out my new Icarus Box, a heated drawing pad I bought from Ester Roi who designed them in the US. I am only using it on the lower settings, as the paper cockles rather alarmingly on higher settings, but this enables me to work faster and spread the colour further. It will also keep me nice and toasty during the coming winter! More on trials of this later.

  
 

I shall be posting some new workshop dates on my website tomorrow. 

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‘Know Your Onions’

This is the finished second in my latest ‘Larger than Life’ series and the first of a whole bunch of onion pictures that are spilling out of my head at the moment. The second is on it’s way to France with me so more on the progress there later. Meanwhile, let me know what you think. The onion is over 8inches in diameter! It is now available as a limited edition of 100 giclee prints, signed and numbers. Details on my website soon.

  

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Two workshops and some new work

I had a busy week last week, an interesting first run of my new ‘Complex Colour Layering’ workshop at the studio,

  
A fun, one-day workshop in Egbaston for the Birmingham Society of Botanical Artists, ‘Graphite Drawing with Underpainting’ (thanks for looking after me so well) produced some excellent results. This was a chance to try a completely new technique for most.

   
   
Plus individual pencil sharpening advice!

  
Last night saw the very messy start to another ‘Larger than Life’ sprouting onion.

  
Watch this space!

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Larger than Life Nectarines finished

Just a bit of cleaning up and it’s off to the printers next week..  Limted edition prints will be available when the new website goes on stream in the next few weeks. If you want to pre-order drop me an email. 

  

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‘Larger than Life II’

Sharing progress on the second of these new ‘larger than life’ pictures.  These are twice life size (approx.) Italian Nectarines. This has taken me nearly 5 full working days, so far so much quicker than smaller work. Worked by layering with baby oil or liquid paraffin wax.  Let me know what you think.

   
    
    
   

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Last day at Art in Action

One more day to go. Non-stop talking, so many interested people and so much amazing talent. 

Here’s yours truly,demonstrating on the stand.

  

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Larger than Life update

All done and off to the printers tomorrow! More photos to show the scale and detail.  I’m really enjoying this technique using a combination of resist, underpainting with conte pastels and baby oil, then layering coloured pencil into baby oil, lifting the excess and finally applying the detail. Baby oil is liquid paraffin wax not an oil and unless over applied will not stain the paper permanently but the colour mixed with baby oil will stain the paper so this technique is a bit risky!

   
   

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Larger than Life

I’ve been keeping a low profile on my blog lately whilst working on this large clematis drawing. This is the first of a series of much larger than life drawings which I have been burning to do for a long time. Three times life size, the drawing measures nearly a meter wide and I’ve still a bit to do before it goes to be scanned. I’ll keep you posted on progress.

  

 

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