Tuesday, May 5, 2015

EVERY DAY in May!


I signed up for the annual 'Every Day in May' challenge on Facebook and Flickr. Am already thinking, Oy what was I thinking!?... I decided to brush up on my watercolour skills while doing this and really enjoyed the first three days - maybe watercolour is my medium after all. I've been faffing around with oils for a while now and still don't quite feel the love.


Day 1 was a favourite food, and the only appetizing things in my kitchen were some grapefruit and avocados that we'd bought at the roadside on a recent trip to the bush. Just come into season, fresh and delicious!

Day 2 - a nearby Tree -  so I looked out of our front window and lo, there was a beautifully autumnal Pride of India (or Crepe Myrtle) that I'd hardly noticed was turning. Nothing like painting something to appreciate your surroundings.

Day 3 was Curtains and as I'd left all my painting clobber by the window and had room on the side of the page, I added the sitting room curtain plus more of the rather unkempt background garden (top of this post)







Day 4 - Bottle/s of spice or herbs. Not really inspired by this one and left it till late in the day to pull a common old bottle of Robertson's cinnamon out of the cupboard and tackle it.  Drawing it took me right to my days as a 'renderer' in an ad agency - back in the day when there were no computers, digital cameras or google. We had shelf-loads of reference magazines and racks of Magic Markers and I drew for eight hours a day and sometimes more and all weekend if there was a big campaign on - no extra pay! 'Pack shots' similar to this one were where I stared intensely at glass, plastic, ellipses, shadows and logos to work out how to recreate them 2D on paper.


Day 5 - Something Hot. Seeing as my husband wouldn't pose :) I settled for my morning coffee in a hot orange mug. Thoroughly overworked in places, I seem to be getting worse at this as I go along. Should be good for me though, if I persevere!

I'll try and post every day for the rest of May to prevent having to write so much the next time - short and sweet to get bum off seat.

3 comments:

dinahmow said...

I love seeing everyone else's sketches, but have not got back into the habit myself.Self, you must do it!

RH Carpenter said...

Love your take on all the challenges each day and your HOT painting (too bad your hubby wouldn't pose! ha ha). My favorite is the top with the gorgeous tree and the curtains that look like I can reach out ad touch them :)

Cathy said...

Your avocado and your cinnamon are fantastic!!