Flighty, but Fun

I've been playing with some presents I bought myself on holiday - a few Daniel Smith watercolours from the Italian Artshop which stocks this brand that I've read about and wanted for years, not least because of the generous size tubes they come in...makes you feel a little less Scrooge-like about squeezing a dollop onto your palette with our poor Rand diving ever deeper into a hole; and a very reasonably priced Black Silver Dynasty 'dagger' shaped brush from Artsauce in Observatory, an artist-friendly shop in both price and helpful advice. I love the shapes and marks you can make with this brush, from broad flat stripes to pointy or swirly leaf shapes, to fine, sharp lines, it doesn't hold a lot of paint though so you have to dip often.


I used DS Phthalo Blue, Naples Yellow and Deep Scarlet in the top sketch of my son sleeping on the couch and on the strip underneath him - trying to see how much of a range I could get with just those. I also bought Moonglow, a lovely purplish granulating shade and Pyrrol Orange which I'm now wondering why... I did like it on my test strips hanging on the line in my studio. A transparent, glowing orange it could come in useful when painting... sunlit nasturtiums perhaps? I don't really like to fuss about colours and have actually been thinking I should trim my palette down as it's too confusing, and unnecessary to have so many. Sigh, ah well.

Hanging on a line in my (messy) studio here are offcuts of bits of watercolour paper that I've kept - very useful for playing around on and happy moodling!

Has anyone else caught onto the 'Word of the year' WOTY phenomenon? Suddenly it seems to be everywhere, with several creative mentorship sites promoting it as a creative spur or focus. I think I've decided on mine... FUN... which seems rather trivial, flighty and frivolous, but for some time I've been feeling a tad anxious and weighed down by what should or shouldn't be done and where I ought, or ought not to be artistically and otherwise, and the state of the nation, and that's the word that has jumped out at me from various sources. So I think I'll take it and see where it leads to. Would love to know yours if you have one!

Something with Bristles

So much for posting every day - just keeping up with drawing is about all I can manage. Day 6's EDM challenge 'something with bristles' immediately made me think of the drawing into ink washes with bleach method that I first tried here. Great for fine lines and scrubby marks. I was asked to post a tutorial by a couple of people on the Facebook page, so here goes:

Materials:

• Black water-soluble fountain pen ink. Not sure if Parker Quink is available everywhere, it's a standard stationery item here. (the flower on the top is mine :)) 
• Ordinary household bleach. I wasn't aware of how bad it is for you till someone mentioned it in the comments and I looked it up. Wear gloves and a mask, open the windows and doors!
• Water for rinsing and diluting the ink and bleach - a small nozzled bottle is very useful - and small containers to hold the solutions.
• Old or non-precious brushes. I think bleach would eat any natural bristle
• Bamboo pens or sticks to draw with - likewise bleach would destroy a metal pen nib
• Watercolour or drawing paper - different types will give different results. I masked the edges with tape.
• Things to add texture - sponges, toothbrush, paper towel.

Prepare your paper with ink washes. Vary the dilutions - with Quink you'll see the black separate in places into blue and orangey pigments.

 Add textures if you like, flick on ink or bleach solution, dab with paper towel or a sponge - experiment. Allow to dry - or if you start working into the wash while still damp it will give softer edges.

 Dilute a little bleach with water in a small container. It seems to work just as well as full strength. Have your reference material or photo at the ready.

 I started by bleaching out the negative shapes in my leaf design with an old paintbrush

 Adding lines with a bamboo pen - if you dilute the bleach more you can get less stark lines

 and some pattern or cross hatching

 If you like you can go back in with ink washes, lines and splashes

Not my most successful result, but the more you play around, the more options you'll come up with, and are sure to encounter some happy accidents along the way. I can't vouch for the archival qualities of this method - I've heard that the paper will eventually deteriorate but so far my earlier drawings have survived. Have fun!

Those Magnificent Men

I joined our sketching group on our second trip to the Museum of Military History on Saturday - our first being four years ago, amazing we've been meeting that long, with two original members and a few newer ones along the way.

I wanted to sketch the Spitfire that last time was in the middle of the display area, my Dad  having been a Spitfire pilot in WWII. I couldn't find it and presumed it had been taken somewhere for an exhibition or for maintenance, so started sketching this plane from the 1st World War, a Scout Experimental 5a (SE5a) of the Royal Flying Corps. Sitting there squinting at its details in the dimly lit hall, you can't help but feel the ghosts of the young men that were brave enough to go up in these then revolutionary and flimsy looking flying machines. The straps that held them in, the tiny wires they'd adjusted wing angles with - as my focus moved to the background and I added the propeller of the plane behind it, it dawned on me that that was the Spitfire huddled in the corner... ah well, I was enjoying the play of light on the ribs and bones of the older plane. I ditched the water(aquash)brush  that I've been using, and its scrubby colour - great to mix up some juicy washes with a real brush. I feel the need to find a way to enjoy sketching again - it's been getting a bit mechanical lately (ironic to try it on machinery!)


I wanted to make a quick second sketch before leaving, so with a loaded brush just put down the main shapes of the BMW 'Afrika Corps' motorbike without getting too bogged down in the detail. These were used by the Germans in North Africa c1942, this one rebuilt from spare parts donated by collectors and from spares shops.

These are some of the other sketches done - you can see them all here on facebook and get a better idea of the whole museum.

It occurs to me that I sometimes pick old songs and movies as titles for my blog posts, that some younger visitors may never have heard of before - this one's from a movie that came out when I was ten, and thought was the funniest thing I'd ever seen.

That Jacaranda Time again

This seems to come around faster and faster every year - jacaranda blossom time. They aren't as spectacular as usual in Johannesburg, perhaps because we've had early rains and I think the flowers need a little stress to perform really well - perhaps like all of us. I was not too stressed, it was a lovely sunny morning and I met three sketcher friends in a tranquil side street in Westcliff where we spent a relaxed couple of hours. I did exaggerate the purple, it was there, but sparsely scattered - hard to paint without getting finicky. I started with the bottom one in my watercolour Moleskine with rather a fat brush - a Van Gogh goats hair one that I 've loved for years but which has now lost its point and is losing its hair. 
I switched to some long neglected Caran d'Ache Neocolor II watersoluble crayons which I've never mastered (but haven't spent much time trying). With only 12 basic colours, the middle one is startlingly vivid where I put in street signs, bougainvillea, some yellow and orange  flowers and a bit of a jacaranda - I reined myself in a bit on the last top one of Alan and Marlene sitting picturesquely under the trees.
Previous posts on jacarandas are here, here, here and here if you're interested.

People who sketch People

After creatures at the zoo, I've been back looking at and sketching people, wherever I've been, sometimes making the effort going out specially to find some  - brush people, pen people, pen and wash people, water-soluble people.

I often seriously doubt my ability to render them while I'm at it, but usually at some stage after the sketch is done, I'll recognise something of what I was trying to capture, and forgive myself my shortcomings.

I often wonder while I'm sketching, if I am in fact enjoying myself - that only seems to happen after the session is over and I look at the sketches, and think... that was fun... wasn't it? It can be a bit of a panic, thinking its just not happening at all. And then it has, I (sometimes) realise later.

But not always, then I fiddle and faddle and add more colour or thicker lines until its thoroughly overworked and I'm fed up with it like this one...


Occasionally I'll see someone who really appeals to me, because of their clothes, or posture or attitude and rush down a few mad strokes and something good just happens - that woman in the red dress and white hat (top right) for instance - and I think finally I'm getting somewhere, that's how I want to sketch.

Then the next time I try, and am disappointed again but leave it just as it is and much later perhaps, oh well, maybe not as bad as I thought...

...it's a roller-coaster isn't it?!

A new way to sketch

It was an annoying sort of day yesterday - I heard too late about a peaceful protest at the Emmarentia Dam park very close to my home and my heart. City Parks want to erect a pallisade fence through the middle of it, to keep the dog-walkers away from the botanical gardens section, which they want to chop into further sections, build more erections and no doubt, in time, charge entrance fees to a place which was expressly left to 'the people of Johannesburg' by the owner of the original farm, Louw Geldenhuys. Ooh, my blood is boiling again, so I'm getting off that rant and back to sketching. Anyway, I was too late for the protest (and to draw the people and their dogs), but there was to be an outdoor concert there later in the afternoon, so I thought I'd go along to that and sketch. But a massive thunder-and-frightning storm struck, nipping those plans in the bud for all concerned.

Back in the blogging saddle again, I came across Sarah Wimperis' sketching list on her Muddy Red Shoes blog, and things started looking up. I have the very Pentel Aquash pen that she recommends! And she uses it with normal pan watercolours to produce her gorgeous sketches! So far I have only used it with water-soluble pens (here a Pentel signpen) to produce quick and easy tone washes. I spent what was left of the day happily trying it out with my little Cotman pan set - the above sketch of hydrangeas and Walter, the wooden carving my husband bought when he was 16 years old and hitchhiking, by himself, to Zimbabwe (yikes! yikes!) from Cape Town (yikes!) - has no good features of composition or planning, I was just trying out the brush and colours with what was in front of me. But I'm excited to have this as an alternative to my last attempt at sketching from inside my car, w/c pan set on my knee, sketchbook balanced on the steering wheel, little pot of water jammed in the side door-pocket, brushes being dropped and disappearing into the nethers of the handbrake mechanism.... this makes it all seem so much simpler! Thanks Sarah!

New Art Materials - whee!

Our biggest art shop, Herbert Evans (website under construction), started it's annual sale yesterday. Along with every artist and crafter for miles around, I look forward to it with anticipation and spend days before working out what stocks I'm running out of, and how much I might have over to splash out on something new and interesting.

I decided to concentrate on watercolours this year, and avoid the aisles full of other delights. If you buy eight 5ml tubes of W&N w/c's you get a free tube of a '175th Anniversary' colour, Smalt, (weird name?!) also known as Dumont's Blue, so I joyfully added a couple of new colours to my basket:- Green Gold and Idanthrene Blue, to make up the numbers. They also had - o joy! - some Pentel Aquash waterbrushes - I have read sketchers all over the world chatting about their waterbrushes and swallowing my frustration at not finding any here, but at last I am a proud owner! And a last minute impulse buy - I popped in a six-pack of Faber-Castell Pitt pen brushes... I had read Laureline's write-up of brush pens and hoped these were one of the nice ones she reviewed...but they aren't. They are filled with drawing ink, and aren't water soluble, unless you very quickly wash over them right after applying - I'll reserve judgement till I've played some more, but so far my doodles above seem not far removed from the Koki pens my kids used when little.
But I LOVE the waterbrush - did this sketch of an avenue near our house with a Pilot fineliner and the Aquash - and I love the ease of use and control over water flow - will be putting it in my shoulder-bag for impromptu sketching, and I might get another one or two while they're in stock... and I love the new colours - Smalt, in fact, is a very old pigment - discovered in ancient times and produced by W&N from 1830's till 1890, when it became obsolete, now re-formulated for this limited edition. Its a bright, deep blue - a little more violet than French Ultramarine (though they reckon you can't mix it from available colours) with large particle structure, so it does gorgeous granulation things. They may continue with it if there's a demand, I hope there is!
In the bunfight at the till - has to be a drawback to a good sale - my tube of Hooker's Green got lost, (but not before it was rung up) so I'll just have to go back again for another look - oh dear ;o)

The Brush Project

HERE are my brushes!! I was embarrassed to find that the link I put in yesterday's post, saying I was busy doing this, *popped up on 'paintings prints and stuff' - Vivien Blackburn's blog where she posted this project (*hey, how do you do that?) - and I couldn't work out how to remove it. So, here they are - they really are fun to draw...lots of different textures on small areas. I messed up the shadow on the right side, it slanted away from the bristle end to the back, and mine goes too straight with a bend inwards. I used pen and Peat Brown W&N ink, and Higgins black ink, and a few soft watercolour washes in places, on a Schoellershammer Aquarelle block that I think I've had for about 30 years! The two brushes on the left I've had forever too, I don't think I've ever used the one on top, but it's pretty.