Getting Back to Blogging...

Spring... a time of renewal.

It seems that cycles of writing regular blog posts interspersed with weeks/months of being incommunicado affect many bloggers, and unfortunately I am no exception. Apologies. It is not due to being inactive on the art front... in fact the pause often happens initially because of a very active phase and not having the time and energy. Then it becomes harder to get going again. So a very quick update and then I will move on and re-commit to this blog as I do love the way it can act as an online diary and record of a life in art, while at the same time inspiring others, hopefully.

If you pop onto my page for Art Events & Teaching you will notice that I am running regular classes and workshops throughout this year at Norfolk Creative Arts, an exciting new venue in Grimston, West Norfolk. There are a wide variety of tutors, subjects and media so if you wish to investigate visit www.norfolkcreativearts.co.uk and there is sure to be something to tempt you!

Spring Term Wednesday Weekly Mixed Media Classes
at Norfolk Creative Arts are now in full swing! 

Aside from all the planning for these classes I am also busy with personal artwork as a joint exhibition with another artist is looming on the horizon in May. More details will follow in the next few weeks but we are both creating mostly new work for it and the beautiful village hall in Thornham is quite spacious, so the pressure is beginning to mount.

Some images of work that may be included in the upcoming exhibition...

Woodland (North Wootton) in compressed charcoal & white pastel © Tod Evans

Barn Owl, using limited watercolour palette and charcoal pencil
- a quick animation here to show you how it built up...

Close crop of Teasels in pencil, white gesso and acrylic 

© Tod Evans

Views of seascape in watercolour, gouache & Inktense pencil
as it built up © Tod Evans

Roydon painted in acrylic with palette knife
© Tod Evans

The beach at Old Hunstanton in acrylic © Tod Evans

So a little sneak peak at some of the contenders to be included, there are works still in progress (not shown) and I am excited about work yet to be created! Will keep you posted on new developments but if you are in Norfolk over the weekend of 14th and 15th May, 2016 we would love to see you at our exhibition Into the Woods & Beyond to be held in Thornham Village Hall, PE36 6LX.

Sketchbook work continues as well, and possibly may be included for perusal...

Sketchbook work continues...

Finally, a recent exhibition visited by myself and family was Painting the Modern Garden: Monet to Matisse at the Royal Academy in London. There was (and is) a close connection between many artists and their gardens and it's natural that they wished to explore ways of depicting the colours, shapes and features, often working in them as outdoor studios. Monet is the key artist in this fine exhibition but there are examples by Caillebotte, Pissaro, renoir, matisse, Van Gogh, Klimt, Bonard etc. Also some artists I had not encountered before, Joaquin Sorolla being one and I plan to research more about him. It is Monet, however, who resonates the most and the work inspired by his lily pond is sublime. Despite over exposure on packaging and household items over the years, to see the paintings in real life is to fall in love with them all over again. The fusions of colour, the abstraction of motifs and the free brushwork is totally absorbing. The finale, the triptych, in the last room is breathtaking - the sheer scale - so that as a viewer you are compelled to move up close and study the fragmented textures and colours before stepping back right back to appreciate the whole again. Like a little dance forwards and backwards we go repeatedly, drinking in the artwork with the senses. I really did not want to leave that painting and having visited Monet's garden in Giverny it is as relevant today as it has ever been.

Superb exhibition, well worth a visit.

The exhibition runs until April 20th so I encourage you to go and see it if possible!

Experimenting with Colours and Techniques

A new enthusiasm and energy has taken hold recently with regards art making. There seems to have been a shift in my vision and a freer approach is emerging... I have been experimenting with new colours and foregoing detail in completed work in favour of expressive mark making. This is exciting!

I spent one afternoon playing with some new watercolour paints...

Winsor & Newton watercolours - Transparent Orange
and Sapphire Blue

Daniel Smith watercolours and W&N Cerulean Blue plus Sapphire Blue again.
Bottom half of painting had some cellophane draped over while paint was still wet,
and then left to dry. 

Winsor & Newton Gold calligraphy ink
(fortunately lightfast - beware, not all calligraphy colours are) with
Daniel Smith Undersea Green and Violet gouache.

Tricky to photograph so the gold shimmer
is apparent!

The potential of the new Daniel Smith colours is very inspiring as they granulate readily and the colours separate out into their component parts.

I have also been studying a new book by Debora Stewart and her techniques for abstracted art echo what I have been moving towards. The untitled (as yet) work shown in the stages below is a step in the right direction with a loose beginning, and I tried to keep the drawing spontaneous rather than laboured and exact.

1.  Compressed charcoal was stroked energetically
across mid grey Canson Mi-Teintes pastel paper.
Water was swished over this with a large flat brush
in multi-directions. As the work was upright on an easel
drips were encouraged to flow down the paper. You can see where I then
started the line drawing in white pastel pencil. 

2.  Once the basic composition was in place I began to
introduce some of the lightest / darkest tones and established
the insect as the focal point.   

3.  More light areas are built up with white pastel pencil and
a few more hints of ochre placed.

 

4.  The stamens of the top bloom are now in place.

5. Finally the stamens on the primary bloom are suggested
and the brightest sunlit areas are strengthened with touches of
a white Unison pastel stick. 

This drawing was very enjoyable to do and three elements helped to keep it fresh and loose. First, I stood at an easel to work which aids larger arm movements; the initial layer of large sweeping marks contained an innate liveliness and lastly I held the pastel pencils well away from the point, so relinquishing some control. Also, the limited palette works to keep the focus on the insect and small touches of ochre elsewhere lead the eye around the composition.   

Today has surely been one of the hottest so far... and I spent most of the afternoon and early evening in the studio. I would normally wear an apron when working with pastels as they are one of the messier mediums but couldn't bear the thought of an additional layer and didn't bother. Using a photo I took in Holme-next-the-Sea of pink Mallow as a starting point, I worked on a painting that focused on mark making and layering to try and capture the essence. 

A loose wet-on-dry application of watercolour

was the starting point for this painting. The base colours were encouraged to fuse and again drips were integral as I was stood at the easel.

Although the support looks white in the photo it is a warm cream Art Spectrum Colourfix paper. The slightly gritty surface happily accepts watermedia and there is plenty of tooth for soft pastel in subsequent layers. 

                 

Once the initial paint was dry a very loose drawing in charcoal pencil was 

established. Again holding the pencil nearer the end furthest from the point helped prevent 

a tight rendition. Also pushing up, rather than pulling in a downward motion, and gently rolling the 

pencil between the fingers as drawing enabled more random marks to be made.

The next step seems counter productive, but I did it anyway, and 'lost' the drawing

by dragging a flat brush with diluted gesso across the surface in multi-directional strokes. 

This is a technique favoured by Debora Stewart but with hindsight I realised she uses 

compressed charcoal so a little more of the drawing remains intact! 

The drawing is then re-established with charcoal pencil and even if more of the first drawing 

had been present this second one would have been superimposed, and slightly offset, to 

enhance the feeling of layered media. My eyes are really enjoying what is beginning to happen in this work and I'm almost tempted to stop at this stage.

I push on however and introduce more colour using soft pastel sticks. 

I limit the colours and tonal range to try and avoid confusion. 

When I pause to assess how the work is going I feel a little disappointed. Close up there is plenty to engage the eye but move a short distance away and it blurs into a generalised mid tone.

Something must be done to redeem it...

 Taking yet another risk, I lightly block in the negative spaces in the top two thirds of the painting. 

I use a white pastel pencil and hold it low so that the side of the point catches across the gritty surface and allows the under layer to still play a part. 

I finally stop and take stock again. After a few extra dark punctuations 

with the charcoal pencil I feel it is finished. 

Did I make the right choice?

Too early to tell. I need a bit of time to pass to assess it as a whole again.

What do you think?  

 

Nature Print Experiments

Earlier this week I spent a very happy and productive few hours in the studio trying my hand at some nature prints. This year our little paddock is almost shoulder height in places with cow parsley and I had a fancy to try some experiments and see what I could do with some specimens of this and some grasses using black water-based printing ink. After gathering some plant material I headed back to the studio and spied a pigeon feather on the ground by the step, another possible inspiration.

Preparing a surface with acrylic paint and roller prior to printing.

I decided to prepare a coloured surface which could be set aside to dry, and that I would have a practise with the printing technique on cheaper cartridge paper before using it. I opted for a piece of Fabriano 5, a hot pressed watercolour paper, as I felt the smooth surface would help keep any definition crisp and cleaner looking. I didn't want the paint to become too dense or complicated so I opted for just two colours of acrylic paint and applied it lightly using a rubber roller, allowing plenty of white paper to remain visible. This was then set aside to dry.   

First attempt - printing from the feather
onto white cartridge paper.

I felt the potential of the feather could be more successful than the finer plant material so opted to try using this first.  I utilised an A4 sheet of laminated plastic to lay the feather on and a roller to transfer the black water-based printing ink across the feather itself. This was then gently placed on some plain white cartridge paper and a piece of cheap photocopy paper on top of this, a bit like a sandwich. I used my hand to carefully apply pressure and rub across all the areas of the feather in the hope of a good ink transfer... As you can see in the photo above I hadn't quite got enough ink across the barbs of the feather so the print is very linear. I tried a few more and then felt ready to have a go printing on the prepared coloured paper.  

This feather print was placed at the bottom of the prepared page
and I was delighted with the amount of detail.

Here is the same print but shown alongside the feather itself
plus the ink transferred onto the photocopy paper
- the ink has naturally worked itself through the barbs
leaving an additional mirror image!

A few more feather prints were made on the
Fabriano 5 prepared surface. 

After a practise on cartridge paper I finally had
a go at printing from the cow parsley.

I felt encouraged by the results of the nature printing so far. The process itself seems very straight forward with quite basic skills involved, but I can see that the design element is more difficult and necessary to make a piece of artwork that goes beyond this rudimentary level. Most important of all though - I was certainly having fun experimenting!

It was at this point, when I was taking a few more photos, that I glanced at the now messy plastic inking 'plate' and was intrigued by the impression the feather had left in the wet surface.

The imprint left by the feather in the built up
inking surface on the plastic (it looks brown here
but must just be the light catching as the ink is black in reality).

One of the grasses I had plucked in the paddock had fantastic spidery roots so I prepared another painted surface to print onto using heavyweight cartridge paper this time. I also printed some textural effects from an offcut of bubblewrap. Unfortunately the resulting print didn't really work, possibly as the root was quite fleshy and round so not much could make contact with the paper, and also the spindly bits were a bit too thin and fragile maybe?

The grass roots and the (unfortunately poor) printed result...

However undeterred I moved on to try another tactic...

Two types of grasses printed onto Bockingford 'Not' watercolour paper.

I added watercolour washes and some spatter to the print,
and found the effect quite pleasing.

By this time I was beginning to feel my energy getting low and decided it was time for a break and that I wanted to reflect on the experiment so far. Once again, as I took a few more photos, the inking 'plate' revealed an interesting array of marks and textures.

A section of the plastic inking 'plate'
showing interesting textures - an abstract image in itself.

I really enjoyed this experiment in nature printing and if you get the opportunity have a try yourself. Even if you don't have printing ink and a roller, why not see what effects are possible using acrylic, gouache or watercolour applied to your subject matter with a brush?

Focus on Flowers Workshop at Dobbies

The Focus on Flowers Workshop at Dobbies Garden Centre, King's Lynn, was a great success and based on the feedback from participants it would seem everyone went away armed with some nuggets of new information and enthusiasm for tackling more flower drawings and paintings.

The four photos here show some of the preparatory work in a sketchbook for discussing how the basic structure of most flowers fall into one of eight categories.

This was the subject I introduced at the beginning before we moved out into the garden centre and had a go at some structure drawings from live plants.

This led into focusing on how tone adds information about the light source, form of the subject and where things are in space, even if it is very a shallow space rather than the foreground / middleground / background of an expansive landscape. There was time to settle and work on one longer tonal study or several shorter ones.



Light and shade visually allows areas to come forward and others to recede - even though it is just a flat piece of paper!

               
                 

We had a break for lunch in the restaurant area and enjoyed a delicious meal of jacket potatoes with a variety of fillings and a  salad garnish. As we sipped tea and coffee there was reflection on experiences so far, and a few people mentioned how interested some customers had been in what was going on and how different it was for them to see flowers being drawn in sketchbooks.









The afternoon was devoted to using watercolour and working from a flower specimen individually chosen from the garden centre. Strategies practised in the morning helped with getting a basic drawing in place; and one participant, feeling bold, decided to go straight in with paint and use soft fusions of colour as her starting point. I had demonstrated briefly some of the main useful watercolour techniques and also how coloured or water soluble pencils can be successfully incorporated to enhance passages in the work.

Working from chosen flower specimens.

Focused on their flowers, observation and creativity...

There was a break mid afternoon and Dobbies supplied us with more refreshments and plates of wonderful cakes and traybakes. Then it was back to work...

Light and airy in Dobbies restaurant, and plenty of room to work.

It was a great day - lovely company, delicious food and plenty of teas, coffees and iced juice to keep the brain cells alert. I thank all the staff at Dobbies for their welcome and generosity in accomodating us. As the weather warms up, your garden comes to fruition and the local parks show off colourful flower displays, try capturing some of that beauty in a sketchbook or painting as a memory of time spent observing nature closely.