It's all about the mushroom

Hello,

My good intentions of more frequent posts have appeared to have gone out of the window!  Life gets busy and so this blog takes a bit of a back seat.  I do want to keep it up though and will strive to get better!  

A lot has happened since my last post back in....well, whenever it was.  I've been creating some new work and taking part in several creative/makers markets which I've really been enjoying.  I've got some more of those coming up so I'll aim to write about those properly nearer the time.  I'm also going to be having a piece of work in a group exhibition coming up shortly which is very exciting for me.  I haven't exhibited anything since my college days so I'm delighted to be a part of a show now.  I will post about that soon.

In the meantime I'll share my latest piece of work all about mushrooms.  They fascinate me and are something amazingly fun to draw.  This work did go through a few iterations before I settled on this composition and colour palette, but I'm so happy that I stuck with it and I'm really pleased with how the final piece turned out.  My intention was for it to have a vintage kind of feel to it, and I so enjoyed playing with all the textures in this one.

I WILL be back soon with more updates.  In the meantime I hope you're having a good week.  It's Saturday so I'm getting out and about in (hopefully) the sunshine!

Sharon :).

A bird fest

Hello,

It's been a while (again) since I've written a post but better late than never!

I've been busy over the past few weeks creating new work and it's been an exciting and productive time.  I came back from a short Christmas break full of energy and enthusiasm, ready to flesh out some ideas that had been brewing for a while. 

For the purpose of this post I'm going to focus on three recent images I made.  My plan was to make a small group of images with a similar subject matter and colour palette.  I don't often make sets of work so I thought this would be a good challenge for me and I'm really happy with how they turned out. 

The starting point for each image was a linocut bird.  I love the textures you can achieve with linocut whilst still achieving an all over pretty even covering of colour.  I am a basic linocutter I guess but as there's no real right or wrong way for my purposes (so I've told myself), I feel that's ok.  I wanted each bird to be surrounded by a strange plant land, and I really enjoy creating fantasy plants and landscapes that are a little strange and perhaps unsettling.  I always like to imagine living in those strange worlds and whether I'd feel entirely comfortable!  I wanted the images to be retro-mid century tinged, and I hope my chosen colour palette reflects this.  Once the linocut print was down, I worked into the landscape building it up with coloured pencil, acrylic and gouache.  I get totally absorbed in creating, working up the layers, making the textures, it's a real joy.  I've started using gouache after leaving it for a long time (lots of dried tubes that have now been re-discovered and bought back to life, not always successfully)!  I find for larger areas it scans better that watercolour for me (although that may be my bad scanning technique, who knows, if anyone has any tips I'm all ears)!  I took inspiration from sketches I made from one of my many visits to the V&A Museum in London (love it so), and of course natures delights, birds, are always a lovely subject.  The V&A has a huge amount of beautiful and sometimes strange objects and artwork.  I especially love the medieval period rooms and get lost in time when I'm there.  

Well, I think I've rabbled on for long enough.  I hope you've enjoyed this post.  I'll aim to get more regular at this, although I can't promise anything!

Enjoy your day and I'll see you soon. 

Sharon :).

Medieval musings

Hello,

I hope you're all having a good week.  Today I'm sharing another new piece of work that's been inspired by my museum sketches.  I had a real desire to draw a dragon.  I saw so many of them in my museum wanderings, and there is something very magical about them that really captures my imagination.  It took quite a bit of sketching to get the dragon that I wanted to create, but I'm really happy with how it turned out.  I hope there's a sense of personality captured in my creation!  I've been enjoying drawing fantastic, strange, mythical creatures over these past few months, adding to my usual bird and animal creations.  It's been a bit of a shift for me in terms of subject matter, and something I'm hoping to continue with.

The dragon was transformed into a linocut image and then the rest was a combination of acrylic paint, coloured pencil, charcoal, and pen.  I wanted to take elements of stone work, carvings and fire into the illustration and I loved creating all those textures and patterns.  I also indulged my love of a limited colour palette sticking to three main colours.  

I like to keep the lino smudges in my work and not leave things too clean, just a personal preference really, does that work?  I'm never too sure.   

Just finishing up my coffee now and then I'll be busy organising for an art market tomorrow.  It'll be my first outdoor market and it's for artists based in my London borough of Barnet.  I'm hoping I'll be able to get some pictures of the day and I'll post them here hopefully next week!  

I hope you've had a lovely week and enjoy your weekend :).

My recent way of working

Hello,

I hope you're all having a good start to September.  Can't quite believe it's here already and as it's been a lovely summer here in the UK, I'm hoping some good weather will continue as I've loved wearing shorts pretty much everyday all the way through.  That's been a real treat for my legs and a nice change from them being cooped up.  So far it's still good so all is well.  

Today I'm sharing a new image I've recently finished.  I've been working a lot with ideas just from my imagination over the past few months which I've then made into prints or cards.  I guess it's a bit of a change for me to just create work where I feel I have complete freedom to experiment as it's all been work that will potentially go into my Etsy shop or just be created as portfolio pieces for my website.  I've mentioned before how enjoyable this has been for me and it's also meant I've allowed myself time to 'have a go' at new processes, one of which has been incorporating linocut into my work and I'm really happy with the results.  I've been combining it with my painted/penciled/stencilled areas and I love the variety of textures I can get from it alongside my regular combinations.  

This is the most recent work.

The sea creatures were created from the linocut and then I've used a combination of acrylic paint, coloured pencils and oil pastels to create the plants and shapes.  The idea stems from a combination of conversations with friends....yep! feelings, music and a desire to create a moving, swirling image with a limited palette.  

Over the past few months all of the below images have been created incorporating linocut into my work.  I really do enjoy the process and the finish it gives combined with the looser marks created by hand.  All of these illustrations are available to buy as Giclee prints over in my shop too.

I thought I'd share that little insight into the way I've been working, I hope it's been of interest!  I'm now off to get some sketching done working through some new ideas.  

I hope you're all ready for the weekend and I'll be back soon :).