An Inspiring Start to The Year

 

This was going to be my January blog, but I'm a bit slow in posting.  I almost managed it!  

However, I've been quite busy (that's my excuse).

I wanted to have an experimental month in January.  Did I do this?  Well....I started off with good intentions but it was very, very cold in the studio and this sapped my resolve.  And then...before I embarked on any real work, I had a trip over to Inverness to see and hear Barbara Rae (recently made a Dame).  I've always liked her work, but I thought I had stupidly missed her exhibition.  However, my friend Susan (Bridge Art Collective colleague) gave me a lift over and we went to meet her and listen to her lovely impromptu talk. She talked about how she paints in places familiar to her – mainly the Lammermuirs, County Mayo in Ireland and Spain – and she returns again and again to these same places. I found this interesting as it chimes with the words of Matisse (if I remember correctly) who talked about walking and painting the same place over and over again in order to get to the essence of a place. Because Barbara paints in these distinct places, her palette changes to reflect the location, and you can discern this in her work. She also explained her processes, and how she makes monotypes to help her focus on the essentials of a scene and work out a composition. I could go on.  As my friend Jacqueline said, Barbara is generous with her insights.  A lot of us who went along to Inverness Museum and Art Gallery found the afternoon inspirational.

So, having been inspired, when I got back into the (cold) studio, I decided to make a few more monotypes before I did anything else– here are a couple.

And then, it was back to my desire to do some experimenting.  I made some (rabbitskin) size first of all.  Then, to some of it, I added chalk, then pigment. To another dollop of size, I added ash from my woodburning stove, then chalk and pigment. The wood ash made me reflect on the awful fires in California - how devastating! Climate change continues (what a surprise)!  

Anyway, the woodash mix gave me a very uneven, granular medium which I painted onto paper making a textured surface.  I then painted on this surface with acrylics. Taking the Barbara Rae approach, I should have used my monotypes as a springboard for a composition or two, but when I looked in my sketchbooks, all I could see were Hillponds.So that was what I started....

Looking at this photo now, I feel that it gives a misleading impression of the actuality.  What was emerging was too messy, too colourful (Fuar Tholl was too pinky!) and it wasn't working for me.  Should I have carried on?  I don't know now....but, well, I did!  

First of all I tried painting another version of this....a slightly different size of paper, and no texture.  Just acrylic and a bit of medium.  I thought the colours had a bit more subtlety that my textured version, and the middleground was less shouty.  So it gave me guidance for what to do next.

 

I've been at it for the rest of the month, backwards and forwards, sandpaper, craft knives, paint. And this is where I got to.  I am happier with this, with its focus on the mossy mounds in the foreground (and those colourful mounds drew me in in the first place), but, well .... it's different from my first pass.

Of course, January was a beautiful month for snow and ice. It was a huge distraction - I was always going out for a bit of a walk in the snow.  Eventually...when the forecast predicted that it was about to disappear....I thought that I must go out NOW and do a few sketches - but snow is so difficult!

 

First just down on the shore (one of several).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And then round at Loch an Loin (one of several). 

It was so beautiful at Loch an Loin - the beauty of it just made me cry! - so I went on to do this painting....

 Have I managed to capture it?  Who knows. And now the snow has gone, even almost gone from the tops, so I'll be back to colourful landscapes this month...maybe! 

 

Winter Lingers On

January/February is the time of year which gives me the best opportunity to get on with new work. The village is quiet, the Gallery has been closed and the New Year surge is still fresh. Lots of time and motivation to get on with work you would think.

Well, there are always distractions, and, as I mentioned in January, the snow has been a huge distraction, or then again, perhaps it's been an inspiration! The transformation of the landscape with a blanket of white, the change to the light. And the roads have been a bit icy so it's been difficult to get out and about for new sketches.

More Snow pictures

I've been continuing to try to capture the joy of the snow – I do love it! And because it's come and gone and come again this year, the snow patterns have changed. One day I was preoccupied by the 'iron filings' patterns on the hills, the next I was transfixed by the shroud of ice on the shore, and another day it was the sweeping snow showers. I've also been trying to come up with a satisfactory painting of Meal Cean Dearg, one of the Strathcarron/Torridon Munros.  I got as far as producing these two, but not satisfied with either.

However the snow inspired me to make a new linocut plate too. 

I made a sketch of the kale in the garden of Seabank Cottage in Lochcarron - here's a photo 

I could see that there were the makings of a good black and white picture - loved the black patterns of the kale leaves.  So I've made this linocut and have called it 'Winter Garden'.

'Winter Garden'

  Trip to Inverewe

Despite the ice and snow I managed a trip to Inverewe Gardens in January. A number of artists met up – there was a residency on – and we managed a walk and a couple of sketches in a weather window, until the sleet started. I loved the bleakness of dead plants in the snow and managed to do a few sketches such as this one of dormant Gunnera. I was intrigued by the black shapes against the snow, but I haven't thought through where to go with this idea.

However, I'm starting to think that gardens might be a good focus for me this year. I find plant forms (and trees) interesting and I think I would like the challenge of a slightly different focus this year.

Making New Prints

Just last week I was down in Edinburgh for a few days and managed to get a couple of sessions in Edinburgh Printmakers. I was making a couple of new photopolymer plates, like this one that a re-working of an older print.  It's known as 'photopolymer gravure' as I make the drawing first on a piece of transparent film.  Here is the drawing on film and the Toyobo plate I produced.

 And here is a finished print I made this week.  I think if anything it's more expressive that the drawing, so I am pleased with it in that respect.

 I was also trying to improve an aquatinted plate that I wasn't happy with.  I realised that the composition was not good enough and so I cut the plate and did a further series of aquatinting to bring out the landscape, and here's how the finished print looks.

 It's based on a view of a lochan in the hills above Achintee, on the south side of Loch Carron.

They were good sessions – I think the new plates are OK. Now I just have to get down to printing out editions...on my printing press up here. But at least I have made a start.

Painting vs Printmaking

I find it difficult at times to switch from painting to printmaking. I think you must use different bits of your brain. With printmaking you have to be so clear about what you're trying to achieve – plan it out properly in advance – whereas painting is more of an exploratory activity. Matisse said something along the lines of drawing is of the mind but colour is of the senses and I suppose this explains the difference. Anyway, I feel as if I'm in a drawing and printmaking zone at the moment, so that's my focus for the coming month...I think...

Fresh Start

The start of another year always seems like an opportunity for a fresh start and this year is no exception.  Last year was just a bit too busy and this blog has definitely suffered.  And the blog is important to me/my work as it helps me to reflect on what I'm doing (and not doing!). Ah well...

I've been very distracted by the snow - we've had so much of it - and every time I pick up a brush, I just want to use black and white. Perhaps this is a good thing, a good restraint. I sometimes use a little bit of colour - as in this one, which is a view of the bay and shore near where I live.

I quite like the looseness and lack of detail I've managed to achieve in this one.  Perhaps it's looser because this started out as a larger pic and I've cut it down.  It's a much better composition now.
I did this pic at the same time, using the same palette of black, white and some blue and brown.

I think this one is just a bit too studied and static, but then it was on a very cold still day.  The thing about snow is that you get these heavy dark lines appearing and this helps me to focus on the structure of a landscape. I've been thinking about this more in snowy studies I have done over the last 2 weeks.  Here's a charcoal drawing which is based on a sketch  - I loved the lines of the shore disappearing into the sea.

  Then I tried it in ink and acrylic with a little gold oilbar.  But it's not nearly as satisfactory as the charcoal drawing, is it?

I think the angles of the shore are not quite right and this is because I did it sitting down, not at the easel - should know better!  I also thing the hills look a bit boring - a slab of white.  However I thought the gold oilbar was a good idea, so I used it in this view which I did last week too.

But I'm not very satisfied with this - I think it's a bit woosy, trying too hard to be realistic, but being neither one thing nor another in style.  I had another go at it today, with this result.  I find this much more satisfying, being bolder and bleaker.  More graphic, I suppose.  And the composition perhaps works better (for a mood of bleakness).

I did do one other woosy one last week, which is this one of the path alongside the shore.  Again it looks overworked and scratchy, but some of the inky marks are quite good, and the light is not bad.  I was getting a good effect by mixing yellow ochre with white.  I haven't re-done it as I'm not sure if this composition really works.

I can only conclude that although I have made a start to the year, there's a lot more work to be done. Choice of materials is so important, and I need to focus on the materials which produce the best results for me.  Boldness with charcoal or graphite usually gets me off to a good start, I think.  The challenge is always there.