A painting of my grandaughter

This is a painting I tried of my little grandaughter, Rose. I painted it from a photograph so it is the first time I have tried to get a more lifelike, rather than a stylised portrait. This was from a photo I took of her when she was just about ready to go into her first ballet lesson.....I have to admit my heart melted just looking at her with all her hair tied up in a little ballerina's bun at the back of her head. She looks much too old in my painting (she is only three)and I don't know how to get that really young look yet..... and although the proportions of her head and shoulders are as they are in the photo I don't know what I need to do to get it look as if it is all "right" but there you are...a first attempt....and it was lovely to try.

A thought ..... about thinking (too much)

I love this painting....it is by an artist called JULIA KAY. See www.studiojuliakay.com Anyway I wrote the little poem below this morning and thought this lovely painting went rather nicely with my words. I am sorry I don't know why Blogger will not publish poetry in the lines in which it is laid out so if you could just visualise a new line wherever there is a capital letter............ "In the quiet light of close of day As the sun sinks to her bed We may sit awhile and think and yet Still find we have no answers Maybe the only way is to sit And enjoy that quiet light Be thankful for the close of One more day And not worry any more About finding the answers." - Poem by me :-)

More examples of image transfers onto calico

I find it so strange that for me at least I really love the hazy imagery which I got from the ordinary copier paper. I guess of course it completely depends not just on personal taste but also on what you want to do with the transfer once you get it. I like aged, rather battered looking effects so I suppose it makes sense for me. Whatever....it has been interesting and I will certainly try out some more and also have a go at working on top of some transferred images too.

Image Transfers

I've been trying out some different ways of working with image transfers for a new ATC swap on Freeing Your Wings in the "Trading Treasures" group which Angela runs for us. I hadn't done any of this till I worked on Kylie Pepyat's project on the Willowing Life Book Course and I was really surprised at how much I enjoyed it as I hadn't thought I would. Anyway....I thought I would experiment a bit with trying to transfer images onto calico and have learned a lot so thought I would share it. If you look at the photo above you can see the original photocopy of an image on the left as you look at it. In the centre is a transfer from photographic paper to calico and on the right is the transfer from ordinary copier paper to calico. I used gel medium for all my transfers and they have all been transferred to a reasonably heavy calico. Below are other examples which are laid out in the same way as just described. I was really surprised as I thought I would much prefer the cleaner transfers from photographic paper but in fact I really liked the various fuzzy/faded/etc images I got from the copier paper. I also discovered that the length of time you leave the transfer before rubbing it off with water makes a huge difference to your final result. Even the ones which look almost too vague are quite interesting ..... well at least to me..... even though at first I really thought they would only be fit for the bin. I think it is a really fascinating process in terms of the huge vairety of outcomes you can get. As far as these transfers are concerned I don't want to work on top of any of them although I know that is a common practice. Anyway if you are interested I will try and add a few more to give you an idea of how much the results can vary.....I might have to add them separately though as for some reason the uploader is playing up a bit and posting them sideways so I will try and sort that out!

"Remains"

Another go at "pulling" a picture from the results of lots of layering. For me, it is finished but don't know what others think. To me it came out looking like an ancient engraved wall painting and when I got to this stage, I just wanted to leave it at that. Would love to know what people think though....is it finished or not do you think? :-)

"Just Fly"

I am rather stupidly thrilled by this crazy painting of mine. It is another go at "pulling art" which we learned with Mystele on the "Willowing Life Book" Course. I had such fun with this one and it happened that I have been working on her during the week when I had a clear scan (related to my cancer) so it really is a feel good painting for me and why I chose to add the butterfly and the words "Just Fly" as I have been given another year to fly free sort of thing. I found myself feeling so ridiculously fond of this quirky faced lady.....I would love to know what feeling she evokes in you ..... if you can see into her "soul" I would love to know what she is saying to you. I used all sorts on this one.....acrylics, gouache, gesso, watercolours all mixed up together!

Week 10 on Life Book (Willowing)

This piece was intended to feature stencilling to the side of the face. There is stencilling there but I only had one stencil and it is not a particularly obvious one, just small flowers but it is there hidden for the most part under seeral other layers of ink, stamping and paint! I never pursued stencilling as I found it hard to control the colours from oozing out from under the stencil but I need to persevere. Funnily enough my lonely only stencil is very like the background to my blog page! I have to learn to be a bit bolder with shading my faces. I do shade them, this one is in neocolour IIs and I used salmon as the base coat then added golden ochre, ochre, rose pink and white acrylic. I always get a bit nervous of the end result looking blotchy although I have learned that blending in additionally with a dry brush helps here too. Also I really must learn to scan my paintings rather than just photograph them as the photographs never come out as clear as the paintings and also if the skin tones do appear blotchy in the photograph you actually cannot really see it in the painting. That sounds like an excuse but it is true! :-)

"Mother Love"

I did this painting as part of Tam's Life Book course on Willowing. I painted it to honour my three beautiful children who I brought up for the most part on my own. It hasn't copied very well and hasn't come out as clear as I had hoped. At the top I wrote a sentence one of them (my oldest son I think) wrote in his news book when he was 6. It reads "My mummy always wears a brown jumper with a brooch and hoovers all day." The quote around my hair is from Isaiah "I will never forget that I have held you in the palm of my hand." I have always loved that and associated it with my three children. My daughter, Juliet, is at the top, she is now 40. Paul is my elder son, on the left hand side and he is now 41 and Daniel is my younger son and he is now 37. They had a really difficult young life because of our family circumstances and I am so proud of them all because they are all really beautiful human beings. I made lots of mistakes but I hope I got some of it right, they tell me I did. They have certainly taught me a lot too.