Textures in landscape

From a peaceful feeling to too much texture? Not so much too much texture, but all-over-the-place texture. I do like the feeling of soft pastel on Fabriano Unica paper, though!

As you can see, I'm back in an experimentation phase!

At the hairdresser's - what my brain sees

There is a great view from the window at my hairdresser's, Eddie Doyle of Blackrock. I decided to superimpose it over the elements on the counter in front of me. Maybe next time I'll just go and stand at the window?

Capel street - the journey continues

Enjoying playing with the elements in front of me in the city.  I deconstructed the Louis Copeland shop window and framed it with street elements. And drew just want interested me in the view down Henry street towards the Spire, with the dome from Penneys on the left. I'm having fun experimenting and not worrying too much about accuracy - there are many sketchers in our group who can do that much better than me, and that's not how I see the world anyway!

Looking out my window

Something I haven't done in a long time - drawing the view outside my window. I think I haven't done that since Covid. Did so much sketching at home during the Pandemic that it put me off, I guess. But I want to draw more, and get back to loose expression in my sketches, rather than trying to be someone I'm not.

First version, I thought I was using watersoluble ink, but it was actually waterproof. So I had to do a second one. 

PS: I'm still using an old watercolour mini palette, in the spirit of using up art supplies!

 

Intensity

And then when I had a bit more time, I pushed the experiment further, on a square of Fabriano Unica paper, using watercolour, iridescent acrylic ink and soft pastels.

What did I enjoy about today's studio session? The flow of pigments, watercolour and acrylic ink pushing against each other. And the strong colours. And the marks with pastel.

What colours to use to recreate that feeling

I'm in a bit of an art slump at the moment - it's ok. I'm not panicking yet. Maybe I had reached a natural end to my exploration. But when that happens, I have to find ways to start again.

So I was very inspired by Sally-Ann Ashley's words when she had the opposite problem (too many ideas fighting for attention) "So if your mind is a hive of activity right now like mine, ask yourself one question, 'what did I enjoy the most about today's studio session?' Whatever answer jumps out at you, don't discard it and don't overthink it. Let it be your starting point for tomorrow - as this will be mine"

When I woke up this morning, I thought about which item in my studio book was intriguing me the most. It was an ink piece, done in orange and purple, creating an abstract sky and land in very strong colors.

So I did what I always do, colour swatches, and a little experiment in a watercolour sketchbook. And then I couldn't help adding a bit of those iridescent acrylic inks, and Unison soft pastel!

Cropping

I cut up those ink blobs, trying to find shapes that appealed to me. But did not find much in the way of shapes to collage.

And two quotes that spoke to me recently, and that I copied into my studio book.

 

Near the RHA

It turned out to be a sunny afternoon, but it started with some very heavy showers, so I had a few stop-and-starts. And it was cold of course. Why can't we have a nice Spring like everywhere else! Saw a few of our sketchers down an alleyway and joined them. But I struggled with the view - it ended up being a mish-mash of everything that was in front of me.  Then I sketched some of our other sketchers. Just liked the way they were sitting on the steps. Text added at home. I think text always helps to balance my pages.

Did I need gold inks?

Sometimes I get a notion. But I have no idea what to use these inks for! And I just recently threw out two bottles of masking fluid which I had barely used.

 

Virtual Cherry Blossoms (because our pink ones are not out yet on 3 April)

A wonderful session on Zoom with Suhita Shirodkar and her Substack followers. We sketched cherry blossoms, each in our own way. Looking forward to our cherry blossoms in Ireland very soon so I can sketch them for real.

More ink - how to translate from a lovely small experiment?

 Sometimes things just don't work out, but I still got some nice colour mixes out of it.

Under the Sea with World Tour Street View

This month's Street View World Tour was extra fun, as we went under water, guided by Nina Khashchina, who regularly sketches while diving. She does it for real, we were doing it virtually!

Changing gear

Really not sure where I'm going with these. Part of me is longing for the crashing of waves at Clogher beach. I did a few paintings a couple of years ago. Now I would like to re-explore this location. But of course, I'm not the same painter I was then.  I need to experiment before I can approach this again. Here I was just doodling with Ecoline markers, ArtGraf taylor shapes and a Zig marker.

Testing ink on better cartridge paper

A while back, I ordered lots of A2 cartridge paper (something like 200 sheets). But I didn't check the weight of it. And it's too light for what I wanted to used it for, ink and watercolour experiments with a fair amount of water and scribbling. It's really only good for charcoal or light drawing, which I don't do much of. So, it's sitting under my desk, and I'm finding uses for it (the only thing is that it's super sharp, so I have to be careful about paper cuts - and no, I'm not using it to rest my feet!)

So now I've ordered a block of heavy-weight cartridge paper and I experimented with some inks, and I'm much happier with the result.  Even more so after cropping. Now I want to do something like that in watercolour. Will I be able to create the same intensity?