Initial painting which in hindsight I was happy with.
Here's a quick painting that I've been agonising over. I replaced the flamboyancy in my initial painting and used Indian and white ink to strip it out entirely. I'm not sure which outcome I prefer, I think I liked my warm inviting toucan painting but succumbed to frustration from staring at it for too long, getting sick of it then throwing ink at it in retaliation. It rarely works out …
The final outcome, a result of frustration.
Very late September squirrels, I took out my new favourite grade pencil the 4B and began sketching the chunky grey squirrels in a local park. These particular squirrels have no fear of humans and would think nothing of chasing you down or catapulting themselves from fences onto your body to bully you out of your private stash of monkey nuts.
I was asked to paint a budgie for my grandparents as it is their diamond wedding anniversary and they own a pet blue budgie named Joey.
I did something a little different with my painting to pattern the darker blue areas. I did this by pressing into and shaping cling film whilst it lay on the wet watercolour pigment and I really like the effect after it had dried!
This budgie was made from inks, watercolour, white pen, salt and sugar.
As you can see, I’ve been quite busy! Meet my newest watercolour painting, who was born from my client’s love of the film Shame and the actor Michael Fassbender.
I had to incorporate the sullenness and melancholy which were important themes throughout the film and also incorporate my client’s love of cats.
But, as you can see, it took five other developed paintings before I had a piece worthy of my client’s eyes. The trouble with me is that I get so wrapped up in the work of my favourite artists I end up with a higgledy-piggledy styled mess in a futile attempt to try and mimic how they would have interpreted the brief.
I’ve included the other attempts to try and put the pressure off other inspiring artists as it does take a while to produce a piece of good quality, you will produce utter rubbish and here’s the proof — but persistence pays off.
My sixth painting was just me, in a room with a palette of watercolours, and the reference image, putting all other creative influence aside and I developed a piece which my client is very happy with … and so am I!
Look at these coffee stains, interesting right? Manipulated with watercolour and inks they may make some unique artwork in the future which I will be implementing right away.
I crumbled in some sugar and coffee granules which enhanced the textures further. I’ve also included some more familiar drawings of animals I did recently.
Before I ran off to work I found an image of a puma, and sketched it quickly using a 4B pencil, the most effective use of fifteen minutes in my whole week sadly. This image was sketched on recycled paper.
