Archive for illustration friday

Illustration Friday: Sink

// December 16th, 2011 // 10 Comments » // illustration friday

 

I’m writing a few guest posts this week and went to revisit a draft I’m working on, but felt very uninspired. So, after dithering in Gmail for a while I noticed that the Illustration Friday topic for this week is: Sink.

Which made it easy to justify skipping my morning writing session and make art instead.

It’s Friday. Illustration Friday. Must paint. Maybe tomorrow will be ‘Guest Post Saturday’.

 

 

Illustration Friday: Transportation

// October 8th, 2010 // 11 Comments » // illustration friday

Bit of a Steam-punk flavour for this week’s Illustration Friday offering.

Gypsy Fire (Finished!)

// September 10th, 2010 // 7 Comments » // illustration friday, painting, process

This week’s Illustration Friday theme is: Proverbs.

I was going to do a piece for IF this afternoon after I’d done some tidying up of my Gypsy Fire painting. But as I was finishing up the bird, the phrase ‘bird in the hand is worth two in the bush’ kept going through my mind, and I thought this painting was like a little twist on the proverb: A bird in the hand is worth two in the fire.

Is that true? I’m not sure. It may not really stand as a proverb, but it’s related. And it means I don’t have to do another illustration for today’s theme. Score!

*****

This painting has been a tough one to complete, I kept messing it up, then getting it back. But it’s finally done.What a relief to sign off on it.

I think I’ve learned more from this painting than any other piece I’ve done since I started the blog, and as a bonus, I’m pretty happy with the final result. I think it’s pretty much as good as I can make it, given where I’m a with my painting right now.

*****

News: I’m putting together an Etsy shop. This one should go up today, hopefully (It took me over two hours to work out how to list a painting the other day). I’m pretty excited to get all my completed pictures in there, and I’m looking at getting some prints made as soon as possible, too.

Other news: The RSS subscription button in the sidebar has fallen off. But you can click on the question mark and it will still sign you up as a subscriber to the blog. You should try it out–don’t worry, you can’t break it any more than it already is.

Fun Fact: If you click on the image then zoom in, you can see that the stars came out like tiny fried eggs floating in space.

Bubble Muse

// August 23rd, 2010 // 7 Comments » // creativity, illustration friday

This is my latest Muse piece, my painting style is swinging around like crazy at the moment. I’m experimenting a lot with trying to make my art more enjoyable to make and to look at.

I thought this would make a great Illustration Friday picture–the theme this week is ‘Atmosphere’. When I was painting this, the qualities I wanted the Muse to represent were air and lightness.

I’m preparing for a big art project that involves lots of Muse paintings–this is not quite the look I’m going for but I felt good after finishing this one, I feel like I’m progressing and getting closer to the look I want.

It’s very different from the Gypsy Fire painting, and also from the earlier Muse painting I posted. I’ve only recently switched from Goauche paints on paper to doing acrylic paintings–it feels like a whole new world is opening up for me. My studio is starting to fill up with paintings, some surpisingly good and some total crash-and-burn efforts. I’m learning some great things from the failures though, and they can always be painted over.

I’m doing a lot of thinking, and writing about the creative process and how we get inspiration. When I’m not writing I’m painting, and a part of my mind is tracking what’s going on there as well. The more I keep the idea of muses in my mind, the more real they seem to me. It’s like having a koan ripening inside me, I’m just waiting for all the pieces to come together.

Illustration Friday: Star Gazing

// August 14th, 2010 // 8 Comments » // illustration friday

Hi Illustration Fridayers!

When I saw this week’s theme I remembered an old sketch I had done, and knew I had to do a colour version just to have another shot at it. I love the idea behind this–that there are galaxies outside of us, but also within. I really want to develop it a bit more and make a painting from it one day.