Strange Things

What strange things comes from this head of mine when extremely tired; in fact exhausted. Yesterday I spent at a meeting with a network of artist who promote the Flinders Ranges in South Australia.

The day started with a bus load of about forty artists (The Peninsular Art Group) who wanted to meet the 'Painters of the Flinders Ranges' with samples of our work on display. This get together plus the AGM meeting was combined so that distant members of the group I am a member of, could save on time and costs that are involved.

Once the visiting artist left it was time for a quick lunch then start the meeting. Proudly I am once more Vice President of the 'Painters of the Flinders Ranges' and thanks must go to those that support me to be able to continue on with this job.

Anyway getting back to the 'strange things' that I started rambling on about in the beginning of this post. As much as feeling exhausted my head was still running a mile a minute. For me picking up pencil and pad and start sketching is the best way to slow down to a very relaxed frame of mind. You can see that these sketches changed from very stilted to something that has a bit more creative imagination to it once I was calm, although it is some strange looking tube of paint. This was over a period of about ten minutes. It was soon afterwards I headed off to bed and slept the best nights sleep I have had for about a week.

Do you find sketching relaxing so that you yourself can settle down to a good nights sleep or even perhaps help you to get into the 'creative' frame of mind so that you can work on a painting? Please feel free to use the comments option to let us know.


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Derwent Coloured Pencils

Being a curious artist or should that be an impatient one I quickly unpacked the Derwent coloured pencils that arrived by post and put a bit of colour on some Colourfix paper, which you see in this post.

Katherine from Making a Mark kindly commented to my post called Rocks in my Head. It reminds me I do have a lot to learn about this medium that I have never used since I was a child. Of cause I never had professional colour pencils back then but gee 'colouring in' did pass many pleasurable hours as a child.

Katherine mentions in her comment that she love FC Polychromos and Lyra Rembrandt on Arches HP. I can see my coloured pencil and paper shopping list will be growing longer as I learn from accomplished coloured pencil artists that are sprinkled throughout the internet.

All that is wrong with new art material coming into the studio is the lack of time to experiment with them. I managed to find a supplier for drafting film that has a coating on both sides for the pencil to adhere too. The drafting film is staying packed away so that it does not become damaged until I get serious about putting time aside to work with it. If you are interested in drafting film yourself I purchased mine from Premier Art Supplies in Adelaide.

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Garry Conn.com and Dosh Dosh's Technorati Favourite's List

When Dosh Dosh first posted about “Ultimate Technorati Favorites Exchange: An Interactive Experiment” I bookmarked it with the intentions of participating. Since that time numerous blogs have started up lists on their blogs to keep the momentum going. One that really caught my attention was Garry Conn.com. He has made it so easy to subscribe his list "Technorati Most Faved List" to your Technorati Favourites that there is no excuses not joining in because of lack of time.

Will you?
"
Is it fair to earn Technorati favourites this way?
"

Is it fair to earn Technorati favourites this way? Fair or not my thoughts are if you want to get some reward for all the work that is put into a blog, go for it and get a higher ranking with Technorati! I am not going to go into the nitty gritty reasons of the why’s because Dosh Dosh gives all the explanation and it is worth a read and then you can make up your own mind as to participating or not.

If you do decide to get involved by adding your name to Garry Conn.com’s list, please make sure you read his ‘three rules’. These rules are what makes it fair to everyone participating and so easy to do. Be warned, the list is growing. I write the last name down that I add to my Technorati Favourites to make sure I don’t miss adding anyone to my list.

Dosh Dosh has a list at the bottom of blogs that are participating as well and once more if you want to partake, read the rules carefully. You might like to check the blogs that are already on the list. Be warned, make a hot cuppa first and make sure you are comfortable in your chair, as there is some interesting reading along the way.

When getting listed myself I was thinking about the old saying “all is fair in love and war”; well this is all out war for the Technorati Favourite list.


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Just like Dominos Falling

When trying to juggle a few things at once my mind just will not always spread thinly to concentrate on all at one time. It started when I burnt the spuds for mash followed by the peas and they were in separate saucepans! Then I rejected Bart’s comment from "I Landscape" for SnapShots for the "Sherrard Falls, New South Wales" post, which Blogger does not give a second chance to avoid the mistake. I emailed Bart with a copy of his comment and asked him to comment once more, which he did. Thank you Bart for understanding! What was next….oh yeah then I sent the wrong phone number via email to my kids so that they could phone their grandfather. Thankfully they were on the ball and noticed the number wasn’t from the area of my dad and curious to know ‘who's’ number I did send them. The common factor with the numbers was the two people have the same Christian name in my phone and didn’t double check the remainder of the information. All of this happened in the space of half an hour so that it had my head spinning.

After yesterday I think it will be either finish earlier in my studio or have a later evening meal so that my old brain can keep up with the jobs that I am supposed to be doing.

That will teach me not to laugh at another artists run of bad luck. Want to see which post it was? Head over to Maggie Stiefvater post "Slapping Fate About the Head and Face" at Greywaren Art. Maggie is a professional artist and also a ball of energy and I love to read her blog in the hope that some of it will rub off onto myself..... but I did not expect the 'bad luck' stuff to happen to me.

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Rocks in my Head

The grasialle is still coming along really well, although I must have rocks in my head because when trying out my new coloured pencils that turned up in the mail today (eBay special ), as I naturally drew a rock.

This coloured pencil drawing was done on 110 GSM Draw Cartridge and really didn't expect to get a better practice sample on this type of support.

I would like to thank Wendy Prior who is the owner of this blog. I emailed Wendy today asking her for some advice about drafting film, which she generously gave. Wendy is a exceptionally skilled coloured pencil artist and I never realised what could be achieved with this medium until I came across Wendy's blog several months ago.

I do have more pencils coming from an eBay seller, which are a Derwent brand and going by what I have read about them on WetCanvas, they do promise good things. I guess that will depend on this artist using them as well as an improved support for the artwork......that means I am yet to spend more money!


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Vase Sketch plus Recipe

It has been a huge day in the studio today and loved every minute of it. Sorry no photo but do offer you this sketch as well as a recipe that I put together last night for my hubby and I. It is quick to prepare and cook and of cause for anyone working is ideal to throw together when time is short. Enjoy!!!







Red Meat of the Fast Kind

500g of suitable red meat for cooking as a stir fry. ( I used our farm mutton)
1 finely chopped garlic
1 tablespoon of light soy sauce
1 tablespoon sweet soy sauce
2 tablespoons of dry red wine
1/2 teaspoon of sesame oil
1-2 tablespoons of olive oil
1 red onion, roughly chopped
1 large carrot, cut into strips
1 small zucchini, cut into strips
1/4 cup of liquid vegetable stock or 1/4 low salt vegetable cube
1/2 - 1 teaspoon of cornflour
Two good handfuls of baby spinach

Method: Combine the first six ingredients and toss to coat and refrigerate for two to three hours.

When you are ready to eat, heat one tablespoon olive oil in a hot pan and stir-fry the sliced onion and carrot until it is slightly cooked. Add zucchini and cook just long enough to soften slightly. Remove from pan and add meat in batches with a little extra oil as needed. Keep the pan very hot to avoid the meat stewing.

When the meat is browned (I remove it as soon as there is only a little bit of pink left on some of the meat so that it does not toughen) combine the stock and cornflour and heat in the pan until bubbling.

Return the meat and cooked vegetables as well as the baby spinach to the pan and toss through the hot sauce until the spinach wilts.

Serve with rice or noodles.

This recipe will provide two generous serves.

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My Foot

Sketching the human body must be one of the hardest things for an artist to do. I personally like to draw parts of the body and for practice my own foot makes a good model.

The oil painting that I am working on is coming along nicely. Until I have covered more of the canvas I would rather not take a photo or there will be a large number of posts with what seems like little done to the painting, bearing in mind it is a large canvas.

At this stage I am not sure if there will be a post of a sketch or an update of the painting tomorrow...... stay tuned!!!

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Arts and Stuff Carnival - April 13, 2007

Welcome to the April 13, 2007 edition of Arts and Stuff Carnival.

Art Creativity

The Positivity Blog presents 8 Ways to Spark Your Creativity posted at Henrik Edberg.

MissMalaprop presents Miss Malaprop - indie finds for your uncommon life » Blog Archive » Fine Art Adoption Network posted at Miss Malaprop - independent, sustainable, eco-friendly shopping, film, art, fashion, crafts & design, from New Orleans with love.

Lexi Sundell presents Center of the Sun posted at Energies of Creation, saying,

"This article uses the story of the poppy painting, Center of the Sun, to explore the effect of energy work during the painting process."

shedwa presents Shedwa Commercial posted at shedwa.

Lexi Sundell presents Creativity and Constraints | Energies of Creation posted at Energies of Creation, saying,

"A comparison of two paintings sheds light on creativity and constraint in art. Discipline results in creative freedom, as discussed in this post."

Miscellaneous Art

drew stiles presents you devil you posted at Drew $tiles™.

antonio presents Turn your favorite photographs into oil paintings. posted at Turn your photos into artwork..

shedwa presents Art Attack posted at shedwa.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of arts and stuff carnival using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

Upcoming Edition Dates

Submissions deadline: May 11, 2007
Next edition will be post on Arts & Stuff: May 13, 2007

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Chambers Gorge Rock Pool “WIP” seven

I am soooo enjoying this stage of the oil painting. All the hard work has been done working out the tonal map with the grisaille technique that I can now just add my layers of colour.

Because it is a landscape I have some flat darker colour in some areas where vegetation will be placed over the top giving the grasses and shrubbery depth. You didn't think I was going to paint every blade of grass did ya?

This image isn't the best as the yellow for some reason wants to be dominant and yet the painting has very little left from the under painting. The rocks in fact do have a very pale wash of Burnt Sienna over them. Maybe the camera is picking up the yellow from that. I don't really have the time to spare to play around with the image too much so this one is it folks!

I am hoping for a translucent sky, which already has two glazes of colour with more to come. I am unable to add the shrubbery that will come up above the skyline until this area is completed with glazes.

Did I say I am enjoying this stage of the painting!!!

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