Bridlington boats

I spent the week before last working on images of fishing boats.  The idea originally was to work up a serious of sketches for textile work.  I did several 'mood' sheets, which is something I always did for my textiles, before I started painting seriously and ended up painting more than stitching.

I have wanted to get back to stitching for months now, but I just never seem to get the time for both painting and stitching, and can never work out how to divide my time so it does work.  Anyway, that's where I started when I did these.

These are some of the mood sheets - I like to collage my photographs, scans of my previous work, both actual and in sketchbooks, and texture/colour from old magazines until I get the right 'feel'.

These are all copies from my 'Sea' sketchbook - although it is more of a 'mood' book in itself - no drawing was used during the making of this book!

These are photos, plus some lovely imagery I found in an old  National Geographic magazine.  I like to alter the magazine imagery a little by using white spirit on paper towel, gently rubbing to disturb the ink.

This one was similar to the one above, but I then used some oil painting, drawing with the tube, to add marks, and also splattered  some acrylic ink in places.

The last one is the cover of a sketchbook I made- it was meant to contain all the works from these sessions, but the size of the works ran away with me, and also I am quite pleased with some of the work, so will be framing it.  I think I will print out the work and mount it into the book, adding more marks if I feel like it needs it.

Studio as finished

Here are some of the photo's of the studio as it is now.  This is as tidy as it ever will be.  The table at the front has wood, glue and batons for the storage boxes I am making, see further down this post.

Here are the cupboards and the bookcase, moved so that there are no nasty corners where I can dump stuff.

On the right of this picture you can see a wooden box?  I am making a set of three of these, each a slightly different size, to store blank canvasses, paper and board, plus some of the finished works.  They will slot behind the bookcases and hopefully keep tidier than before.

Here is one cupboard, nice and tidy, although the shelf is sagging.  I have taken a lot of the weighty stuff out of the drawers and it's now stored at the bottom of the cupboard.

Here is the other cupboard, lovely and tidy - for now.

I have been doing quite a bit of work in between all the chaos, but just didn't have time to take photographs, put them through Photoshop and post them,  so will start today.

Studio re-organisation almost done

It's eight days since I last posted - again!  I think I am almost finished with the re-organising, and it's as tidy as it ever will be.

Here are some of the photo's showing the chaos when I emptied out these cupboards so I could move them.

Who would imagine that emptying out a  bookcase would take so long and take up so much room!

and here is the mess when I emptied one of the large IKEA wardrobe/cupboards.

More pics later.

studio reorganisation continues

It's over a week since I posted, and the studio is still in limbo.  I should have taken photographs before I started to tidy up.  The corner of the studio shown below, with the bookcase and my book press was totally filled with boxes and canvasses, up to the top of the bookcase and overflowing onto the floor.

It was impossible to use the book press, and the clutter had filled the floor space so much that I couldn't get to my easel which is in the opposite corner (photographs later). 

Today I am going through the stuff in the bookcase.  The top one and a half shelves is full of my sketchbooks, some of which I never look at, so they are being relegated to the loft.  I also have A LOT of gallery exhibition catalogues, collected over the years, or in the case of the Sotherby's and Bonham's catalogues, bought from a Marlborough bookshop whilst on holiday.  I need to go through all these catalogues WITHOUT getting distracted, and weed out any that have no interest for me and pass them on  to someone who would appreciate them.

The art books will mostly stay in the bookcase, although I do have a lot of some artists such as Monet and Van Gogh as I pick these up in charity shops for very little and I can't resist buying them.

This is the IKEA wardrobe which is next to the bookcase, crammed full of STUFF - mostly paints, mediums, and sketchbooks, plus the wire drawer is full of paper - all muddled up.  This is the problem when you like to try everything and anything, so I have pastels, acrylics, oils and watercolours plus all the mediums for them, plus coloured pencils in a variety of mediums, charcoal etc, etc.

I have now tidied this up, and am trying to work out how to stop myself piling stuff onto the space in front of the drawers.  I guess I will move the drawers to the front of the shelf, and store stuff I don't use much behind them. When this stage is finished the bookcase is coming out of the corner and the wardrobe will be moved into it's place I hope.  The Ikea wardrobes are very heavy, even when empty, so I think it will be a struggle.

Studio reorganisation

I have been thinking about altering the layout of my studio for several weeks.  Over the last few months I have come to realise that the layout at present just isn't working well.  I have corners that fill up with clutter, the access to my easel is easily blocked and my table tops soon become covered with STUFF.

I need somewhere to store blank supports, and also work in progress, and work which is finished, but may be worked on again.  I also need somewhere to put work up so that I can see and assess it over a period of time.

I have accumulated a large collection of jugs, bowls, cups and the like, for my still life set-ups, and these are stacked precariously in plastic boxes.  I would like them to be out on show, but not in the way.

I have come up with some ideas that I hope will cover most of the above problems.  It does mean that the two large IKEA wardrobes that I use as storage cupboards will have to be moved - and of course emptied before they can be moved!  The two bookcases are also being moved.  So I am not going to be able to do any work for at least a week.

In between heaving all this stuff around I hope to be working on all the ideas that are spinning around in my head, after the visit to Hull museum.  I also have ideas for new work in general.  I may post some preliminary sketches, but I really want to keep these ideas to myself for a while.

Hull museum

Here are a few of the photographs I took.

Household shrine - also me taking the photo, reflected in the glass.

 Medieval stone arch

 Medieval stone carving.

 Medieval wood carving

I can't remember which area this was from, I liked the pattern, and the crack.  Reminds me of a landscape.

Hull & East Riding Museum

I visited the above museum yesterday, with Diane and Jacqui.  We were looking for inspiration for an upcoming ERA exhibition titled 'Layers of Meaning'.  It is linked to the East Yorkshire Archaeology Society, hence the visit to the history museum.

We had a great afternoon, and all took lots of pics (without flash, but it doesn't seem to matter too much).  I particularly liked the Gothic medieval period, the stonework and wood carving is amazing, and I love the colours from the hand-painted books of that period - brilliant blues and reds with gold.

I have a few ideas for the exhibition, but the pieces will have to be small as hand-in day will be end august/beginning September and we are all three exhibiting at Burton Agnes in the summerhouse 1-10th September, so we are all also working on pieces for that.

I will also be away the last week in August as I am going down to Art Van Go at Knebworth to do a workshop with Alice Fox on experimental mark making and stitch - I am so looking forward to that.

So - looks like I have five weeks to do both sets of work!  I think I will be working small for both exhibitions!