In The Forest - first colour print

Here’s the first colour print, bad photo, but it’s too dark and snowy to go out and take a good one. This now needs a couple of days to dry and then I can print the black over the top and that’ll be this one done :)

In The Forest - test print

Finished the first block, here’s a test print which I’ve then transferred to the second block and then marked up. Once this one is all cut we’ll be ready for printing.

Drawing someone drawing someone...

Here’s a drawing I did as a Christmas present for Susan. It’s her daughter, who upon seeing it said, she liked it, but I hadn’t finished it as it wasn’t coloured in…which made me laugh, lol :) Children can be tough critics ;)

I hadn’t done a detailed drawing like this for a while, so it was really enjoyable. Think I may do a little series along similar lines in 2010.

Merry Christmas Everyone

Single Pears all finished

Pear Floating Above Stone Shelf…numbers 1, 2 and 3… I know you’ve seen lots of these, but I thought I’d post the finished versions of them all anyway :)

Glazing Pears

Have been rather busy with some freelance work and making things for Christmas of late, so not much work to blog here I’m afraid. However, I finished off the single pears this afternoon so I thought I’d take a few photos of how I do the glazing stage.

Here I’ve got the four colours I want to glaze with and a small pot of oil. Each of the colours is transparent, not opaque (if it doesn’t tell you on the tube you can look up the brand you’re using on the internet, or it’ll usually tell you in an art materials catalogue). To start I’ve mixed each of the colours with a little of the oil…

Next I paint over the area I want to glaze with a thin layer of pure oil, this helps blending and gives you an even finish as you work.

Not brilliantly clear this photo (and sorry it’s a different pear…) but here I’ve just dabbed on the colours I want quite crudely, a spot here and there. Then using a clean dry brush you lightly pull the paint around on the surface, working around the spots of different colour you’ve added. Clean and dry the brush VERY frequently to avoid turning the colours to mud, but don’t be afraid of mixing them in certain areas. In the case of these pears taking the green into the red gave a lovely bruised effect on the skin.

A final pear with the glaze all blended together…In this instance I’m just using one layer of glazing, but you can use as many as you like. The only things to remember are…let each layer dry fully before painting the next, and use the paint thinly…the whole point is to trap the pigment within the oil and get a magical optical blending of colour…think of the way light travels through a piece of amber and aim for that :)

A Pears Progress…

A busy day today (actually, yesterday now…), I decided to do a little more work on the three single pears, just a couple of hours building up the colours further and adding some highlights, I want them to have a jewel like quality so I think this was time well spent…followed that with some work on a drawing I’m doing for a Christmas present (So you’ll have to wait to see that blogged)…Then moved onto the double/triple pears, added some initial modelling to the pears themselves and then started painting the shelves…2 meters of stone shelf edge takes a while to paint lol…

Sketches

I’ve been doing a lot of scribbles for possible future linocuts/paintings of late. Usually while sat in the pub having a pint or two…I like sketching in pubs, I’m not sure if it’s because I was partly brought up in a pub, but I find them very safe, comfortable places to be with your inner thoughts…I don’t think it’s entirely due to the beer ;)…something to do with the smells and sounds…anyway, I thought I’d post a few pages from my sketch book…you may or may not see some of these appear in some form or other in 2010 :)

In case anyone is wondering the ‘In the Forest’ linocut is still progressing, albeit somewhat slowly…I think a couple more carving sessions should see it done, so perhaps we’ll get a first print this side of Christmas ;)

On vaguely related note, I’ve got one of the ‘Floating’ prints in Art Jericho as part of the Oxford Art Society’s Winter Show. Had a very nice little mention in the Oxford Times – “Graham Rice’s linocut Floating is a powerful study of twisted bodies in a boat moving towards what might be paradise. It’s a great picture. ”

…Floating towards paradise was exactly what this piece was about, so that was lovely to read :)

You can read the full article here.

Three single pears

Second job of the day was the main painting on these single pear paintings…the bachelors of the pear world to follow the comments of the previous post ;)…all looking nice and glowing now. I’ll add a few highlights to the front of the shelf and then glaze the pears once they’ve dried.

Drawing up next set of pears

First painting job of the day done, I’ve finished drawing up the next set of pear paintings…onto the next stage of the single pears now…:)

Pears everywhere...

Well not quite the constant stream of posts I’d planned on today, took me a while to get starting and once things were finally progressing, I didn’t want to keep stopping to blog…so I just got on and painted…which is what I should be doing anyway :)

Started by glazing the original ‘pear on shelf painting’, you can’t really tell from this photo, but it’s got a lot more depth and life in the pear now, only took 10 minutes to do, but it’s really made a difference.

Then moved onto the three floating pears, did the underpainting on the pears as I developed the stone shelves then I’ve gazed a little colour over the pears to create the shadow colours (hence the pears look very dark here). Will let that dry over night and then start building up the forms and highlights properly.

I really like the floating element in these, it feels like they’re developing a very magical ingredient. :) Anyway, enough rabbiting on, off to do some work on the linocut.

Mirrors and wine...

I’m about half way across the lino block now, nothing wildly exciting to post, but I thought I’d take this snap to show the way I’m using a mirror as I’m carving. When I transferred the original design to the lino block it was reversed. By standing a mirror up and looking at my drawing in that, I can see exactly what I should be cutting. As this design is quite detailed this is proving essential, whenever I come to a fiddly bit, I’m checking the drawing in the mirror…then I take a sip of wine… ;)

Other news… Didn’t progress any further in the Little Xmas competition alas, but am looking forward to going to see the exhibition. Had a look around the gallery and studios when I dropped off the picture and both are lovely…would love a studio like one of those…:)…if you’re in that neck of the woods, go take a look…better yet, go and buy something…well done to the winners, very well deserved and a really excellent selection of work across the board :)

In theory tomorrow will be a “Pear” painting day…if so, I’ll post at various stages again so we can see how things develop….positively one hopes :)

And finally, I’m going to change the settings on this blog so you can comment without a Google account. Since installing the ‘Lijit Wijit’ I’ve been fascinated to see where all these people looking at the blog come from…so if you’ve been lurking there in the background, post a comment and say hi….that means you in particular Matthew ;)

New cards

I’ve had three new cards printed up for the next Eynsham Art Group Exhibition

Saturday 21st November – Sunday 29th November
10:00 - 4:00 (Sunday 2:00 – 4:00)
At the Bartholomew Rooms in Eynsham.

The cards are of the following paintings…

Eynsham Primary School Through The Trees
Woodstock at Night
Eynsham Square 3:25 June 1st

Just need to get some actual paintings ready now…;)

In the Forest - first carve

Also started cutting the first ‘In the Forest’ lino block today. I’ve done one of the wolves and a couple of trees. Very intricate so it’s taken quite a while…and I now have very sore fingers…still, no pain, no gain. Carving is going well though and I think I’m getting some nice lines…as always we’ll have to wait for the first print to see if that’s actually the case. :)

Floating Pears - 3 paintings - Drawing stage

A variety of odd jobs to do today, the first of which was getting these ‘Floating Pears’ drawn up on canvases. They’re intended to all be individual pieces, but I’ve composed them so they work as a triptych as well…seemed like a good idea at the time.

Also, my Linocut ‘Floating’ (the couple in the boat) got into the Little Xmas Art Competition. You can see all the shortlisted artists on the OXART website. Sue Cook, Sue Templeman and Jane Tomlinson also got through the first round, so the Eynsham Art Group is very well represented. Good luck to all :)