Saturday, December 25, 2010

Nest Exhibition

Recently I had a couple of works on display at an exhibition opening at Nest, a café in Tumbarumba NSW. It was a fantastic night, and I highly recommend the café to everyone. The exhibition was bird themed, so I entered a couple of oil pastel drawings of red robins.
Been a while since I exhibited some artworks, between studying education and taking a new job in graphic design, it was hard to make time. This was a real motivator to get back in to it, especially selling one (the smaller on with the orange mount).
** Update: Have sold both now! :) 28/1/2011






Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Desktops

Really needed to post an update, I'll have to scan some recent works. In the meantime I made some desktops out of some bird drawings, they were fun to make :)


Thursday, September 16, 2010

Portraits

Even more oil pastels, back to portraits again, and more colour experimentation. Really can't get enough of oil pastels lately.



portrait 31
oil pastel on paper, 2010



portrait 30
oil pastel on paper, 2010

Benjamin

Did some oil pastel drawings of my gran & uncle's cat, Benjamin. He was good to draw, as he remained motionless for extended periods of time, which is a desirable trait for any drawing subject.

benjamin02
oil pastel on paper, 2010



benjamin01
oil pastel on paper, 2010

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

More interiors

Recently worked on some more interiors while on my last art teaching prac out of town. Stayed with my grandmother and uncle on their farm, the house reminds me a lot of my childhood, it was great to draw it, and really nice to stay with them. My grandmother is also artistic, and I got to have a look at a lot of paintings of hers that I hadn't seen before. She has a really impressionistic style, beautiful use of colour.

Similarly I am continuing to work on colour, currently these photographs of the A3 size drawings are the best I can do, I'm no good at taking photos of the things and the colours always end up really different to the real thing. Need to get my hands on an A3 size scanner.



Billy and Paul
oil pastel on paper, 2010



Nanny's Kitchen 02
oil pastel on paper, 2010



Nanny's Kitchen 01
oil pastel on paper, 2010

Monday, June 28, 2010

Interiors

Still stuck on oil pastels, and continuing with colour experimentation. Using different colours to convey light and mood. Have really enjoyed doing these, and will do more. Just having trouble with getting the colours right when adjusting the photographed images in photoshop. The image quality in these ones is quite bad, especially in the second one, and the colours aren't quite like the actual drawings. Hope I can take some better photos soon, or find a scanner big enough for A3.


interior01
oil pastel on paper, 2010


interior01
oil pastel on paper, 2010

interior03
oil pastel on paper, 2010

interior04
oil pastel on paper, 2010


I think I like the last one the best. Most of them contain raw umber, it's my favourite colour at the moment.

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

New portraits

Here are some more recent self portraits, working with oil pastel again. Was trying to experiment with colour and texture, and getting out of my comfort zone by using colours I would normally avoid, was fairly happy with how they went.

portrait29
oil pastel on paper, 2010


portrait28
oil pastel on paper, 2010


portrait26
oil pastel on paper, 2010


portrait25
oil pastel on paper, 2010

Monday, May 10, 2010

Nudes

I recently had an urge to unearth my oil pastels, they're so fun to use. Decided to draw some nudes, which I haven't done in a while.


nude04
oil pastel on paper, 2010

nude03
oil pastel on paper, 2010

nude01
oil pastel on paper, 2010

Friday, May 7, 2010

More yupo

More playing with yupo paper at the beginning of the year while on holiday in Victoria. Decided to paint the gum trees since we were surrounded by them. I like the second one the best as it got rained on a little, and created a lovely texture.


tree03
watercolour on yupo, 2010

tree02
watercolour on yupo, 2010

tree01
watercolour on yupo, 2010

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Yupo paper experimentation

I work in an art supplies store, so I'm always busting to try the new and interesting things that my manager gets in. The yupo paper had been there for a while, but I didn't realise the potential it held for watercolour, so I gave it a go. The interesting thing about yupo paper is that it isn't paper from wood pulp, cotton or rag, but rather just sheeted plastic. Watercolour behaves differently on this surface, swimming and pooling until the water evaporates, instead of being absorbed into the paper. This makes it maintain a more liquid appearance even after it has dried. These works aren't necessarily my style, but it was fun to see what it could do. Sprinkling salt on the still wet image yielded interesting results as well.
flowers
watercolour on yupo, 2009

untitled
watercolour on yupo, 2009

untitled
watercolour on yupo, 2009

grim04
watercolour on yupo, 2009

Sunday, April 25, 2010

grim girls

Returning to the girls from eyeontheprize, adding watercolour and some flies. Trying to communicate decay and vulnerability. When I have the time and means I plan to translate these into oil painting.


grim03
pen and watercolour on paper, 2009



grim02
pen and watercolour on paper, 2009

grim01
pen and watercolour on paper, 2009

fear

I did this mixed media drawing a while ago, it was going to be a starting point for a different series, but I had to abandon it due to a lack of time. Will probably expand upon this idea in the future. Focusing on fear, humanity, vulnerability and the unpredictable.

fear01
mixed media on paper, 2008

Friday, April 23, 2010

Monochromatic portraits

Leaving the watercolours alone for a moment here, decided to unearth the inks and charcoals. Was a lot of fun to use these bolder mediums again.

portrait23
mixed media on paper, 2009

portrait22
mixed media on paper, 2009

portrait21
mixed media on paper, 2009

portrait20
mixed media on paper, 2009

portrait19
mixed media on paper, 2009

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

matics

I wasn't sure what to make of these, I'm pretty sure they were a continuation of works from a previous year on global warming. I'll probably do more work on this theme later.

matics03
mixed media and collage on paper, 2008


matics02
mixed media and collage on paper, 2008


matics01
mixed media and collage on paper, 2008

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

milky

After a friend had a baby I was compelled to draw him.

milky05
pen and watercolour on paper, 2008


milky04
pen and watercolour on paper, 2008


milky03
pen and watercolour on paper, 2008


milky02
pen and watercolour on paper, 2008

military

These are the first works that I made using children's book collage, and a definite step away from my usual work at the time in 2007. They were fun to make.

military02
pen and collage on paper, 2007


military01
pen and collage on paper, 2007

Monday, April 19, 2010

Random collages


These works were inspired by trawling through old children's books in op shops, experimenting with appropriation. 'creaturesoftheforest' is a theme that I will be elaborating upon in the future.

creaturesoftheforest01
pen and collage on paper, 2008




birdstring
pen and collage on paper, 2008



antarctic
pen, watercolour and collage on paper, 2008