Pen andWash

Thursday's subject a fortnight ago was 'drawing exercises' : any medium (but had to be dry), any subject and any style.Not my favourite subject as I profess to be quite weak at drawing, but I suppose this is all the more reason to practise!
In the spirit of 'making them all count' for the 2012 exhibition, I chose to draw in permanant pen, as I hoped that this would enable me to add some colour later, as black and white drawings do not seem to sell that well for me.

'Sunflowers and Pineapple'

Permanant pen on hot pressed paper

I was reasonably pleased with the result and included in my portfolio to take on holiday with me to finish if the weather wasn't too good.
True to form, it poured with rain all day Tuesday so I added the promised wash to the painting. I did find it difficult to move the paint around on the hot pressed paper and was disappointed that the finished result was heavy and over-worked. But there you go, win some, lose some.

As I had taken the trouble to carry the sunflowers all the way to Cornwall, it seemed a pity not to make the most of them, so I paid over the odds for a couple of lemons, and scoured the holiday cottage for a couple of jugs or vases and had a second go to see if I could get something a bit more to my taste from the flowers. This time tha paper was Fabriano extra white and the weather was a lot brighter and I think the results are a lot better. See what you think.

New Paper

Peter Ward was kind enough to give me a sheet of paper of the new product exclusive to Great Art. Its called Centenaire ( see one of his previous blogs) and is considerably cheaper than some of the more established manufacturers. One of the attractions for me is that it is very white compared to,say, Whatman.This is a must for me when I am doing my floral paintings, so I was quite interested to try it out.
At Club this week, the subject was 'Pots and Vases' and I used my sample sheet to produce the still life below.

The paper is 140lb not paper, I believe, and I found it fine to work on. The colours of the background bled well when painted wet on wet and the paint sat well on the paper for the objects. My only slight criticism, was that hard edges were difficult to soften once they had dried completely, and I did not like to scrub too hard as I was not sure if the paper would take this kind of abuse. It was just a question of keeping concentration long enough not to allow paint to dry until I was satisfied with the edges. Sometimes, at club, this can be difficult, as we all enjoy it as a social occasion as well as a painting session!

Also this week, I have had a go at a slightly different composition, putting detail at the top and having all the lost edges at the base of the painting. Usually I work the other way around. It came about because I saw a clever photograph of a bunch of flowers taken that way in a gardening magazine and thought it might be interesting to try out. Trying new things can sometimes be surprisingly enervating Not totally sure if the photo does the painting justice, but see what you think.

'Marguerites'  Watercolour on Fabriano Extra White

38cm x 28cm

Post Exhibition

It seems impossible that it is 6 weeks since I posted anything on this site. My apologies to all who have accessed it hoping to find some chatter and a painting or two, but it has been impossible to do everything, and this is one of the things that suffered. The exhibition in Wells Cathedral was a success beyond my wildest dreams, but was incredible hard work throughout the 10 days I was open. It had to be manned at all times and I am grateful for the friends who came to help.
Prior to the exhibition there was so much preparation, followed by 10 days in the cathedral, and then a week of trying to get the house straight again. After all of that I hit a bit of an anti-climax low, and panicked a bit about how to replace all the work ready for the same thing next year.
Thankfully, I am out of that now and have started to paint again, and today was our first day back at club after the summer break. The subject was a picture of a peacock in full display. It was a lovely subject and really good to be able to use some of the colours in the box that don't always get our full attention, like Prussian blue, Windsor green and transparent orange iron.

'Peacock'  Watercolour on Saunders Waterford Not

Despite being told that they are great, and investing a bit of money in them, I am not having too much success with the sable brushes. I do use the bigger ones, sizes 14 and 10 when I am doing washes as they hold a good amount, but the size 4 does nothing for me and I find myself reverting to the 007 series synthetic which I have always liked. I will keep at it , though as they did cost a bob or two!!

What to charge

As the exhibition looms close on the horizon, I am trying to tie up all the loose end. The only major task left to do, was to bar code all the paintings ready for any sales to be processed in the Cathedral shop. The process of selling is a bit complex in the Cathedral, as we, the exhibitors are not able to take any money. All purchases are dealt with through the shop, which means that would-be buyers have to take a docket with the appropriate bar code down to the sales staff, pay for the goods and then bring the receipt back to the Chapter House to collect their purchase. As Wells Cathedral is the only Cathedral in England to have the Chapter House on an upper floor, and the stonesteps have been worn into some very strange shapes over hundreds of years and are very steep, this can be a bit of a chore. In some cases I tend to walk down to the shop with the client and the painting, so that they do not have to make a return journey. This can only happen when there are two of us behind the desk and this year that will not happen very often! All this depends upon trying to explain to non-speaking foriegners why I cannot accept the notes they are offering me, especially for my boxes of cards.

The cards are a great product. They are A4 folded to A3 and there are 8 designs in each boxed set and I sell them for £10.00.Every year I sell out completely so each year I produce a few more boxes and this year there are 30 of them. I hope to sell all of them and the profit (not as much as you would think!) will just about cover all my incidental costs such as advertising, printing, postage, petrol etc.

I try to make the boxes as professional as possible, the card is bought pre-folded and comes with proper card envelopes. Each box is lined with tissue paper and the boxes are white glossy 'book boxes' (size of a standard paperback book)

The above pictures show the box lid design and the selection in the box which is pasted on the base.

Back then to the last remaining task: sticking on the bar codes. This can only be done after I have put the paintings into price groups and decided what price to attach to each group. I find this so hard to do. I do not want to undersell my work, but do not want to appear as if I think the work is worth hundreds. Also, I am aware that times are quite hard financially for lots of people at the moment. And I do want to sell some paintings so that I make a few bob for the cathedral to encourage them to ask me back again next year. Finally I do want to re-coup some of the outlay involved in framing about 85 paintings and mounting another 30 or so.

Some artists measure the painting and charge by the square centimetre, but I find this very unsatisfactory as I always feel some are better works than others even though they are the same size. Also the acrylics often do not have a frame so different rules seem to apply. What I have tried to do is produce a range of sizes and hence prices without compromising the way I want to paint. Although this year my paintings do seem to have grown in size somewhat and therefore I feel I have to charge more for them.
We shall see if I have got it right, although I am sure that the different month this year will have a knock-on effect on sales (last year it was the beginning of July)

As my friend, Jan, is unable to take part this year (she is the landscape painter, to my flower painting) I have included a number of pictures which are not in my usual exhibition range, and I have include one here for you to look at.

'Bottlemania'  Collage on Fabriano Extra white

Golden Lake

In response to a conversation I had with Peter Ward (http:watercolourfanatic.blogspot.com), about the possible disappearance of Quinachridone Gold, I had a look at replacing one of my favourite colours, Maimeri Golden Lake with a more readily available alternative. I love the Graham paints so looked at the possibilities within their range. As a consequence of reading Peter's latest blog, I thought I might share my findings with you.
I compared the two basic colours, Maimeri Golden lake and Graham Nickel Azo Yellow, and as I use the Golden Lake primarily to mix greens, I mixed the Azo Yellow from Graham with all the blues in my palette to see if there was a good range to satisfy my needs. The results are shown below. At the same time I also bought Azo Orange from the same range, and thought you might like to see those results as well when mixed with the blues. I found the Graham Azo Orange much brighter and less opaque than the Cadmium Orange I had previously used and am delighted with the lovely greys to be achieved.

The Bockingford Paper has no significance, jut a free pack picked up somewhere! It is quite difficult to mix absolutely equal strengths of paint in each test, but I think enough shows to make my point.I am happy to use the Azo Yellow until I discover something better, and the Graham paints are lovely to use.

Just to keep the floral interest alive, the background to the Orchid picture below was done completely with mixtures of Golden Lake and Indigo, both by Maimeri

Composition

We are often being told that the composition on the thirds has the most impact and I have always tried to think about this when doing my drawings for the flower paintings. Also the advantage of having an uneven number of elements. Just recently, however, I find myself painting groups of flowers where the finished work does not conform to these two basic rules.

I suppose that all rules are made to be broken from time to time, and the more experienced one becomes, the easier it is to get away with it. I would be please to hear what you think about the composition of the paintings below, where most of the flower interest is in the top half of the painting. Maybe its just that tall blooms lend themselves to this type of composition.



Another 2 Hours!

As promised, the results of trying to put together a couple of small (for me) paintings for our limited space exhibition later this month. Lots of things on and so not a lot of time, so another 2 promised 2 hour sessions to see what I could put together. Here are the results. Now I feel justified in making up my allotted number with a couple of large paintings to advertise my August exhibition.

                                        'Anemone Japonica' Watercolour on Fabriano Extra White
                                                                        22cm x 32cm

                                     'Cherries and Grapes'. Watercolour on Fabriano Extra White
                                                                18cm x 27cm

I keep telling myself that I now have enough paintings for all the projects I have in hand and I can take a rest and do a bit of cleaning or something, but there is that compulsion to always do 'just one more' so I will not say 'that's it folks' because I am sure it will not be!