Yet More Faces

Here are some more faces in the 29 Faces September 2014 challenge hosted by Ayala.

Face 16

This is Michelle, I met her yesterday at her parents’ home, and she is a special needs girl, always full of smiles and love for those around her.  She is adored by her family and all those that know her.  However yesterday, I had to pull myself up short, I had fallen into the trap of thinking she had no worries.  Across the dinner table I caught several glimpses of a sad Michelle, a wistful Michelle, she caught me looking at her in those moments and immediately pit on a beaming smile.  Oh how we assume!  I am now sure that smiling face is a mask that Michelle puts on to hide all the angst that any teenage girl has whether she has special needs or not

Face 17

This is Mary, she is a minx!  She loves to put the cat amongst the pigeons.  She doesn't do it out malice, she just likes to liven things up.  You can just see her planning her next little mischief!

Face 18

This is Lizzy, she is all dressed up warm and cosy, she is watching her friends playing on the playing fields getting muddy and dirty, she would love to join in  but fears that her Mama would be annoyed if she came home cold wet and dirty, but oh it would be so much fun she thinks…. Just maybe I will take off my nice coat and join in!

Face 19

Let me introduce Wanda to you!  She is a fun girl, loves to be different, everything about life astonishes her.  She finds the ridiculous in the serious stuff of life, we need more of her sort in the world!

Wow, I am slowly catching up, when I started I thought I would be lucky if I got to 20 as I started a week late.  I just, just might make it to 29, lol.

Linking to  Sunday Sketches as well as 29 Faces.

Friday Round Up

29 Faces gals

Face 12

This is Annie; she is the vulnerable little girl within all of us.  Annie looks at life with a question – Am I good enough?  We might be sure of ourselves on the outside and perhaps fool ourselves that we are staunch.  However life curve balls show us that our armour is full of cracks.  Well, that is true of me!!

Face 13

This is Rachael; she hides behind her glasses.  She gives the impression that she is hard and doesn’t care.  However, her glasses hide the ready tears and sadness at the world’s tragedies. 

Last week several people asked about my techniques and whether I use the computer.  Rather than answer individually I decided to show a step by step of one of my faces.

Face 14

I always start any painting with pastel, whether it be acrylic, gouache or whatever.  They are usually gestural if they are to be whimsical as above or more realistic if representational.

Today, I was planning to use mainly acrylics, so I did a wash of gesso and drew into the wet gesso with pastels.  I do that to create a good surface and to create textures – use it fairly thick.

Then I start to use the acrylics, decide what colours I am going to use.  It is still gestural at this stage, I am trying to get the picture to speak to me.  When I start I never have a clear idea what I am going to do.  Then I start to add textures with crumpled tissue (I find that the tissue from old dressmaking patterns is wonderful as it doesn’t dissolve like new tissue paper.  I pick them up from op shops for 50cents).  I use whatever comes to hand, nothing is safe from my paint stained hand!  

Today, I used the kitchen scrubbing brush  to add splodges.  I would have had a photo, but my camera decided it need new batteries and being totally disorganised my spare ones need charging too.  

So this photo is what I did while they were recharging.  The picture on the left I did with pastels, sometimes the urge to carry on with pastel overtakes and then I just use some water colour to finish off.  

At this stage the girl finally started to talk to me.

This is as far as I got today.  I don’t think she is finished yet, her face needs some work.  

When I upload my pictures to the computer I use the computer to crop.  Sometimes I rotate the crop to give an interesting angle. And if I am going to add words I use the text tools as my writing is crap, see the header above!

Even though she needs more work she is talking to me and her name is Mel.  She likes to look at you with those blue as blue eyes and stares into your soul.  You always feel that you can’t hide from her.  She is a wise soul!

Face 15

This is Cindy; she looks at the world with wide eyed wonder.  She is very trusting and believes everything she is told.  In this picture she has just been told about the big bad wolf in the woods!! After doing the pastel I used splodges from the tissue ball with acrylic and stencilled with toile.  (I will show some of my handmade stencils next week).  She is not finished yet.

Mix it Monthly – Trees

Earlier in the week I decided to get out my Sennelier Inks, they are a shellac based ink and create wonderful transparencies and have a gunky feel!  I brought them about 3 years ago and only used them once!  Which is silly as they give a wonderful rich feel to your work.

This has an abstract feel because I got carried away with creating textures.  I started out as a painting of a bush area at a nearby nature reserve.

This is a painting of a Silver Fern the national symbol of NZ.  It is a tree Fern and in certain light the underneath of the leaves seems to be silver.  I just love them.  Sorry Connie I just cannot get my head around the colour scheme this month. But I am working on it!

Art Journal Journey – Living beings

I am cheating here a bit as this colour pencil work I did some years ago, I don’t think I have shown it before.

I once had a tin with a pussy lying on some William Morris material.  One day I decided to try my hand at doing a similar drawing. 

 There was a reason.  When Zana, one of my cats had kittens I kept two of them, Jasper and Lucy.  However, I found having 4 cats too much.  So I decided to find another home for him when he was about 4 months with another family a few streets away.   He settled in well. But at about 6 months he kept on coming back every week day at 10 am on the dot and going at 4 pm, obviously his new owners were out at work and he remembered where there was a nice bed. 

Eventually it stopped.  Except for a period of two weeks when he came for the day for 2 weeks. During these two weeks I did this picture that was 6 years ago.  Well imagine my surprise on Tuesday, there was a meow that was not from my three, I went to the back and there sat Jasper.  He walked in bold as brass, went up to Bro and rubbed his face against his, he went up to Zana, she hissed! Lucy just sat there with eyes wide as saucers.  Then he hopped up on the sofa and had a sleep for 2 hours and disappeared.  I phoned his owners and they were amazed as I!  Wonder when I will see him again?  In another six years?  I wonder if he has been around here at night as I have a cat flap.

Well that’s it for today  Have a great week, I will probably have some for gals for 29 faces on Sunday or Monday.

I am also linking up with

Paint Party Friday hosted by Eva and Kirstin.

Art Journal Journey hosted by Valerie and Susi

Mix It Monthly hosted by Connie

This week......

Been busy as….. Painting a storm for 29 faces, AJJ – living beings and Mix it Monthly - trees!

Face 7

This is Sara; she is a beauty, loves to dress up, wears flowers and ribbons, and goes out on the town frequently.  However, despite being so-called ‘popular’ she is very lonely, if you look hard enough you can see into her soul through her eyes and see the sadness.  I think she has been hurt a lot.  I used gouache and acrylics; it took me all week to get her how I wanted.

Face 8

This is me a child!  I grew up on a dairy farm and after school had to go down to the milk shed to help with the milking.  To get there, I had to pass the hen run.  In the hen run was a bad tempered rooster, he used to sit up in the tree and fly over the fence making a racket and trying to peck us kids.  I was petrified of him!  I used to climb the fence and cross the paddock to the boundary and take a rather steep path to the shed.  To this day I am very nervous of birds, I desperately want to have hen for eggs but the thought of having to touch them sends shivers up my spine!!!  While I am at it, I will also admit that I was afraid of the cows too!  Perhaps next week I will do a picture telling a hilarious episode of me and a cow!  Shame on a good ole Taranaki farm gal! (Taranaki is the province where I grew up and is primarily a dairy farming area)

This picture I did for 29 Faces and AJJ – Living Beings.  If you want to see the faces I posted during the week go here.

Some more stuff for AJJ - Living Beings and Mix it Monthly - Trees

They are about my cat Bro.

This first one is his relationship with dogs.  He has a love hate relationship.  He keeps his distance as he has had one or two run in with them.  But I have caught him terrorizing or perhaps tantalizing the neighbour’s dog.  They have a one of those yappy terriers, and it is often in the front window when they go out.  Bro likes to sit in the middle of the lawn staring at it while it goes berserk, yapping jumping at the window.  I swear he is laughing!

Bro pretends to hate birds.  Proof of this was witnessed by the one legged blackbird that frequents my back garden looking for worms.  It disappeared for a while and I thought it hadn't survived the winter.  However looking out the window I saw the bird on the foot path to the washing line.  Around the corner came Bro.  He sat down as the bird continued to hop about.  They were only a foot apart!  He stayed there till it flew off.  He got a great big hug from me.

I used acrylics in both pictures.  For the trees they are wearing their spring outfits as it is spring here.  (It has arrived at long last!)  I haven't used the colour scheme provided by Connie but will for next Tree picture that I am working on.

Bro taking his early morning stroll in the garden!  Below Bro guarding the property on the carport roof!  Oops it needs painting!!!

Well if you got this far thanks for visiting and have a wonderful creative week.

Linking to

 Paint Party Friday hosted by Eva and Kirstin,

Art Journal Journey hosted by Valerie and Susi

and Mix it Monthly hosted by Connie.
also
Feline Cat Friday hosted by Kitty Par-tay

Faces 3 to 6

For 29 Faces this time around I have decided to give my faces a name and make up a little about them, it makes them real.  It is a mixed bag of styles today.

Face 3

This is Debbie; she is in a rush, flying through her day with a million things on her mind.  For this ‘lovely’ I used some pastel paper that has ridges.  Ha, in the end I did not use pastel!  I used watercolour and acrylics and crumpled up tissue to stamp textures.

I have discovered a neat new home-made stamp – toile. I had some left over from a toy – a crochet ballet rabbit I was making for grand-niece.  I couldn't help myself and dipped in some wet paint and laid it on the paper.  I am in love with it!  So much so, that I used it in the next Face.

Face 4

This is Suzy, she is lost, she does not know where to find herself, and she is looking everywhere but not within.  It’s sad; she does not know how wonderful she is.  I drew her with a black fine sharpie and then used watercolour with lots and lots of water.  I went a bit mad with the net here!

Face 5

This is Eliza, she has just lost someone close to her, she is trying so hard not to cry and doesn't realise that if she let go she might feel so much better. However I do think that the tears are about to gush out!   For Eliza I used acrylic and pastel, and of course some of the net for stamping.

Face 6

We seem to have had a bit of a sad time so will have to end on a happy note, this is Lily, and she is a happy little soul.  Looking forward to all the treats that life is offering her, she is confident that she is loved and cherished (as all children should be).  I used acrylic and a bit of gouache.  I managed to keep my hand away from the net!

As you can see I am on a roll! 4 faces in 2 days.

I will see you again on Friday when I hope to have a few more faces to show.  Do go and see all the other lovely artists taking part in 29 Faces (link is on sidebar)

Splashing Around!

This week I have been splashing around with paint and using chalk pastels.  I just love the textures you get when acrylics and pastels are combined.  Today I have another lady for PPF and a still life.

I have to say that I am really into doing colourful ladies at the moment.  I am drawn to strong ladies, eccentric ladies, in your face ladies, and even perhaps sad ladies.  The lady above I feel is saying “Yeah, so….. I know I have a giant flower tucked into my waist band!”  Or maybe she is saying or thinking, “What are you looking at!”  There is certain defiance about her.

The still life is imaginary; the colours were next to each other on the palettes so I played.  I quite like it.

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and thanks for visiting.

Linking as usual to Paint Party Friday hosted by Kirstin and Eva, thank you ladies for the opportunity to show our work with other great artists.

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple….

Wow posting two days in a row!  I was going to do just the Frida Kahlo post for PPF, as I didn't think I would be able to get any painting done today.  But as you see I did even if it is still wet!.  I really wanted to finish it as I think it would be great for Connie’s  Mix It Monthly which ends in a couple of days.

Last week while reading one of my favourite blogs that had a post on aging, one of the comments referred to this poem so I googled it.  It is a poem by Jenny Joseph from “Warning”. Written in 1961.  It really, really appeals to me.  However, I promise not to spit!

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple

With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we’ve no money for butter.

I shall sit down on the pavement when I’m tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along the public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.

I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick flowers in other people’s gardens
And learn to spit.

You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
And eat three pounds of sausages at a go
Or only bread and pickle for a week
And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes.

But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
And pay our rent and not swear in the street
And set a good example for the children.
We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.

But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.

What will you do when you are old that you could start doing now?

I think I will wear orange and pink with stripes and dots, and fall asleep while boring people are talking!

Have a wonderful creative week and I hope to visit you all during the weekend.

Linking to Paint Party Friday

and

Mix it Monthly

Work in Progress and Stuff

I have had to drop out of 30 Paintings in Thirty Days, as I am way behind and I decided I would rather do the 29 Faces in February as I have a soft spot for it. I haven’t done much in the way of art over the last 10 days as I have been dealing with the death of two people close to me  It was expected as they both had long term illnesses, one cancer and the other a rare lung disease.  It still was a shock and to have happened in the same week a bit heavy for me.  (They didn’t know each other)  At their funerals I thought about their lives and they couldn’t have been more different.  Liz had a well lived life, even if it was before her time, she was in her fifties.  Her only regret was that she would never see her grandchildren grow up.  However, Peter on the other hand, had many regrets and had a lot of bitterness in him, I think he thought he had a lot of time to put things right (he was in his early sixties) but his illness was swift and he didn’t have the time to fix relationships and so on.  It has made me think, Life is so short!  

I remember one of painting tutors at Polytech saying that all he wanted in life was to be able to say to God at the Pearly Gates, that he had done his best with the talents he was given.  That statement has always stayed in my head all these years.  I am so guilty of not using my talents for most of my life.  In recent years I have been addressing this, but I still sabotage myself!  Blogging has done wonders for my self-confidence as an artist, but it still a bit of a secret to people in my daily life.  If they are invited inside my bolthole they are gobsmacked to realise that the paintings on my wall are mine!

So I decided I have to come out of the closet so to speak.  A friend from Polytech days wants me to have a joint exhibition with her at the end of the year.  I am going to commit to that.  If I can do one painting a month, I should make it.  The other thing I have to do is do something about my illustration, I sabotage that too!  So I have started a new blog Rainbow Splashes, I wanted it to have the same name as my illustration website and I will be opening an etsy shop hopefully by the end of February and that will also be called Rainbow Splashes.  Go and have a look if you are interested in illustration, there I will blog about the books I am illustrating, sketches, watercolours of flowers and whimsy stuff that I am doing for the etsy shop.

Work In Progress

Over the last couple of days I have done some painting on my big canvas. 

The above is where I got to a couple of weeks ago.  Below is where I got to today.  I am pleased with how it taking shape.  I think it is almost finished just a few refining touches.

Over the last couple of days I was using leftover paint to start my next picture; this is much smaller 12 x 12 inches.  I can’t see anything in it yet, needs a couple more layers.

That’s enough from me a rather long post!  Hope to see what you have created on my rounds.

Happy Paint Party Friday!