J, Yellow in Blue

 The third of the three "mini-prints". As I mentioned elsewhere, I worked on these in parallel. First I worked on the drawings, reducing them and translating them to work with quite broad lines. I also made some adjustments so that they each had the same amount of "information" as I wasn't concerned with them being some kind of set when I was doing the drawings. 

I cut the three "drawings" and transferred each on to a separate block where I then cut out the figure's silhouette and then roughly brushed ink over the block and roughly cut these to give the "brushstrokes" in the back ground. I used the same yellow block over all three as a kind of hardly-noticeable unifying theme.

J, Yellow in Green

 

The model for the original drawings for these three prints is Julie, hence the J in the titles. I did a lot of agonising over titles, but in the end I opted for something descriptive as I usually do when I'm stuck. One of the things I like about quick poses in life drawing is not being hung up about detail and measurement. They're usually the closest I get to "gestural" drawing, conveying something quite energetic, even in straightforward poses like this.

J, Yellow in Pink

 I've been wondering whether to post about these three separately or together as I have been working on them in parallel. I've plumped for separate as they are "stand alone" pieces, I guess.

Anyway, another "mini-print" exhibition came across my radar a couple days ago. Leamington this time, not juried, but in my back yard. I had it in my mind to try a few little prints along these lines, so it was enough impetus to give it a go. Due to the exhibition rubric, they are smaller than my usual small at 10x10cm - though technically the same area as the 12X8s I did for the Leicester show, the square format seems more constraining somehow.

These prints are again based on quick (2min) life-drawings like the painting in Painting Stacey. The original drawings were big (A2) and scribbly but had a dynamism to them I wanted to try and translate to a different medium in small scale.

Painting Stacey

 

Another print based on life drawings. From this August, this time. Two drawings of the same model (Stacey) - the one on the easel was a quick 2-minute drawing without lifting the charcoal from the paper, and the other was a bit longer, emphasising shadows. I like the slightly confrontational hands-on-hips stance, it gives her a vibe that hints at, "I'm naked and it's cold, is that the best you can come up with?" I tried out several colours before opting for the light blue. I feel it reads well as shadow and as coldness in contrast to the world inside the picture inside the picture. If you know what I mean.

This one has turned out quite well, I think, probably the best offset of the colour blocks I've done. Or at least most unstressful.. And I've made the mistakes seem deliberate, so I'm happy with that. Pretty sure this will be one of my entries for the Rugby Open this year.

London Calling

 Number 3 in the series of scenes about town. A few months back I walked past this bar and saw two fed-up looking women at one of the outside tables. The bar is called London Calling, so I thought maybe London was calling to them, calling them to be elsewhere. Now that's way too subtle an idea to get over in a small print, so I thought I'd just do it straight, as it were and see how it comes out.

So here it is. The architecture is somewhat edited, but that's art isn't it? And the two women here were sitting in our garden, but they work.

A couple more cards

 I was at an event in the local park yesterday, so I did a reprint of some of the cards that were running low. While I was at it I did the Rugby Player from ArtPages No1 and Sophie Pointing from ArtPages No 2 as cards, too. I thought they were both strong enough images, so if you need a card for a more roughty-toughty relative, here they are. And it also makes it true that all the ArtPages images are from elsewhere. If a little post-dated.

Artpages Zine No2

 I just had to do another one. It'll probably be a while before the next. I thought I had all the old blocks I needed for relevant pictures for War and Peace - I aimed to use the Amelia picture with some other variant of Your Country Needs You, but I can't remember where I put the block. Then Sophie Cunningham caught my eye and I thought I'd redo the Kitchener poster with her instead. THEN I went life drawing again and one of the things we did was to cut quick silhouettes of the model out of coloured paper. So that decided me on the classic side view of Sophie with her quote about not taking notice of internet hate, cuz she is, after all, the new Yogi Berra. And the Sports Page is restored to sports. 

Also because I've been reading the Aeneid lately, a good Latin quote from Virgil seemed right.