Lake Watcher
Watecolour and pastel, 2014, 16.5 x 21cm
As I promised myself, I have been painting a lot since September. These three painting are part of a group I completed at the end of last year.
Clapton Pond Rose
Watercolour, pastel and gouache
2014
19 x 28cm
Glinter
Watercolour and gouache painting
2014
24 x 29cm
The new year is difficult. Lots of chores and catch up to do. I have been painting, but I’m feeling a stagnant.
This is a picture of the studio we built in our backyard.
Three years ago, a massive Victorian water pipe exploded outside our home in London. It flooded our garden, kitchen and lower floor. Flower pots with trees, from the back of our garden, ended up in our kitchen. The fridge had floated away. Our household was affected along with about 30 others.
We lost a third of our stuff and a third of our house. I’m not crying. It was only stuff. But the disruption to our lives was difficult. We’ve lived in our house for 20 years and I had a studio set up in the largest room. Anyone who has had a studio for over 20 years will know the scariness of having to pack it up and move it.
Most of our neighbours elected to move out of their homes into rented accommodations while renovations took place. We decided to build a shed in our garden to use as a temporary kitchen while our house was renovated. The renovations were more extensive than we imagined. Everything needed doing. And then once we began, we decided to fix all the little things about our house that we wanted improving. We lived in it for 2 years while the work went on around us.
This garden shed was to be my new painting studio. My one regret was that I didn’t rent a studio to work in while it was going on. I lost the flow of working. I could never find things I needed. I had no private space or place to leave things where they wouldn’t be disturbed.
After the work was finished, I still couldn’t face the final move-in and organise of my new studio. I don’t know why. I had some kind of mental block. I have kind of worked in corners of my house for the last year.
This week I finally tackled the new studio space.
Got everything organised, dumped all the rubbish, put work up on the wall and began working in it. I feel so much better.
I don’t know what took me so long. It feels so good to have a space of my own again! I began a new painting and I started working into some works in progress from the summer.
I’ve been getting my studio organised and ready for the year.
Quick watercolour studies of whatever flowers I get from Columbia Road Flower market on Sundays. I love the tangle of them.
Went to the 20/21 British Art Fair. Favourite thing: Seeing Ann Oram’s paintings at Duncan R Miller gallery stand. I will definitely be making time to see the exhibition of her work at their gallery from the 3-31st of October. Her paintings were very rich to see up close. Lots of different textures from the variety of media she uses. Yum!
Ann Oram’s October Flowers and Chinese Lantern on a Pink Ground
Studio Mirror by Geraldine Girvan
My big new art crush in Geraldine Girvan. So far, I’ve only seen her work in reproductions, but I aim to seek some actual works out to gawp at soon.
I love her use of bodycolour/gouache. In the (slightly fascist) world of watercolour painting, bodycolour (aka gouache) is a bad cousin. Most watercolourists wax lyrical about the transparent properties of unadulterated watercolour. Although many do use a little Chinese white, it is not considered “pure”. However, some colours don’t read to me as transparent. I love the chalkiness of gouache, and its richness.
I find it difficult to manage an entire painting in gouache. It doesn’t seem to like being overpainted. And I like layering. I’m looking forward to the workshop “Experimenting with Gouache” that I am taking at the RWS early next month. It is taught by Wendy Jacob.
Gouache painting by Wendy Jacob
Many of my paintings include white gouache but I look forward to extending my use of gouache further. I’ll show and tell when I have something I’m not too ashamed of.
This is a small postcard sized painting. I sat in a swamp on an overcast morning, drawing. Herons flew over my head. Beasts rustled the reeds.
I’m back from my lovely summer in Canada. I spent most of my free time painting. And have resolved to keep going everyday.
I have dabbled with painting for the last 10 years, watercolour in particular, but never committed. I have been frightened that I would end up with useless paintings, filling my plan chest, with no where to go. Frightened that hours of work would be wasted. I have also been wary of the anxiety caused by paintings that aren’t going the right way. This fear, and the fear that I can’t make good paintings, has kept me from taking it more seriously.
I painted everyday this summer. There were days that it caused me anxiety. It’s a hard anxiety to name. If paintings are like world building (yeah, I’m God in this scenerio) then it’s the anxiety of watching the world you are building going wrong. Maybe I’m taking it too seriously.
Anyway, I started to feel more confident, towards the end of the summer. I could fix them or even allow them to go wrong. I think I can manage my anxiety by painting everyday. That way, keeping the difficult moments in perspective. The good times, are some of the most exciting moments of my life.
As for my fear of plan chests full of useless paintings… Well I have many more knitted items and other things I have made, than I need or wear, and that doesn’t seem to bother me. All the “useful\practical” things I make are rarely necessary. I mostly don’t worry about them, so why worry about paintings piling up? They don’t take up much space.
I feel ready to take my painting more seriously. I am committed to painting everyday. I have signed myself up for a watercolour course at the Mary Ward Centre and lots of workshops and talks at the Royal Watercolour Society. I’m going to get out and see more exhibitions and also do some plein air painting.
Expect plenty of posts about painting.