Inspiring and interesting

  This out to have been posted on Friday but the last few days I've been rather occupied with a new hobby we discovered accidentally. Geocasheing! All yesterday Peter, myself and a friend drove about the coast hereabouts and did some treasure hunting and hid some ourselves.

But that hasn't go much to do with art! Here are a few things found during the week:

Caricature has never been one of my great interests, it's not really my style, (I think it can be quite ugly!) but there is something in it that anyone interested in portraiture can learn from. I found this video by a professional caricaturist very interesting, have a look.

I have always been interested in the lives of other artists. This was quite inspiring.

Life of an artist video link

If you like art and baking you can combine the two! I think I might do something like this for upcoming family birthdays. Van Goah cake

 I haven't been exploring the internet much this week (a good thing really) so I'll leave off with my latest drawing.

  This drawing is rather different isn't it, I wanted to show the pain and terror of the horse trying to run away. My photo is a bit blurry, sorry about that, before I frame them i'm going to have to have a day devoted to photographing my work properly.

Interesting and Inspiring

   It's raining determinedly right now which belies yesterdays beautiful sunshine. I was up with the horses yesterday morning and it was so warm it felt like the middle of summer, but then I was doing allot of running around with my four legged friends!

Lady Grey and her old paddock mate whom she is decidedly cool towards.

She has put on allot of weight on this lovely grass! 

Tigger was very boring I don't think he likes the camera!

   Well here is what has interested and inspired me this week:

 I found out about this equine artist, Emma Kennaway (interview), in the weekend and was inspired by her stunning artwork of horses especially her huge drawings.  She has given me new inspiration for horses as a subject and I have begun to think of new ways of making an old subject interesting. Perhaps it is because she is not a 'horsey' person that her drawings of them are so original, she is able to think outside the box with a new perspective on horses. I have always been faced with the challenge of originality when drawing or painting horses, and do not always meet it successfully! Here is another video of her explaining her pictures before her exhibition.

   As an artist and ever since I read the book Drawing on the Right side of the Brain by Betty Edwards (I not in passing that it is a must read for anyone who wants to or dose draw) I have always been interested about the way people see things, and what we notice and do not notice. I read this blog post a little while ago which talked of an interesting study about inattentional blindness. How we don't notice things if we aren't looking for them which explains why artists see different things in the same subject than a non artist because we look for different things.

    Now here is a short video I made this week. 

  What do you think? I was quite excited when I came up with the idea and have searched in vain on YouTube for video's like it. I think I might enlarge upon the idea! That waltz is my favorite piece of music at the moment.

* * *

  Now here is something I didn't do. This brilliant artist draws wonderful portraits. His videos are so inspiring.

 Video Link Wet Portrait

Too Many things I Wish To Do...

  For all my natural lack of motivation I have always been one of those people who think if you want to do it than do it, for where there is a will there is a way. This is one of the reasons I began to play the piano again, and learn to play the violin, and teach my horse useless tricks like Spanish walk and rearing, and write 25,000 words last June, and think I can do all the things I would love to do, and then come up against an unrelenting wall called time. I wish there were more hours in the day or more days in a week, then I would take the violin more seriously and have lessons, and spend more hours in Deliberate Practice. And I would learn to dance, and learn a different language, and travel, things I have always wished very badly to do. But time is something you can't reason with and the only way I can ignore him is by dreaming.

Taken by my brother at Peter_NZL

 
  Would you call me an over achiever, or a want-to-be-over-achiever? Well whatever it is I wish I were not, I wish art was the only think I want to do with my life, then I could be so much more focused and produce much more and better work. But never minded, I only complain like this because I have nothing else to complain of, my life is pretty blessed really, I just sometimes need a kick in the head to make me realize it! Anyway, now I've touched on it, let's carry on dreaming...

  This is my dream home, I shall live somewhere much like this one day. Big leafy trees, old, old, buildings, avenues, stone walls, chimneys, dappled sunlight, garden seats, vast green park grounds and beautiful horses in the fields.

My exciting Monday Mornings, among other things.

  I always start my week of with a bang. I seem to have the most energy and focus on a Monday morning than any other morning, which dose not quite agree with the generally accepted rule! I always begin my most ambitious painting and do the most amount of work on a Monday. Tuesdays are pretty good too, then Wednesdays I begin to lag and usually it goes down hill from there until on the weekends I hardly get anything done painting wise. And then Monday comes round again and I begin with a new spurt of determination and drive.

   I read this short article about weeding gardens yesterday and it has some relevance to this topic. My weeds grow very quickly and are choking me up by the end of the week. From now on I intend to a little weeding every day. It really dose work, chipping away at the old block has to produce some effect eventually. I have always had a time of it trying to get myself motivated to do more paintings and pictures and not just wait for those moments of inspiration. And I have noticed lately that I have come along way for I am working on some picture every day, and even in the weekends I at least to a few sketches! Mum is always saying that good writing (for she is a writer) is %10 inspiration and %90 perspiration and this applies perfectly to the artist, dose it not? Combine this with the saying 'the more you work the stronger you get' and pretty soon inspiration will be a more frequent visitor. It was quite a happy discovery for me!

 Well, I've begun my Wednesday morning with a blog post, that's a good start, now I'm off to finish a painting. I'm videoing it so there will be speed painting video coming your way soon. :) And don't forget to subscribe to my new monthly newsletter! See right to submit your email.

  A small sketch I did in my small A5 sketchbook last month. This is pretty much actual size.

 

White Horse Inspiration

   I have a new and exciting commission to work on! It is to be very large pastel painting of a white horse in blues and grays. I have been given the liberty to decide what horse and what posture to paint which is nice and gives me liberty to do something inspired. I have been looking on the internet for paintings and photos of white horses to inspire me and to get a general idea of the sort of thing I will be doing. Here are a whole lot of pictures that inspire me, I will try and credit owners where known.

Found Here

by Joanna Maitland-Hudson

Found Here

'Riding on the Clouds' by Karen Hargett

By Lisa Miller

Maria

I love all this artists work! Pferde Gemalt Art

Found Here

'Wild at Heart' by Katey Sodeau

Another inspiration from a brilliant equine artist, Debbie Dunbar

I have also pinned a whole lot of beautiful white horse pictures on my White Horse board on Pintrest.

Interesting and Inspiring

   Here are a few things I have collected together for your amusement. Browse, read, or scan as you please! Would you like me to make this a regular sort of post on my blog? Do let me know if you enjoy it and if there are other things that would improve on the idea etc.

There is a new website called ArtStack which is much like Pinterest only it is for art only. I have just joined and yet to find my way around and figure it out, but it looks pretty interesting.

Here is something from my art portfolio: Something old and something new:

One of my best watercolour paintings from 2009

A Charcoal sketch of a horse eye which I completed last week.

  A few blogs I have begun to follow lately:

•   A graphite equine and animal artist, Cathy Spearing, has just finished a beautiful drawing of a row of white horses.
• At Unbridled Imagery, Michelle Grant shared her painting struggles the results of which are beautiful paintings of horses. 
• The Mare's Tales is a photography and art blog. Her latest blog shows some lovely photos captured at the racetrack.
• This artist shares her colourfull semi-abstract art on her blog.
• And finally here are a couple paintings by Bev Lewis at Animal Artistry

By Bev Lewis

Sunlit Hare by Bev Lewis

  Here is a very informative video about eyes and how to draw them. It is more in depth than the usual 'how to draw eyes video' and I found it quite useful. Here is a link to it, there are so many how to draw eyes videos on YouTube that I couldn't find it to add on blogger!

  If you haven't already seen this...well it's pretty amazing. Artists often try to use techniques to make their paintings appear life like, well this artist has a way of doing something rather opposite.

A Drawing and some Words.

  Here is a drawing I did a couple of weeks ago; finally took a photo of it today. I drew it with charcoal pencils on A3 paper. What do you think of the style? I have recently taken to charcoal and love the effects one can make with it. I have drawn a few more charcoal drawings to share, but before then I need to find a good method of photographing my drawings so that the background stays an even white. I'll do some experimentation with lighting, I think that is my main problem. Or perhaps scanning the smaller ones would work best. My brother has allowed me to use his camera which is much better than Dad's so I'll attempt to make a new speed drawing video this or next week, though it is hard without the tripod.

   I am going to begin a weekly post dedicated to sharing art (and/or horses) related pictures, links, and videos, which I have come across during the week and captured my imagination or inspired me. The first of them I will post tomorrow... I leave you with:

 'Cloud horse

 Dream horse

Mine forever 

Free horse.'

(-a little poem my Mum wrote for me once.)

courtesy of Google Images. :)

My first Newsletter!

  I have just been writing my first ever newsletter and am quite excited about it! It makes me feel rather professional to be sending out a newsletter every month! Now I just need people to send it to. So if you would like to subscribe to my monthly newsletter you can in a moment by filling in the to blanks at right in the side bar under the blurb about me. And then you can expect to receive my very first newsletter in you virtual mailbox.

   I'm such a beginner as an artist, really only about to start out on a career as an artist which I have always dreamed of being (at least since I stopped dreaming of being a 'horse rider' when I growed up). I still have lots to learn on the practical side of creating beautiful pictures, and on the business side I know just about nil. Unfortunately, an artist cannot expect to make a living unless his work sells and that requires selling. Which I know not much about!

   'Well, take the plunge and learn on the way, hopefully before you hit your head on a rock!'

   I shall be writing about my experiences setting out on a new road in my newsletters along with photos of my best latest works and other little things I shall think of to keep you amused!

A Quote from Beatrix Potter

A days work..

   I have been painting all day today. I think I painted longer than I ever have in a single day on one painting. I hope that becomes a regular occurrence, but I do end up feeling rather exhausted. Painting can be so tiring - to the brain anyway - so when I finished at five this evening I cleaned myself of paint and curled up on my bed with Pride and Prejudice and read with the last rays of sun flickering in through my lace curtains. Jane Austen is so entertaining on every re-read that P&P is always the perfect book to relax with.

   (I'd like to do a painting like that one day.)  The painting I was working on is one I started this morning and have just about finished. It was inspired by this abstract painting by Osnat Tzadok

 My painting is a little bit abstract but it was mostly the warm and cool contrast of colours in this painting that inspired me. If I can find a camera with batteries, I will photograph it when it is finished.

   And now I've got to scamper to have the dinner ready for the hungry men when they come in from working on boats. I think Pizza tonight. :)