A new beginning - and using texture...

There's been a rather lengthy absence from this blog due to ill health. I feel I've lost a lot of my confidence during my enforced break, and it's going to be quite challenging getting back on track. I had done some of this work in October, but then couldn't get around to updating my learning blog. I would like to thank all of you who sent kind messages of support, they were much very appreciated!

I've decided to change the way I approach this process, and begin to include a much wider perspective about my art, and how I feel about it. This process should be about thinking, questioning, becoming more reflective and more self aware. One thing the break has done is to made me reflect a lot about why I wanted to do this course.

I think when I began, I was much too worried about doing the "right" thing- this is key issue which affects my artwork, placing restrictions on myself. I won't grow and develop as an artist unless I change. I'm conscious that I have trouble in letting go, and am fearful if things don't "look" right. This has to stop. From now on I'm photographing and posting everything. Doing that "in public", will be very important for me.

Just to try and explain; I have drawn and created since before I began school, but am still haunted by the words on my report as a 9 year old, "not good at craft or games". I did not conform to what was expected of me, I found it so boring. To my teacher, craft meant us making a space rocket out of washing up bottles, or building a construction out of drinking straws! I wanted to play with collage, and make fairies, and invent tiny villages just like I did at home.

I desperately wanted to do art at secondary level, but went to a very traditional and highly academic girls grammar school, where it was seen as a second, no, a third, class subject. Our art teacher appeared at the beginning of the lesson and again at the end. There was no tuition or guidance, and at GCSE O level we were still using children's poster paint and sugar paper. Interestingly that year only three people in the entire school passed the examination.....
I received a grade D.

I firmly believed that I must be completely useless at anything creative. As for showing anyone my art, well, that simply couldn't happen. It took me many, many years and much encouragement by kind and supportive people before before I realised that I wasn't useless, and I am a creative person. But even now, those memories run deep, and I'm often plagued by self doubt. I think I need a way to prove to myself that "I can"by doing something in a more formal way.

The OCA notes say that there are no right or wrongs regarding the log, it's a document which is unique to the individual. So, this will be a new beginning, and to mark that I've re-named the blog and made a few changes too the format too.

And so, on to the work I've been doing....

The final exercise before my Still Life assignment is all about texture. The brief was to first experiment, creating a range of different textures in small squares, building up to creating a drawing about texture, with a series of found objects, using the knowledge gained.






























I really enjoyed the exercise, but, I found that, as usual, I was continually going back to using pencil as my preferred medium, and trying to be very detailed. I can't seem to get away from this. In the words of Freddie Mercury, " I want to break free"!






























To try and break my habit I attempted a first drawing using charcoal. It didn't go as badly as I had thought, but I'm conscious I'm still working much too small. I did like the composition though and was particularly pleased with how the appearance of the driftwood. In the pencil drawing, I decided to change the composition and use some oak leaves I had found instead of the poppy heads, as I thought they would be a good contrast against the crystal.




Now on to the final challenge in the still life module - my first assignment! But before then, I am going to try a do some work to loosen up, and try to develop a more" painterly" approach to my drawing.