Life Drawing – Exhibition Pieces

Posted on 3rd July 2012 by perfectly4med

As promised in a previous post, here are two more pieces that I exhibited at my end of year show last week. These are life drawings of the same model – the first is my first attempt at using oil paints with a palette knife and was completed in around an hour (we had to work really quickly!). I was trying to emulate the style of David Bomberg.

The second was a two week pose, with around 2.5 hours drawing time – the first week I drew the outline and shaded with the colour soft pastels before sealing it with spray fixative. The second week I worked on developing the shading with charcoal and spray fixative only, rubbing back with sandpaper and layering and layering to get the darkest tones. I’d chosen Jim Dine as my influencing artist for this term’s work, and tried to emulate his way of working in this piece.

Many thanks to our model for her patience, and for her permission to share my drawings of her.

Mixed Media – Exhibition Piece

Posted on 28th June 2012 by perfectly4med

It’s been a while again since I’ve posted – I’ve been busy finishing off end of year projects at college, culminating in our exhibition last night. Here’s just one of my pieces (I’ll share some more in a couple of days), for the final mixed media module, inspired by the work of Jacek Yerka, my ‘chosen’ artist for this term.

Continue reading →

Drypoint print – the gallery editions

Posted on 23rd May 2012 by perfectly4med

As I mentioned in my original post, I planned to further work on my drypoint prints, adding tone and colour. Here is a gallery of the results – and the bottom right is the print I have given away, number 13 of 15 – and may be the winner will want colour added? Most of these are now mounted for the end of term exhibition. There are some other prints available to purchase if you’d be interested…

I think some work better than others – I’m not happy with the tea dye one, it’s too dark. I am happy with the greyscale/monotone trees with the colour window. The pastel is very much in keeping with Jacek Yerka’s work on which this is loosely based as he prepares his paintings with a pastel version first. Let me know what you think 🙂

100,000 views giveaway – the winners

Posted on 23rd May 2012 by perfectly4med

As promised, the draw for my 100,000 views giveaway closed last night. Twenty six people have left comments in the last week, with one late entry from Suzanne that didn’t quite make the deadline – thank you all for your feedback and support!

I used random.org to select the winners, and first out of the electronic hat was Rachel, who will get the set of WOW! embossing powders in their handy carry case, and second out of the electronic hat was Kaye, who gets one of my limited edition prints. Congratulations to the winners – please check your emails!

And roll on my next giveaway at 250,000 views 😉

But before that there will be a giveaway in honour of my 100th tangle pattern – yes, there will be more…

Last opportunity…

Posted on 22nd May 2012 by perfectly4med

The 100,000 views prize giveaway for this ‘ere blog ends at midnight GMT tonight, with the winners announced tomorrow – this is your last opportunity to enter and have a chance of winning a unique piece of artwork. For prizes and how to enter, check my original posting here.

100,000 views!

Posted on 15th May 2012 by perfectly4med

Hi all – this blog has just ticked over it’s 100,000 views in just 14 months of going live. And I think the person putting the time in today was Alice checking out my tangle patterns – thanks for all your comments, Alice!

As promised, I have a giveaway in honour of this momentous occasion. The lovely Tania at WOW! Embossing Powder has kindly provided a set of six powders in a handy carry case: Green Glitz, Princess Pink, Red Glitz, Metallic Gold Sparkle, Blue Glitz and Indigo Super Fine. As a second prize, I’ve also decided to give away a signed, limited edition copy of my drypoint print.

All you need to do to have a chance of winning is to leave a comment anywhere on my blog between now and midnight GMT on 22nd May. Only one entry to the draw per person, though feel free to comment as much as you like! The two winners will be announced at some point on 23rd May. Good luck, and thank you for your continuing support 🙂

Print – Term 3 – Drypoint

Posted on 1st May 2012 by perfectly4med

Our theme across all our activities this term at college is ‘influenced by an artist’. I’ve chosen the Polish surrealist Jacek Yerka to base my work on, and for print I was asked to do a drypoint. I discovered this is an etching process where the ink is trapped in the grooves and burrs made by scratching onto metal or acrylic and then transferred onto the substrate using pressure. I scratched my drawing onto a sheet of clear acrylic sheet (approx. A5 size), applied etching ink (which is very viscous), removed most of it, and then printed onto previously wetted watercolour paper using an etching press. Any ink left on the acrylic gets transferred to the paper, so removing it from where you don’t want it is quite laborious! I was sooooo excited as the first print was revealed, and that didn’t really diminish as I did a limited print run. I’m going to have a go replicating it at home using one of the many die cutting machines in place of the etching press, and more common crafting inks. Here is the basic print, and I’ll be colour washing some in due course:

Two Point Perspective

Posted on 11th April 2012 by perfectly4med

I’ve spent all afternoon on my still life homework for the holidays… an exercise in two point perspective. An hour of reading, a couple of outline sketches and some more research led to a couple of hours doing all the construction with vanishing points at the zenith and nadir rather than on the horizon line – but I kinda like the effect. It then took another hour or so to enlarge, trace and shade the image, and here it is. Those that know, feel free to critique!

A Record Breaking Month

Posted on 2nd April 2012 by perfectly4med

You are a wonderful lot! This month has been a record breaker here on the blog! I’ve had my highest view rate of an average of 512 hits per day, my highest daily hits of 1062 on 30th March, and a whopping 15876 hits over the month. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Much of the interest has been around my new Templates downloads, with a massive 3500 views of my Easter Basket Template since I uploaded it at the end of February, with 1080 of you downloading it to date. I guess those hits will be dropping off any day now!

It’s been great to have the interest and support, and please keep coming back and seeing what I’m up to next. By the way – there’s the next milestone at 100,000 hits – I already have a set of six WOW! embossing powders in a handy carry case to give away… what else would you like to win?

Photography – Term 2 – Final Image

Posted on 26th March 2012 by perfectly4med

Another part of my Extended Diploma in Art & Design course is a photography block. This term’s work followed the theme of ‘manmade’ and the challenge was to incorporate some of the items we’d drawn over the Christmas break into a digital studio photoshoot, followed by image manipulation in Photoshop. I chose to use a manual coffee grinder as that had been the most interesting shape to draw, and my imagination took me off on a flight of fancy – so I emptied the cutlery drawer and with a bit of jiggery-pokery, I came up with this:

If you would like your own photographic quality print of this image (without the copyright notice) then please contact me using the email button in the sidebar.