Remembering our first day at the beach with a quick watercolour sketch in my weekly art journal. Happy Sunday!

Happy Mother's Day

Painting myself some flowers to celebrate today. Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Easter

Wishing you a very Happy Easter. xxx

Sketchbook #1 // Butterflies

I had a go at illustrating butterflies during the month of April, and it turned out more difficult than I thought. My mind wasn’t really there and I recognise I didn’t put much effort into it. The colour choice and composition are not my strong points, and it clearly shows in these pages.

Anyhow, I wanted to try some new watercolour pencils, but also I came across my old watercolour palette and thought I would give it a try.

Watercolour pencils are very easy to use and the results can be quite rewarding. Unfortunately I can’t say the same for non-professional watercolours! The ones that I used in these pages are Winsor & Newton Cotman, and I don’t know if it’s just me, but I can tell the difference between those and the artist’s range. Apparently, in the Cotman series, the more costly pigments are replaced with cheaper alternatives giving the paint a more uniform consistency, thus losing the wide spectrum of hues. However, I have seen well established artists using the Cotman range, with awesome results…so it must be just me then!

I haven’t picked any new subject for the month of May, yet. And although we are close to the end of the month, I’m still hoping I’ll be able to do some new illustrations.

Seasonal palette

Once in a while, more often than not, I get the so called creative block. I stare at a blank sheet of paper and just wonder.  I feel the urge to paint, don’t get me wrong, but the ideas just do not flow and my brain feels numb. Over the years I have learned to overcome this lack of inspiration in different ways, taking advice from fellow artists and discovering what really works for my brain to function again. 

One thing I like to do to get the creative flow back is to play with colours and create palettes. It is a nice and relaxing way to use paint; the urge to paint get satisfied and at the same time you are not committing to paint anything specific. Plus you can do this simple exercise while sitting on your couch (or at least this is what I did!). You can tackle this subject in several ways; making a chart of all your pans and tubes, mixing greens or browns, categorising all your paints by colour.

This time I went for a seasonal palette, trying to combine several colours to recreate the seasons and possibly use them in a landscape painting. I store all my palettes in one transparent sleeve, ready to be used when inspiration does strike!   

Sketchbook #1 // Blossoms

March has all been about blossoms! The trees are full of delicate flowers, whites, pinks and reds dominate over the greens of the new leaves and everything seems to be awakening from the long winter sleep. This is another of my favourite botanical subjects, but for this subject I went for a more illustrative technique using a black ink pen besides my watercolours. 

 

 

 

 

My main source of inspiration has been this book, but I also enjoyed flicking through my many botanical art books. And that is one of the reasons why I'm very tempted to tackle a proper botanical painting of a branch of cherry blossoms or prune for my April's project, but not sure I will have enough time to get it done!

Looking forward to illustrate birds or butterflies this month (I still haven't made a decision), either way it will be a real challenge.

Spring in a jar

March's project has been all about bulbs and spring flowers. I love looking into gardens and parks, and roadside edges to spot little green leaves sprouting through the ground and colourful flowers peeping through. This time of the year is full of surprises if you know where to look and what to look for. 

I have been indecisive for a few days on how I would create a spring garden, and then it finally hit me. I have fallen in love with Jeninne Zlatkis's terrarium, and tried to recreate something similar.

Of course the results are not as pleasing as her illustration (nowhere near!), and I'm still thinking this painting is missing something, but so far I have not been able to figure it out. Maybe is the colour scheme or that red-ish frame (which I'm thinking of taking out). What do you think? Suggestions are very much welcome!

Taxus Baccata

On a bright sunny day, a little branch from a massive yew caught my attention. I brought it home, I looked at it closely, then made a little watercolour out of it. So simple, and so complex at the same time. And next you know it, I got to use my calligraphy set for the first time.

The Vintage Garden

This has been my labour of love for the entire month of February, and I love how it turned out! I like the symmetry of the topiary, the details of the garden furniture and even the colour scheme, with which I struggled a bit at the beginning. I'm getting more and more accustomed to this style of painting, and I think I might have found my perfect match. Hope you like it to!

The original painting will be available for purchase in my Etsy shop, but I'm planning to add postards and prints as well.

Twinkle, twinkle

 

 

 

This is a painting I just finished for my nephew, who is obsessed with the owl from twinkle, twinkle little star.
Hope he likes it, and her mum too.

Sketchbook #1

This is what my brand new sketchbook looked like at the end of January! Hoping to fill it in a bit more with a different theme by the end of February.

Lately

Trees illustration - watercolour

Valentine's card - red ink pen on Bristol board

Topiary textures exercise - watercolour

Flower dooddle - black ink pen on Bristol board

Daffodils - black ink pen and watersoluble pencils

I have been neglecting this space a lot lately, and was wondering if I should really try and keep it alive. 

And my answer is YES. 

I have the intention of CREATING a lot this year, together with enrolling in at least one art class. And this where I want to share my work, whether it is a work in progress, a finished painting, an evening doodle or a simple exercise. 

Autumn harvest

 

 A new seasonal illustration available on my etsy shop (here).

Leaves pattern

I've started putting together two of my favourite subjects: nature and pattern. Let's see where this will go.

October

Happy October! Feeling a lot inspired this month and treating myself to some painting time.

A new illustration

I have been obsessed with hot pressed paper lately. And with some illustrations sketches I've been working on. I'm still experimenting with large washes, but love the added texture, particularly to the clouds.

The illustration is available on my Etsy shop.

The House Garden

Just finished this House Garden illustration inspired by one of my mum's kitchen towel from her dowry. I decided to use Arches hot pressed paper, and although is not my favourite brand, I think it was perfect for this subject. And I'm already planning to make some more on a similar style.

The original painting will be up on sale on my Esty shop sometime this weekend. 

Happy weekend to all!

Moleskine Reloaded

I can honestly say that I’m pretty obsessed with sketchbooks. As it stands I have about 8 of them going at the same time, and as I said before this year (or was last year?!?), my resolution is to complete all of them before buying a new one. But that has proved to be very hard, both the not-buying part and the completing-them-all part. So to satisfy my craving, without compromising my intentions, I decided to make a new sketchbook using an old moleskine diary.

I have made sketchbooks before, and I love how they look once they are finished. And I noticed I have different feelings when using a homemade item, than when I use something I bought brand new.

I don’t feel the pressure of having to make things look perfect, to follow a certain style, to make no mistakes. If I have made the item once, I can sure make it again and that somehow gives me the freedom to experiment a bit more and put the pressure off. And I believe this is the reason why my homemade sketchbooks look nicer and more cohesive than the once I normally buy.

Another good reason for making my own sketchbook is that I can choose the style, the format and the paper that goes in it. To be fair, I have loved the moleskine watercolour books since they came out, and that is what I use the most. However, the sizes available are not my ideal choice.

I love the pocket size of the moleskine, as it goes well with my pocket size watercolour kit, which is just perfect for outdoor and travel sketching. But the landscape format sometimes has proven not to be ideal. I feel like it is too narrow for some subjects, and to make up for it I normally carry some spare watercolour sheets in a different size.

To cut this short, I used an old moleskine daily planner and re-filled it with watercolour paper (I used Fabriano Accademia, natural grain, 240g/m² // 113lbs), giving me a 48-pages pocket size sketchbook in a portrait format. I have followed the very detailed instructions found on the Trumpetvine Travels website. They are absolutely well written and so easy to follow.

The sketchbook came out pretty well; it is not perfect, I didn’t trim the edges of the pages, so they don’t align perfectly and, although I rounded the edges to match the moleskine cover, somehow I managed to trim some of the side edges of each sheet as well (I’m still mastering the art of corners rounding!).

But I absolutely love the overall look. I promised myself not to start using it until I finish at least my two moleskine sketchbooks, which fortunately have only few pages to go.

Shop news :: As I tend to get carried away with repurposing old moleskine diaries, the above pocket size moleskine reloaded is now available to buy on my Etsy shop (click here).