Windsongs & Wordhoards

A Giveaway Winner....... birthday cake and pirates!

2012-02-13T14:07:00.000-08:00

Thankyou to all who entered my 100th post Giveaway... I loved all your answers to the question of flight - it has such a draw I think on the human psyche in general, thinking back to Icarus, Bladud, even Leonardo De'Vinci with his famous machines... then of course Freya with her cloak of feathers and so many more inter-twined paths of mythology.
I once had a very vivid dream, several years ago now, that I had shapeshifted into a Buzzard and felt such unbounded joy in the freedom of that flight, glorying in the wide open sky and the wind flowing over my feathered head and beneath the strength in my wings, lifting me beyond all troubles.
There is something in the cry of a Buzzard on the wind that always pulls at my soul, a kind of painful longing and yet wilderness savage joy...

There were only the five of you in the end which was a shame, though your words filled my mind with vivid images and that same feeling of the winds rushing past me and through me. I really enjoyed hearing your thoughts on this... (Do go and read them if you like over here!)
So, I rolled a dice....
.....and the winner is...... Kate of Kit and Kaboodle!

Here is her answer: 'I think I'd like to be a firefly. Light as air on a summer breeze, illuminating a magical forest landscape inhabited by fairies, goblins and trolls. '

Nice one Kate, just leave me a comment with your address (I won't publish) and your preference of either 'Thought' or 'Memory' and it shall be winging its way to you! Hurrah!

It has been a busy kind of a weekend as it happens... of course it was Elswyth's 5th Birthday today, though she had her party yesterday which was fantastic! An arty party with sticking and painting and clay modelling, the kids were all so good and really seemed to enjoy it.
So in fact she ended up having a kind of two-day birthday, with a cake on Sunday's party....

And another cake at Grandma and Gramp's today!

Lucky girl! And she is very pleased indeed with the new Ukelele we got her...

Elswyth and Grandma

Hopefully she'll take after her Dad who was gigging on the Saturday... she adores the lead singer Wendy and can't wait to have some Uke lessons with her!
Just for fun, heres a couple of videos we managed to get... its quite a new band, this was their 3rd gig, and they've started writing more and more of their own numbers now too... Elswyth's Dad is the one dressed as a pirate... oh hang on there... um... the pirate with the gold strat guitar then!
This ones a cover:(My feeble camera mic distorts the vocals somewhat... sorry about that)

And this one was done by the professional photographer - a lot sharper, less distorted.

Ahaarrr! Hope you enjoyed them...

Dragon Boys! ..........and three days to go for a Raven Giveaway!

2012-02-09T14:12:00.000-08:00

Thought I'd just show you the children's portrait commission I finished last week...
These are two brothers, in fact the brothers of 'Lucy Rose' that I did a portrait of back in the Autumn. Apparently when they saw their sisters they liked it so much they requested one of themselves... its really nice for me as an aspiring children's book illustrator to have that come from the children!

The Dragon Boys! Lewis and Cadan.

I was actually quite happy with this one, it was good fun, though the decision to paint them in armour came quite late on in the drawing stage... they definately didn't look right riding a Dragon in T-shirts! I hope they like it! I am currently waiting to hear from them after the weekend...

And finally don't forget....

There's still a few days left to enter my 100th post blog Giveaway to win your choice of a mounted giclee print of one of these fellows... Just leave me a comment on the original post here, and I'll be putting names in a hat on Sunday! (Would be nice to have a nice full hat!! Perhaps with feathers on!)

Flights of Ravens... and a 100th post blog Giveaway!

2012-02-02T12:37:00.000-08:00

Hi folks! I've finally got around to posting some more of my Raven series to show you! Time has been even shorter than ever so I'm amazed I managed to paint at all as the weeks whizz past far, far too fast!
Between the usual juggling act of running the business full time and being Mum, with Elswyth's 5th birthday skipping briskly along (an arty party to organise as we speak!) dummy book work and portrait commissions (one down to show you soon...) we are also preparing to move house after being well and truly settled for almost eight years. Its proving to be a bit of a wrench for me but anyway, more on that another day!
So, on to the Ravens...
These first two smaller ones I will be putting into a local Art Show in March which will be interesting - I've never exhibited work before, and I happen to know there's some really seriously good professionals entering work too... gulp! They'll be joined by two of the larger paintings in the series but I haven't decided which ones yet...

'Thought'

'Memory'

Here's some closer details of the two...

I am having my trusty fine art repro chap make me some Giclee prints of these two on lovely Somerset Velvet paper and will eventually choose two of the larger ones to do as Signed Limited Editions as well (when I finally paint some I like enough!)

So I have decided to celebrate reaching my 100th post by having a Giveaway to win your choice of a mounted print of either 'Thought' or 'Memory'.
All you need to do is to be a follower of my blog, and leave a comment on this post answering the question:

If you could take any winged form and travel anywhere in this world or another, where would the winds take you and to what purpose?

Answers can be as long or as short as you like. Just a bit of fun really! Though I put it to my daughter at bedtime because she couldn't sleep and all sorts of fantastical flights leapt to mind! I will run this until Sunday the 12th which is the day of Elswyth's birthday party, to give everyone plenty of time to dream of wingbeats on the tides of winds....!

So, if you haven't had enough of Ravens yet, I'll show you a couple more....
These next two are studies for the larger one coming up...

And here is the next large one, though its a bit blurry and hard to photograph... I guess this will be called 'Huginn & Muninn III' to follow the series so far...

Huginn & Muninn in case you haven't caught the previous posts, are the two birds of the Norse God Odin, who fly all across Middle Earth and Asgard bringing him news of all the going's on of Men, Beasts, Gods and Giants. He gave them the power of speech and they were seen to be birds of portent, wingbeats tracing feather trails of Omens across the storm-wracked skies...

Here's some details of 'III' complete with some rather self-indulgent shots of the wet-on-wet washes as they were drying. I wish they could stay like that sometimes with all the lovely rich liquid depths of colour, paint for paint's sake!

I hope you've enjoyed this rather long Raven post! I've nearly got it out of my system now, just one to be finished on the drawing board and the one still in my head which is still stubbornly refusing to manifest on the paper!
Can't wait to hear some of your ideas for the Giveaway... Bye for now!

Beautiful voices...

2012-01-18T15:20:00.001-08:00

Hi folks! Just touching base, I'm still here and have some things I am itching to post very soon - I've been painting more Raven washes and have been really enjoying them! (Even though I should be getting on with commissions with looming deadlines instead!)
Also I have just realised that my last post was in fact my 100th! So a celebratory Giveaway will be coming up very soon on a Raveny theme! Watch this space!

For now I thought I'd share with you a couple of great lady singers I have strayed upon which are both just fantastic...

That lady can sure sing the blues! I love it!

And this is the other lady called Annie Humphrey, that I found whilst exploring a wonderful Native American blog I have just discovered here called - Anishinaabekwe
This is just stunning, both to watch and listen to...

Hope you enjoyed them... back soon with flights of Ravens!

Huginn & Muninn II ...

2012-01-05T12:32:00.000-08:00

Hello folks, hope your New Year has started well, and thankyou all so much for visiting me here during 2011 and for all your kind words, encouragement and friendship along the way!
Lets hope 2012 will be a healthy and a happy one for everybody!

So here is the first painting of 2012 and the second in the series of Raven paintings I've been planning to do! For want of a better title it is for the moment called 'Huginn & Muninn II'
It is funny how its worked out - when I was working on the first Ravens painting there was a wild winter storm blowing and howling around the house, and again for this second painting the winds were furiously rattling the sash windows and stirring up the skies.
To add to the wild lament of the Stormsong outside, next doors dogs were howling mournful accompaniment, as if the wind's ghostly song were calling to some deep ancestral wild-wolfish memory! Very atmospheric!

(Closeup detail)

I painted this larger than the first which gave me more room for expression in the penwork on the Ravens which I like, but as yet I am undecided whether the sky is working or whether there's too much going on in this one. I want it to be dramatic and full of movement, but not too fussy either... one to sleep on maybe...
Although there are parts of the wet-on-wet and salt that I really like just for their own sake...

I did enjoy these two fellows though, and think they're better drawn than the first pair. There is something rather magnificent about a Raven... I wonder which should be Huginn - or Thought, and which one Muninn - Memory?

Here are the two so far together, I think I prefer the sky in the first and the Ravens in the second! Oh well, tonight I think I might stretch some more paper ready for a third, slightly different this time... (Sorry about the slightly murky photo in the second one!) Hope you like them! Bye for now...

Happy New Year! And a silly party song too...

2011-12-31T14:05:00.000-08:00

This is for all of you out there like me who aren't going out to parties tonight! A bit of New Year fun!
My two love 'Horrible Histories' and so do we... they're a silly bunch but its a great way for kids to learn a bit of history, and very funny!
I couldn't resist this one too...

Happy New Year everyone! Take care wherever you are, see you in 2012...

The Old or the New...?

2011-12-29T15:00:00.000-08:00

Hi all! Hope you have all been having a happy and healthy Yuletide!
Just a quick spur of the moment post here to run this by you.... I'm toying with the idea of updating my blog header, so I am trying this one out of the Ravens I painted recently... What do you think?
It changes the feel of things quite a lot and the blog's identity I think, so the question is to those of you who know me and my blog quite well by now... does the old header portray me and my work better? Should I leave well alone or is it time for a change?
I'd love to know what you think!
Here's the old one...

See you soon...

Holly-King Oak-King, a Solstice Hearth and two little elves...!

2011-12-22T14:17:00.000-08:00

A slightly belated Happy Solstice to you all, and I hope the turning of the year brings you good health and happiness!
Our Green Man watching over our hearth is wearing a holly crown in his Holly King guise... perhaps I should hang some pressed oak leaves or acorns there now as traditionally we pass back into the light half of the year and the reign of the Oak King.
I really like this myth in its various forms and have often thought I'd like to re-tell it as a picture book for children... definately a future project I think!

I strayed upon this image below a couple of years ago by an artist called Raven Willowhawk which I really, really like. I haven't been able to track her down to link back to her, but I hope she doesn't mind me sharing it in the spirit of appreciation of such an evocative image and her considerable talent. I just think its a really nice depiction of this myth and it struck a note with me.

By Raven Willowhawk

This also makes me think of the tale of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, which I must find a good translation of to read again. The copy I have is all in Olde English and very hard to decipher! But I love the story and the language full of rich description and symbolisms...

So, I'll leave you now with a couple of very funny videos we did with our little elfin ones which really help to get into the festive spirit!
Hope it puts a smile on your face - it did for us! Take it away Elora and Elswyth...! Hope you enjoy them!

http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/AwzsnqeCYJ2jGweYGI5e

http://elfyourself.jibjab.com/view/veW3FXdtWhxGqXIpLjoD

Huginn and Muninn... on the wings of the storm

2011-12-12T14:04:00.000-08:00

please respect my copyright of these images

This wild sky with its wind hurled messengers seems a very appropriate painting to show you tonight as I sit writing next to the window that is rattling with the night's savage temper of storm.
The wind and rain outside are ferocious, seething around the house, flinging icy spats of rain against the glass... that hollow boom, powerful, elemental, ominous...
I'm glad to be inside, wrapped in layers against the drafts!

This is a painting I have made for my sister in law on her fortieth birthday which was today! We framed it for her in the workshop in dramatic black and gave it to her as the storm began to gather its furies in the twilight...
It is of 'Huginn' and 'Muninn' - 'Thought' and 'Memory', the two Ravens that accompany Odin and bring him knowledge of the world. They are birds of portent, and it is said that Odin gave them the power of speech, and their presence in turn gives him another of his many names - 'Raven God'.

Here are some more closeup details...

I love the unpredictability of using watercolour washes like this, I have an idea of what I want - the colours, the dynamics... but the joy of it for me is watching the paint move to its own purpose, not quite knowing where it will rest, the beautiful living quality of the paint... I love it...

I used my Artists Rotring ink pen over the wash rather than under it to get a deep crisp black...

I intend to do a series of these on a larger scale, a project that's been burning in my mind for a long time now... but as ever just waiting for that precious elusive spare time! I can hear the Raven croaks, the wingbeats invisible in the back of my mind, the ravelling winds rushing... they are crying to be painted!
I am pleased with the result of this first attempt, and its the first painting I've managed to produce for what seems like ages. Our business devours all our time, especially at this time of year, so it is a small victory for me to get it out there! Hooray!

Ooh, the wind is really howling now, lamenting like a wild bereft thing out in the wide dark, crying for the lost and forlorn with a throat of night and emptiness.
I'm off to make some cocoa with extra chocolate and full cream milk! Hope you liked the painting :)

Ahaaaarrrr me Hearties....

2011-12-04T12:21:00.000-08:00

What fun we had last night at the debut gig of my husband's latest new band 'Mutineers'!
With a name like that of course there was a strong pirate theme going on with most of the audience dressed as pirates too, and lots of Aaaars!
The name comes from the fact that the drummer's great, great Grandfather was hanged for piracy during the American War of Independance for smuggling sheep, if I have all my facts right!

I thought I'd do the proud wifey bit and show you some (very bad blurry) photos.... My husband Tony is the lead guitarist (the one dressed as a pirate... oh hang on!)

Pirate Dad and his two piratey rascals!

The acoustic set - Tony, Ju and Wendy

The second set was good loud rock with everyone up dancing till the end...

Little Pirate Elswyth

This ones very blurry but gives a closer impression of the energy of the show... Tony in all his bands does a lot of larking around and daft dancing, which is great fun to watch!

Till the next time... Ahaaarrrrrr!

A blog award...! And the fantastic adventures of Mr Fox....

2011-12-01T15:07:00.000-08:00

Mr Fox by my daughter Elora Age 7

First of all I'd like to thank Lynn of Beneath the Bracken , who does wonderful evocative paintings and mixed media art, for sending me a blog award! I've not had one of these before, but it was lovely to be thought of, so after a quick study up of the rules I will certainly have a go at joining in!

So what I gather is that this award is to be passed on to five blogs you enjoy, each with fewer than 200 followers. Upon receiving one the idea is to:

1. Thank the giver and link back to the blogger who gave it to you .
2. Reveal your top 5 picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog.
3. Copy and paste the award on your blog.
4. Hope that the people you’ve sent the award to forward it to their five favourite bloggers.

Hmmm, so who to pick, there are so many great creative blogs out there and many more yet to be discovered. I've chosen some writerly ones and some arty ones that I really enjoy, so please do check them out!

The Twirling Dragon - The wonderful art of Kim Kincaid who is always so generous in sharing her learning curves, new directions and works in progress... I admire and learn!

WOL's River of Stones - This is my favourite of WOL's three lovely blogs (her others are to be found here at The Owl Underground and WOL's Poetry Place ) Some lovely Wordcraft going on here which I really enjoy, thanks WOL!

The Studio Window - I love wood cuts and engravings and Cornish Printmaker Sue has a lovely blog here where she shares the fascinating journey, stage by stage from sketch through to the final proofs... always makes me itch to have a go myself!

Seven Miles of Steel Thistles - There is such a wealth of fascinating literary knowledge, of mythology, story and language here on Katherine Langrish's brilliant blog... I could get lost here for hours! A treasure trove for any writer, or reader for that matter!

The Golden Fish - This is a really inspiring blog I discovered a little while back combining beautiful images and words. I've been really enjoying these poems and stunning photography!

And so, now for a bit of prouid Mumness! To continue from the lovely Mr Fox picture done by my daughter Elora above, here's the rest of the series of drawings she was doing that I was rather taken by! She has a big thing for foxes and I thought these were so full of fun and action, great characters...!

Hope you enjoyed them as much as I did!

Caislean Oir..... A Contest of Beauties...

2011-11-18T14:28:00.000-08:00

I've been giving some thought to Jackie Morris' recent post of 'A Contest of Beauties' - please do go and have a look at what its all about and see some of the links to beautiful things that are growing there...
I may post some more considered thoughts later if I can untangle what it is I would try to express about this, but lately having been focussed on the dark, turbulant and difficult, to be reminded and to take notice anew of all these things of beauty, and to think on what it is we perceive as beautiful has been good for me...
For now, because beauty to me in all its forms must provoke an emotional response or connection, a moving of the soul, a welling up of feeling, a filling up of the heart, I will share this song by Clannad which always stops me in my tracks... music is a great conduit to the soul...

(There is also a rough translation of the Gaelic in the comments just under the youtube clip which is lovely to understand as you listen to that beautiful language)

A spark in the dark.... or unlocking writers block!

2011-11-14T14:14:00.000-08:00

I'm not quite sure what you will make of this post... There is a story waiting, but for a long time with writing I have felt disconnected, seized up, dashing as I do between running a business full time whilst still trying to be a good mum, so my creative headspace is all cramped and smothered by everyday demands.
I need to try and think.., no, live like a writer again with open senses, noticing, feeling and listening even if there's no time to actually write. Even that thought helped to unlock a few words earlier on...

Where have my Words gone
Winging away over
Wastelands of worry

How shall I find them
with a numb gaze
My very soul muffled
caged within my bones
that will not wake

Hmmmm, well its better than nothing at all! The story is all there, I have the feeling of it, the imagery. I can almost hear the rhythm and timbre of the characters' voices just beyond hearing, I can see the shape and colour of the illustrations, but just yet as through a running stream in ripples and eddies ravelling and unravelling.
But I can't force the words to shape themselves, I have to wait, let them rise to the surface clear and fresh when shade, sound and colour all come into focus.

In the meantime I can work on regaining my writing mind, finding a flow of language again. So I took up a notebook and thought ok, I will just write words down until something, anything comes out! It turned out to be quite an interesting excersise so I thought I'd show you what happened...
I wrote very quickly (as you can see by my scrawl) just as random words popped into my head without time to think too much, probebly no more than 20 seconds a page... just to see what happened...
These pages are not to any ends, just to excersise my mind and try to break the deadlock! I'd be very interested to hear if any other writerly types of you out there have any excercises or prompts that you get going with?? It can be a bit of an uphill struggle sometimes!

So, after all those words how about some pictures! I'll leave you with a few photos of our Bonfire Night the other week which was great fun.... I just love being around fires out of doors with the incense of woodsmoke and the breath of night air... A spark in the Autumn dark...

Pumpkins and Pirates...!

2011-11-01T14:52:00.000-07:00

Halloween can be an exciting time for little folk, I thought I might show you some of the fun my two had over the weekend...

We spent the day carving Jack O Lanterns, decorating spooky cakes, with pumpkin soup for lunch and dressing up ready for a little party later on at our good friend's old cottage...
(You can see our lovely hand pulled woodcut of 'Rebel of Ravens' by Julia Manning on the wall behind that we only recently bought from her wonderful studio nearby... it fits the scene quite well doesn't it! I love her work!)

They can Raaah really, really loud too!! That one shook the windows!

Arrival at the spooky cottage by the river that flows darkly in eerie echoes under the old stone bridge... there were little pumpkin lanterns all up the path...

Lots of spooky food... my clever friend made these brilliant orange jellies...

After lots of fun and a scary walk in the dark down the lane and over the footbridge where the water trolls creep, we made our way home to find our own lanterns guarding our back steps...

(My older daughter Elora told me that at school they had said that they do not celebrate Halloween because they only celebrate 'good' things.... Hmmmm, I could say a rather lot about that concerning certain types of schools' blinkered approach to teaching theology and shallow views of other traditions... I better not get started!!)

On a slightly different subject, just for fun here are a couple of quick projects I've just finished... a poster for my husbands new band's first gig...

My beloved Tony is the guitarist on the left... he really does have a beard exactly like that, just right for a band called the 'Mutineers' really! They ended up with a pirate theme because the drummer's great, great, great (I think) Grandfather was actually hanged for piracy - for smuggling... wait for it... sheep, yes sheep, across the Atlantic! The dog is called Scooby Doo and is the drummers pride and joy, he's a really beautiful dog!

And finally I'll leave you with a little (badly photographed) painting for an old friend of mine... he writes short stories and every so often he will ask me for an illustration, usually with quite a lot of specific and bizarre things in them! I am more than happy for him to have these as gifts but he insists on paying me in whisky and chocolate... don't knock a good thing!

Meet Stompin Dave....

2011-10-29T11:19:00.000-07:00

Last night we went to see this very clever chap, 'Stompin Dave Allen' at a tiny pub in Pilton. He was fantastic fun to watch and we were quite flabbergasted at how he could sing, play fiddle, guitar or banjo and flatfoot all at the same time! I was very impressed!
He even did a stint of banjo playing behind the head whilst flatfooting, and throwing and catching his fiddle and bow mid reel without missing a step... excellent stuff!!

More Life Drawing at Bath Artists Studios...

2011-10-16T04:38:00.000-07:00

5 minute pose

Firstly, thankyou to all who left such encouraging comments on my Dragon spread, its really great to get feedback and I really appreciate your words and thoughts! I haven't put the silver leaf on that one yet but I have started the 2nd spread... I'm only doing three, just enough to give an impression of what the finished book would be like because I know editors are likely to want things changed!

So anyway, yesterday I went to another six hour life drawing workshop, this time at Bath Artist Studios which I hadn't been to before. It was great, a big life room but with a friendly, relaxed kind of atmosphere, lots of private artists studios as well and a big common room with comfy sofas and a kettle!
I haven't done any proper drawing since Salisbury back in August so I was quite rusty as usual and it took a while to get back up to speed!
We started with some 5 minute warm ups (though I prefer to start with even quicker gestures of one or two minutes usually) here's some of them...

This is my usual approach of line, gesture and frantic measuring, which means I don't get a great deal down in the 5 minutes especially before I've found my stride!
The tutor suggested an approach I hadn't tried before which was to use a broad flat edge of charcoal to 'block in' the mass or shape of the whole form very quickly and loosely and then work in with line afterwards...
Heres a couple of 2 minute examples, quite interesting...

So I thought I'd try starting with this approach on a longer pose and see how it went... it certainly got me a lot further on a lot quicker and simplified the measuring to some extent. And it did leave me more time for rendering and enjoying the shadows... this pose below was 40 minutes...

The last part if the afternoon was one long pose, so I started with some very quick rough prelims to find all the lines through the form...

Then worked in charcoal trying to remember all of the various techniques I have learned over the last few years, but still had a great deal of trouble with the bent knee!

This one (above) was about an hour and a half, (I think her head and right arm are a little out of proportion though!) Finally I decided to have a bit of a play with dip pen and ink, with some white gouche highlights for the last 10 minutes - its great fun, but I find you have to be bold, and just go for it! All in all a very enjoyable day!

WIP - A Flight of Dragons... to leaf or not to leaf?

2011-10-12T02:07:00.000-07:00

All images copyright of Carrie Osborne 2011

Finally the Dragon spread - first of the three full colour spreads I need to go with my dummy book roughs, is finished (nearly!)
This has been a long project with trying to steal time here and there to work on it when I can. Its a double page spread so the 'gutter' or fold of the book runs down the middle of the illustration, and the text will go in the paler areas on the right hand side of the page.

I had intended to embellish quite a few of the spreads with small amounts of silver leaf through the book, a flash of moonlight on silver scales here, fish glittering in water there....
So the painting phase of this one I think I'm done with, which leaves the question - to leaf or not to leaf???
It would have to be subtle in case a potential publisher didn't want to go down the foil route, (because I do want to try and get this published if I'm very, very lucky and if I get over my fear of travelling to London!) but of course scanners and printers don't reproduce reflective qualities all that well.
I think I'm going to get it scanned before doing any silver leaf just in case...
Some details for you:

Also I thought you might like to see some work in progress shots...

After stretching paper and drawing out, I always start with the most chancy and most terrifying bit - the big wet-on wet wash... this can either make or destroy a painting before its begun! But thats exactly what I love about painting this way with watercolours, there's an unpredictable element where the paint moves to its own purpose, merges, spreads, and it can be really beautiful and unexpected.

Of course I know which colours I want where and which I want to merge so there is a fair amount of deliberation before placing each heavy stroke of colour, then just keeping my nerve enough not to interfere with it too much as it starts to move!
To add another level of unpredictability I've really got into using salt, both fine grain and rock salt on my washes, and I love the effect you get, though its quite easy to get carried away and do too much!

Here's a few drawing board shots as it progresses...

After each night's painting I usually scribble notes to myself around the edges to remind me what needs doing next while its fresh in my mind, sometimes its several days before I can get back to it. I'm still undecided about that moon....!

I hope you don't mind the self-indulgence of this rather long post... getting the first spread done is a real milestone on this project and means I'm very nearly at the end of it, (which I never thought I would be at times!)
The next stage will be the most daunting - trying to get appointments to show it to publishers, laying it bare and bracing for the inevitable critisms and rejections which I am more than prepared for... but you never know until you try do you!

WIP - Lucy Rose... the paints come out at last!

2011-10-03T16:13:00.000-07:00

Lucy Rose WIP

I managed to snatch a few hours here and there at my drawing board this week, not on my dragon spread which is still patiently waiting for some paint to give the creature life and substance and moon-frosted dragon breath... but on a little commission that's been tucked away in the back of my mind as the deadline creeps up on me!
She's nearly finished, just a few more tweaks, a couple more hours maybe but that needs to wait for another night when my eyes have rested enough to see what needs to be done next!
Here are a few work in progress shots along the way...

The little girl's Granny has commissioned this for her birthday, I do hope she'll like it... its always a little differant painting a child I haven't met compared to painting a child I know well... we'll soon see if I got her right! I hope she likes Unicorns!

Clannad - Strange Land, from Robin of Sherwood...

2011-09-22T14:17:00.000-07:00

Well I'm still trying to get onto my drawing board, but the time machine has broken down for the minute!
Meanwhile I found this fanvid composition on youtube for Robin of Sherwood, does anyone remember the series, you know with Michael Praed playing Robin? We must have watched it dozens of times back in our late teens/early twenties in the days before I needed a time machine!
I've always loved Clannad (I used to rock my eldest daughter to sleep with their songs when she was a baby) and their music threaded through the legend of Robin Hood so perfectly. Its high time we revisited the old series from the beginning I think!

The Moon has come to call, a knocking at our door...

2011-09-12T15:13:00.000-07:00

We got home after dusk tonight and there is already a real feeling of nights drawing in, the first leaves turning, a restless questing wind chasing the last light.
Driving home a glimmering of Moonrise crept up over the hedgerows and the children laughed to see it following the car as if we were towing a big glowing balloon! But when I opened our (very overgrown) front door to check the post, I found the Moon had followed us home and come to call, waiting like an invited guest directly in the frame of the porch...

I still haven't got round to reading the instruction manual for my hybrid camera, but I thought I'd try with a very wobbly tripod and some random chance to catch the Moon...

I've often watched the Moon rising behind these trees, always fascinated by the speed as it passes behind them and on up into unfettered sky, moving even as you watch.
Though the Moon and I have not always been on best of terms, its always a spellbinding thing when it rides behind the clouds or dimishes to a pale wistful thread. I remember once seeing it rise with an aurora of Earthshine, very strange.

This is as far as my camera will zoom in with its current lens, maybe not the clearest of images, but in the same shot below I edited down the brightness to see the wonderful pock marks and craters more clearly... I'm quite fascinated with that bright pinprick of light on the shadowy left edge...

I'll leave you with a rather ropey poem of mine written last year looking at these same trees from my window...

Evening wakens a gilded-mist moonrise.
Not the bright hard light of yestereve
when the Moon rose in bone-light, cold as a river stone
to glitter blackly on still Holly leaves...

No, the Moon is less strident tonight,
drifting beyond the trees grasp,
dancing in a golden mist,
vaporous drifts
like a flowing scarf gossamer fine,
stepping now in front,
now behind,
full laden and bright,
the Sky's shawl of softness gentling her gaze.

WIP - a long project nearing its end at last... well, nearly!

2011-09-09T14:23:00.000-07:00

Images copyright of Carrie Osborne 2011

Well, I drew this painting out on my drawing board almost two weeks ago and have been struggling ever since to find the time and energy to start the first washes!
This was my first attempt at writing picture books for children - quite different to writing 'grown up' creative prose... and I've learned a lot from the process, from the raw thumbnails alongside my scribbled writings through finally to the fully illustrated pencil drawn dummy book.
I have been working on this 'dummy book' sporadically for what seems like frustratingly far too long, trying to snatch a few hours here and there to get it finished - all it needs now is three colour double page spreads to hopefully show its potential (should it be deemed to have any!)
It feels so close and yet so far - after running home from work for the school run, cooking kids tea and then rejoining poor hubby at work to hit tomorrows deadlines, we got home at 9pm for a late dinner... its hard to find the oomph when I only have evenings to paint!
Oh the joys of running your own business!

But no, I mustn't moan, especially at you folks who all keep me inspired out here!
It WILL be finished... and in the meantime I have another story buzzing about in my minds eye that I can't wait to start working on, and I think with all I have learned from the first it will be a better one too!There are also a couple of other half written attempts in notebooks that I may return to in time.... oh time, time, too fleet footed by far!

But anyway... sorry for the whinge, I want to keep my posts positive, so here's a link to some beautiful, beautiful pictures that I strayed upon on the web that will definately make you go ahhh... almost enough to make one broody! Take a look here at...
Add to Heart photography
Cute eh?

Hopefully see you soon with a completed painting!!!

Life drawing at the Barn Studio...

2011-08-31T12:45:00.000-07:00

Hello folks! It's been a while since I last posted, and actually a while since any actual artwork happened either! Time and energy have not been with me, and of course any time gathered and hoarded I spend catching up with my children...
Theres been a couple of trips to the seaside, a Robin Hood day at Brokers Wood, playground trips, bike rides and two new pet baby Guinea Pigs to get to know!

Robin Hood and Maid Marian

Meet Sparkles...

and Fluffy...!

But with the school holidays nearly over I've been itching to pick up some brushes again. I still haven't had chance to try out the new Russian watercolours I got at Art in Action back in July, and to my frustration haven't so much as picked up a pencil since...
So what better way to get going again than by a six hour all day life drawing workshop! This was at a new studio in Salisbury run by two great tutors with quite different approaches - the morning was tutored by animator Matthew Dean, and the afternoon by fine artist and illustrator Sean Slater who taught me a huge amount about life drawing a couple of years back and really put me on the right track.
I was painfully rusty and out of sorts, especially after driving an hour to get there, but it was a brillant workshop and a lot of information went in even if not much of anything decent came out of the pencil!

These were the best of them over the six hours starting with some very quick warm ups ranging from 10 seconds to about 3 minutes...

10 seconds for this one!

2 minutes

30 seconds

1 minute

1 minute

10 seconds and 1 minute I think

30 seconds

These next two I really enjoyed and were something I'd never done before - the model crossed the room holding a sequence of one minute poses as she went, so the overlapping sketches show the continuum of the movement. Not surprisingly this was part of animater Matt's section which was all about capturing movement, and I loved it...

Sorry about my scrunckled up paper, hope you can still see what's going on!

This scruffy one below I really struggled with because it was so hard to see what was happening beneath her long hair, but both tutors seemed to like it for some reason that's beyond me, so I'll leave it in!

And finally two slightly longer poses about 30 minutes each to end the day on with mixed results...

I'll be back soon with some WIP's for you if all goes well - a time stasis machine would help though!

The Snows They Melt The Soonest...

2011-07-29T15:20:00.000-07:00

I love this song, it's one of many I grew up with and Dick Gaughan's dark celtic timbre is engrained fondly into my childhood's listening. I'm posting it just because it' s been in my head today and its a beautiful song, so I thought I'd share it...

Time and tide seem to be rushing by so fast lately, so sorry I've not been around much lately folks... I'll post some artwork soon and I have a painting bursting to get started the moment time and energy allow!
I went to Art in Action last weekend which topped me up with inspiration and a great motivation to get painting, not least because of the wonderful Russian watercolours and beautiful new sable brushes I came home with! More on that later with photos to come!

In the meantime here's a few photos of the wonderful Watersmeet pathway at Lynmouth near Exmoor we visited a few weeks back, that I've been inspired to show after seeing Valerianna's wonderful wild woods and waterfalls over at RavenWood Forest
Its very much Tolkien territory don't you think?

Is this tree yawning or singing? Either way its the wrong side of midnight, so I better be off to bed! Goodnight folks, back soon!

The wilderness gaze that snared my heart...

2011-06-26T16:00:00.000-07:00

On Saturday I had the most unforgettable experience, one I will cherish for the rest of my life... it was only a few moments, but the spans of heartbeats burned deep into my heart as I locked gazes with Him...

His name is Arthur and he is a Gos Hawk and it was such a priveledge to look him in the eye and feel his weight on my arm. This is something I have wanted to experience for years and I had no idea I would be given this rare chance on Saturday. It was our local town's first Medieval Fayre and of course I went to see the falconer with his beautiful wilderness creatures of the air and his incredible knowledge. I was so excited that he picked me!

I was surprised at how nervous I felt as the falconer strode to the other end of the field and then let him loose. He glided in at head height before skimming low almost touching the grass to then arc back up with curved wings to my glove. He was lighter than I expected and when he turned to study me eye to eye, this wilderness, powerful creature of presence and spirit, I was humbled and awed all at once. It meant the world.

Those of you who read regularly have probebly picked up on my deep love of birds of prey... he had some beautiful birds, the prettiest being this lovely little Lanner falcon...
And of course the most imposing, this regal fellow...

There were also some fantastic medieval musicians at the Fayre playing authentic and extraordinary instruments... you can here some of their music on their website here...

I was fascinated by the workings and sound of this incredible instrument...

We also dressed our shop window for the day to join in with the spirit of the town's first Fayre since the 1950's or 60's, this is how it looked, though it was rather difficult to get decent pictures with all the relflections ...
I have found out that the Falconer whose bird I held for an amazing few minutes also offers hawk handling and flying days, the prospect of which fills me with longing... I will seriously have to start saving up!

Boys and Bees - finished (I think...)

2011-06-24T16:30:00.000-07:00

Well, I think its about finished... or at least I've come to recognise the point at which carrying on will only make it worse not better! I have a few niggly bits but if I don't point them out hopefully no-one will notice... but on the whole I am pleased with the likeness of the two boys and I hope their Mum will like it!
Here's a few details, sorry about the rather murky photos!

Well, its far too late at night and a stormy wind has galloped up around the house to rush darkly through the rain ragged trees outside. It is way past my bedtime as usual and I'm the only one left awake, so I'll leave you now and say Goodnight!

WIP - Boys and Bees, a portrait for a friend...

2011-06-13T14:41:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd show you a bit of 'Work in Progress' that I have been doing today. I think the drawings mostly all in and ready for painting now... This is the portrait I'm doing for my good friend of her boys - I'm pretty certain she doesn't know my blog so the secret should be safe!
It has departed a bit from my original idea that I showed in a post here... I think I'll still do the Dragon roundal at some point but the boys would have been so small in it, and I think that's what was stopping me getting started on it. Sometimes you get stalled for a reason...
Maybe I'll start painting this one tomorrow...

Here's a close up of my elusive hawk in the oak leaves...

And a close up of the boys with the bees...

At last, some more Life Drawing!

2011-06-11T14:44:00.001-07:00

2 minute warm up in dip pen and indian ink

A while ago now I lost my evening Life sessions at Stony Street Studios due to low numbers and have really missed it. Drawing the figure is something I have absolutely loved ever since my first life drawing class aged about seventeen in the wonderful old ramshackle Georgian building that was Sydney Place in Bath. It was a rambling maze of corridors and winding stairs, odd little cubby hole studios and huge high ceiling rooms with enormous windows. I learnt a lot in the few weeks I did Life drawing there, but sadly never got to do my Foundation course in that building. The year I went to Foundation college they moved it from Sydney Place with its gardens and beautiful architecture, to the basement of the old Victorian hospital in the city centre that used to be the morgue! No windows! Never mind!

Head study 2 minutes

Anyway, I am really pleased to have found a once a month Life session at Shortcombe Studio, run by an Artist friend of my mums, which will help cure my itchy fingers. It is in a beautiful setting overlooking the Chew Valley lakes, all huge skies and wide open landscapes - next time I will take my camera and show you the view...

So, my first life session in a few weeks - here's the rest of the results...

2 minute dip pen and indian ink

30 second poses

4 minute pose, back to the good old charcoal!

5 minute pose

another 5 minute pose

about 8 minutes for this one I think

10 minute pose

And finally another 10 minute pose...

I did miss the longer poses today and was itching to use my ink and gouche a bit more but its great to have a model to draw again... looking forward to next month!

Man of Iron...

2011-06-04T14:32:00.000-07:00

Way back in February Christina of Mermaid in the Attic posted a beautiful recording of a song she has written called 'Through the window'... and has since followed it with more recordings of equally moving and beautiful songs - a lady of many talents indeed!
At the time the faint wind sounds on Christina's recording reminded me of a Sandy Denny song I had not heard for years, but I just couldn't remember the name of it...
Until finally 'Man of Iron' that was it! I've just found a clip of it and listening to it again after all this time still sends shivers down my spine, it is a haunting, powerful song.
So here you are, especially for Christina...

Woodsmoke and whisky, faces in the fire...

2011-06-03T15:51:00.000-07:00

Tonight we lit our first Firebowl of the Summer, something I always really look forward to... Fragrant woodsmoke drifting into a pale turquoise sky, the forlorn distant cry of the Peacock who lives in the valley, and the black silhoetted leaves of our Whitebeam that this particular twilight held the faintest wisp pale edge of the newborn Moon between a leafen forefinger and thumb.

How many vaporous faces do you see here in the wreathing smoke? And how many glinting eyes?

We usually sit quietly sipping malt whisky listening to the night sounds unfold as the sky deepens, much like this post of last Summer...

But tonight our eldest daughter joined us for an impromptu exciting late night, so there was much chatting about fires and foxes and not much listening to night sounds! It was lovely to share the fire with her and a shame little sister missed it, tucked up fast asleep indoors exhausted by a busy day of painting and paddling pools!

I was astounded at the pictures my hybrid camera managed... I still haven't learnt how to use it properly, but the more I zoomed in the more abstract and dramatic the images became.

I think many more summer nights of fires and friends must follow...

Totems, Talismans and a challenge...

2011-06-02T16:30:00.001-07:00

Reading Jackie Morris' post this morning about the mysterious contents of her beautiful bottle pendant got me thinking on the things we hold precious, about Talismans, Totems and Amulets, and why they should give us strength when we need to hold fast to something...

If you would like to take part in Jackie's intriguing challenge please do hop over to her blog Drawing a Line in Time... and find out all about it...

(picture from Jackie's blog)

As the contents of that mysterious bottle, which struck me as a Talisman, drifted around my thoughts all day I began to remember a vivid Dream I had years ago - a dream of shapeshifting...

At this point I should mention I was thinking about Buzzards. Buzzards have become a very special bird to me over the years... and in my deepest darkest times of turmoil and depression which I suffered for ten years before being gradually persuaded I was worth accepting help, watching the birds soar circling overhead with their wilderness cries and savage joy at the pure elemental freedom of the winds, would calm me and give me strength.
Also in times of intense physical pain, visualising strongly a Buzzard circling effortlessly poised on the winds against a blue, blue sky, would help me rise above the pain and detach myself from it.
But anyway, less of the heavy stuff! Point taken I guess is that Buzzards have become my Totem and my strength...
So back to the Dream...

I began in a thicket, confusing and tangled, I was a crow, my wings torn and constricted until all at once I broke free into sunlit green transformed as a Buzzard on strong brindled wings.

I felt my strength, gloried in my strength, wings muscles beating and an exhilerated joy at the sheer freedom of flight, so vivid.

Then in a heartbeat I was myself, struggling at the base of an impossibly steep green hill, wanting so badly to reach the heights and the clean savage winds, the more my frustration grew the steeper the hill became and the greater my despair.

Another heartbeat and I was again a Buzzard rising on thermals, unfettered and wild circling effortlessly far above the green hill, flying for the sheer glory of freedom. Another beat and I was myself sitting sitting at the summit, feeling the wind thrill through me in exhilerated joy, until finally I flew back the way I came, once more feather clad.

The feeling of flight in the dream was so real, so vivid, it has stayed with me for years... so I guess in an extremely long winded fashion I have come to the contents of Jackie's wonderful bottle!
If I were to wear such a treasure I would wish for an elixir, a spell or potion of shapechanging... whoever should wear it of course would have a different form, their Spirit-guide. My eldest daughter would have the amber quick, fleet fair-footed fox. For me of course a feather, but it would need to be no ordinary feather...
We just happen to have such a feather, a feather of arcane mysteries...

There is a small Griffin who sleeps on our very messy piano guarding a small pot of treasures. We often wonder if he comes alive at midnight to fly around our house in the dark hours, and then one day we found the tiniest, softest brown feather...

So it must be true!

This is what I would keep in the bottle to give me the power to take a brindle-winged form, soar the wide wild winds and glory at the Skysong.

What do you think is in the bottle?

'Red Kite I,' sunflashing wings from a pot of gold...

2011-05-23T13:23:00.000-07:00

I've been enjoying doing the odd Kells style bird lately - inspired from the wonderful Book of Kells, you've seen a few here already. I got the old metal leaf out for this one...! (a heck of a lot cheaper than real gold for experimenting!) I'm not sure what the little ivory handled tool was for originally, but its great for embossing the gold. Some of those original ancient illuminated manuscripts must have had gilding...

Since our recent trip to Wales a few weeks back the magnificent Red Kite has been brushing my thoughts with sun flashing wingtips and wilderness cries on the wind...
I thought it would be interesting to try and see if I could stylise one in the Kells way, but I was torn between being faithful to the natural markings of the real bird or digressing to the more decorative elements you see in the fantastical Book of Kells birds.
I ended up going for somewhere in the middle but had mixed feelings throughout really about whether I've captured anything of the spirit of this beautiful bird or just ended up with a rather over-decorative design...
What do you think?

I think I'm going to make this 'Red Kite I' and maybe do a short series to see where it goes... I did enjoy making him...

Using the metal leaf was interesting, I hadn't tried that before but we had some in the workshop so it made its way home and into my painting. I embossed a little design on the sun with the ivory handled tool in the first pic.
Then of course I had to try all kinds of angles to try and photograph it, trickier than I thought!

This last pictures a bit murky but does show up how bright the gold shines when the light strikes it... I think if I ever had prints made of this kind of thing I would hand embellish them with the metal leaf to keep that effect.
I really must put aside the playing around with Celtica soon and get on with some serious work, there are several projects that have been waiting far too long!
I would be interested to hear what you make of my Red Kite and the gold though, do please feel free to comment freely!

A lovely surprise in the post!

2011-05-19T14:21:00.000-07:00

Look what I got in the post today!
I was lucky enough to have my name pulled out of the hat for Milly's giveaway over at her beautiful blog 'Drawings From Nature' and what a lovely surprise - I got a lot more than I was expecting!
I've thoroughly enjoyed following her blog over the last year or so and love her beautiful paintings of the objects she gathers from the landscape and the seashore. If you have not visited yet, do pop over and have a look! Search back for her Oak project and her Berry sketchbooks too, they're fantastic...

And knowing how much I love feathers, it was a lovely thought to have a real one tucked in amongst the cards too, thankyou so much Milly I love the cards and the feather!

Snow White as you've not seen her before...

2011-05-19T02:51:00.000-07:00

This is a great video by German metal band Rammstein with a rather darker version of the Snow White story which has always amused me, they do it with such solemnity too.
So if you don't mind a wee bit of heavy metal....

For those of you that might have liked this clip, this band do another brilliantly dark video to their song 'Rosenrot', here... Really well done bit of visual story telling (because I can't understand the German lyrics!) Think of an edgier Germanic Cadfael!

For baby Leo... and some quirky creations...

2011-05-15T16:02:00.000-07:00

Here's a little painting for a little baby boy called Leo obviously! As you can see from the date of birth it has taken me a while to get around to it, but hopefully his Mum and Dad will like it... it will be a surprise present for them and a good excuse to go visiting for a cuddle!
Here's some close ups... I left my camera at work so had to resort to my somewhat dodgy scanner!

I have another one to do for some more friends who recently had a gorgeous little baby girl, so the sooner I get my brushes out the sooner I can go cuddling!

And now, especially for Kate of Kit and Kaboodle, heres a collection of quirky creatures as made by my daughter Elora when aged 6...
You may spot a two-tailed fox, a Nessie and a battle droid (from Star Wars) all her own patterns and stitches...

And of course the famous Pteradactyl! Hehehehe...

Kites flying and flying kites...

2011-05-01T14:16:00.000-07:00

Here's another little Kells inspired bird I painted while we were in Wales the other week, though I have it in mind to try stylising a Red Kite into one of these.
The first Red Kite I ever saw was on a little mountain road the first time we went to Wales several years ago. It swooped up on a thermal so close from behind a dry stone wall right beside us in the car... I've been in love with them ever since and always associate them with the rocky green wildness of Wales. This last time I was really pleased that we saw seven Red Kites on separate occassions along the coastal roads, all their lovely markings underlit by the sun and that splendid V-shaped tail. I have a love for birds of prey in general but the Kite really is magnificent!

And so, I know its a poor link... but it was my eldest daughter's Seventh Birthday today! How time flies, it really does!
We always seem to end up flying our kites after all the party guests have gone home on the first of May in the big field across the lane by our house, and today Elora flew hers all by herself for the first time - hooray for being seven!

Even little sister gave it a fair shot bless her, with a little help from Grandma!

Hope you manage to make the most of the May Day bank holiday tomorrow :)

The ruined majesty of Cerreg Cennen...

2011-04-27T15:30:00.000-07:00

On the way home from our week in North Pembrokeshire we just had to visit Cerreg Cennen teetering high and still defiant on its windblown crag!

This has to be the most dramatic castle in Wales, growing up out of the bedrock of a sheer cliff face 300 feet obove the River Cennen in the valley below at the edge of the Black Mountains . I took so many pictures of this place it was hard to whittle them down, but I'd be uploading them all night otherwise! It's just magnificent!

We used to visit a lot of castles both the Welsh and the Edward I strongholds before the children arrived and have always loved them and their vivid, sometimes livid histories. Visiting castles with the children is quite a different experience in some ways. Its thrilling to be able to show them these exciting sites, but I am less absorbed in the castle and more heart in mouth at the sheer bone shattering drops and teetering stairways into ragged open-topped towers as I cling tight to little hands and yell 'Don't run towards the edge!' slightly neurotically...

Extremely vertical!

The real mindblowing glory of this castle is when you first cross the inner ward and look out of the cliff-side windows... the view is stunning, huge and unexpected as the land drops away and away in green swathes... Photos just can't do it justice...

Look closely, you can see the Ravens flying far below us

The children had so much to explore, even climbing inside a small vaulted oven like a cave which set me thinking of dark old fairy tales with crafty, ravenous hags... Its believed the site was an Iron Age Hillfort before the Welsh Princes built the first castle here in 1197 ish, though it was eventually taken by King Edward I. Here's one little cave Elora found in the cliff...

Best of all this castle even has a secret tunnel! You can hire torches to explore the secret tunnel that runs from a steep passageway on through a natural cave, very dark, very slippery and even with game, brave little children we've never yet managed to get to the end... maybe next time though...
Down below, the access to the castle is a working farm with ancient old barns and a lovely renovated cafe with tables made out of old milk churns and slabs of oak. There's a collection on always display in one of the old stable blocks of various old Victorian farm implements... I have no idea what many of these are for but it is fascinating.
They're all hoarded in a rusted jumble of dusty sunbeams with swallows flying in and out nesting in the beams, click on the picture to see some of it in more detail...

While we were in the gloom of the barn, there came a low rumbling noise that gathered and grew. At first I thought a tractor must be going past but it grew and grew and continued on and on again, I wondered what on earth it was... Emerging back out into the bright sunlight it turned out to be part of a chapter of Bikers out on a road trip, quite a sight... (and sound!)
They told me there were 500 of them altogether but around 100 of them had come to the castle that day, so much chrome and leather! I always enjoy chatting to Bikers, they're always really friendly chaps in my experience and one obligingly posed for me!

All in all a good way to round off our week away, and a week full of lovely memories to ease the way back into work and school. I have one more Welsh post in mind to share soon, I hope you all enjoyed this one and I'd highly recommend seeing Cerreg Cenen for yourselves if you can!

Throw Down The Sword and The Phoenix... A couple of tunes for you...

2011-04-25T16:22:00.000-07:00

Reading Aaron-Paul's blog post today 'Keeper of the Light', over at The Lost Forge of Albion reminded me of a great song of the same title by a band called 'Wishbone Ash'
Here's two more of my favourite songs by this band, see what you think...

And one more long one, The Phoenix...

I promise I'll get back to the art this week and lay off the Prog Rock!

Early one Easter morning as apple blossom drifts soft like snow...

2011-04-24T06:15:00.000-07:00

Happy Easter everyone! We got back from our week in Wales just in time for the Eostre's Hare to come calling in our garden early this morning...
Hence forth I was pulled out of bed far, far too early by two excited little bunnies, and had to sneak out in my dressing gown to give him a hand while they were busy with breakfast...
It was a beautiful morning though, full of drfiting blossom and dappled early morning sun, the garden changed a lot while we were away...

Can you spot the nest amongst the bluebells by the play house?

They were in a great hurry as you can see!

And here's the nest after being raided by little hands...

Two happy (soon to be chocolatey) bunnies...

It's only been a week but it looks like I've got a lot of catching up to do with all you folks, so I'll come around visiting soon...
I'll be posting a couple of holiday adventures to share with you soon as well - we did have fun, and lots and lots of sun - in Wales, in April! Amazing! (We had packed all our raincoats!)
Enjoy your day wherever you all are... :)

See you all in a week!

2011-04-16T05:45:00.000-07:00

From Castell Henllys

We're off to wonderful, wild, Wales for a week! (Blimey that was a lot of W's)
So I'll catch up with you all in a week or so. I'm taking my pencils and brushes so hopefully I'll have some sketches and paintings to show you too.
Off now to pick up two very excited children, then onto the motorway we go ! Hooray!

How about some Blues...

2011-04-10T14:13:00.000-07:00

Well the cough and cold the children have had has finally got me, so I didn't get a lot done with my day off this week... I did however find this extraordinary video of a hero of mine the great Buddy Guy...
This is an extra long version and for good reason, just keep watching... he's a security guard's nightmare I'm sure but so big hearted...
This is one artist I've just got to get to see at some point, he's sings and plays with such joy and passion, you can see just how much he loves what he does... what a great way to be!

I just got his latest album this week too 'Living Proof' the title track is '74 years young'. Good ole Buddy, he'll always be young!

And the winner is...

2011-04-07T15:13:00.000-07:00

I decided to roll a dice to find the winner of my Kells Bird Giveaway... We have quite a lot of multi sided dice knocking around at our house so I thought it would give this runic set a good excuse to get used again!
And so the winner is... number 4.... Christina, of Mermaid in the attic! Which means it will be going all the way to Australia... quite a flight for a small bird!
Well done Christina, and thankyou to all of you who left a comment, its always so nice to read your kind words - sorry you couldn't all get to win, but I'm sure I'll do another Giveaway at some future point... Thanks again everyone!

Last chance to enter my Giveaway! And last night's life session, more ink than I bargained for... !

2011-04-06T14:14:00.000-07:00

30 minute pose, ink, gouache and water.

Last weeks life session was cancelled due to low numbers, so I was relieved that this weeks went ahead, actually a very full studio with several new faces which is very promising...
I enjoyed using the ink and dip pen so much last time that I thought I'd give it another go... however I got to the studio to find I'd left my ink at home. Helen, the lovely lady who runs the studios kindly lent me some chinese ink which I found behaved totally differently to the indian ink I had just gotten used to!
Anyway, although it felt more hit and miss than my last attempts I really enjoyed scratching away on my offcuts of mountboard snaffled from work, and threw in a bit of white gouache as well.
Here's the rest of what I scraped out last night...

5 minute pose

This (above) was supposed to be a 7 minute pose that was going quite well, but then quite amusingly my dip pen nib fell out - PLOP into my pot of ink! I had to fish around for it getting covered in ink in the process. By the time I sorted out the mess the pose was over...

7 minute pose

And the final 30 minute pose which I quite like I think, the ink lines are reasonably clean anyway. At the moment getting used to the new medium my attention to measuring has gone a bit to the wayside... but that's ok for now, as I get more familiar with it the accuarcy will get better and at the moment I'm more interested in the energy of the drawings.
It's funny how different mediums have such wildly different effects on your drawing style... I feel with the ink I want to draw fast with deep bold energetic strokes, hence the lack of careful measuring, but I like it!
Those of you who draw, I'd be interested to hear whether your own drawing style or approach changes depending on the medium used...

And don't forget if you'd like to enter my 'Blog-Birthday-Giveaway' to win an original Kells inspired watercolour illustration, just leave a comment on my previous post here...
I will be drawing the names out of the hat as it were tomorrow evening, so get in there quick!

Windsongs and Wordhoards is one year old... time for a Giveaway!

2011-03-31T15:29:00.000-07:00

This week happens to complete the circle of my first year of blogging (29th of March to be precise!)! It seems there is a bit of a tradition of having a giveaway on such occasions and I really rather like the gesture of that, so... I have spent this week painting a little something to give away...
It's a little original watercolour of a 'Book of Kells' inspired bird, you can see my lovely big 1970's first edition on my desk giving inspration as I painted it...
I really enjoy painting celtica, I can see what the monks got out of it I think... I just get happily lost in the hours, brush and water, seeing empty pencil lines slowly come to life with colour.

I got a bit carried away and triple mounted it too! (It's a handy thing as an artist to also run a framing business!)
So if you would like a chance to win this bright little creature, please leave me a comment on this post and I'll put you all in the hat to draw a winner next week!
Whoever wins it, its a way for me to say a huge thankyou to all of you who drop by here for a visit, encouraging me with your kind comments and showing an interest in my creative endeavours.

I began this blog to motivate myself to keep nurturing my art in a life that's become so busy I was in danger of losing my connection to it altogether, and to keep alive my aspirations of becoming an illustrator one day.
But in this strange world of like minded strangers I found much more than I expected. Discovering and visiting all of you I am constantly inspired, reassured and feel although I haven't met any of you in person that I've made some real friends here. It is such a vibrant, creative community of minds, I feel I am not striving alone.
So thankyou, everyone and I hope you like my little bird!

Tonight's Life Drawings... without charcoal!!

2011-03-22T15:45:00.000-07:00

What fun I had at the life session tonight!
This afternoon I went out and bought myself a dip pen with some interesting large spoon shaped nibs to try and left my nice safe charcoal at home just as I had promised myself...
And what better way to break out of the comfort zone than to use a scary new unpredictable un-rub-out-able medium! The model couldn't have been better suited to the inks... He was any illustrator or life drawer's dream model - dynamic, confident, hugely imaginative and with the strength to carry off the extremely stressful looking poses and hold them a long time too. Just so exciting to draw, a real treat!
I left the studio so exhilerated at the end of the session and grinned all the way home! I really enjoyed myself and love the dip pen.
Here's how I got on... a bit messy, a few ink blobs, but I liked it...

Warming up with a 5 minute pose to start

In this second 5 minute pose he was trying to portray falling through space, fantastic except I was so excited about getting used to the dip pen and ink all my measuring went out the window!

15 minute pose, starting to get the hang of it now...

20 minute pose, trying out a bit of brush and plain water to find the mid-tones...

Another 20 minute pose, really starting to like using the brush and water...

And the final 20 minute pose where I ran out of paper for the full stretch of it.

I'll definately carry on experimenting with ink for life drawing, I might take along some white gouache for the highlights next time and use coloured paper...

I do hope these sessions can continue, there were suppossed to be eight of us tonight but only two of us showed up. It made for a very nice relaxed atmosphere but Helen who runs the studio would not have made any where near enough to even pay for the model. Last weeks was cancelled altogether because too many people couldn't make it. Lets hope we can find some more artists to keep it going, I'd be gutted to lose it...

Sketchbook mission #3, a day of Dragons...

2011-03-21T15:35:00.000-07:00

After many of you left me such nice comments on my sketchbook work, I thought you might like to see a bit more of my process of starting to plan out a painting.
Today I was on a Dragon mission... I've always had a massive mental block on how to tackle Dragons, especially when there are such amazingly good Dragon painters out there... my imagination just throws up the fantastic paintings of others I have seen and admired, Jackie Morris and John Howe being top of the list... and I feel rather daunted to attempt my own.

But I can't shy away from it any longer, one of my stories that needs a dummy book completing has Dragons in it, and there is a painting that needs painting for a good friend who's been having a tough time lately.
I'm doing her a portrait of her boys to cheer her up as a surprise, and the only way that felt right to paint them was with a Dragon. So it seems I have to find my own way to paint one!

Needing a starting point I went back to nature to look at lots of pictures of lizards, and there are some amazing creatures out there that certainly look more fantasy than real... I find good reference images really important when I'm researching a painting... not for copying but for informing, so I know exactly how reptillian scales should look or what a lizard's eye looks like, how the skin folds etc...

There are so many different aspects in which to portray a dragon, but today's needed to be a friendly one... the boys intended for this painting are quite young, aged 3 and 6, so I wanted it to look protective rather than ready to crunch boys bones!
Here's the first very quick, rough grasp of the idea...

Then I thought some more about the composition and how the Dragon should look...

Working up my ideas a bit more, with notes about light and dark, possible colours, different compositions and details...

I think I know where I want to go from here... I had initially just envisaged a square composition but quite like the idea of doing it on a circle... maybe somewhere between the two circular ones I have here. I'd be interested to hear which you prefer, square or round??

Next will be to finalise the composition and the details that need tweaking, before drawing it out full size onto my watercolour paper... always an anxious transition! I'll let you know how it turns out...

A Spring Sunshine walk...

2011-03-20T15:15:00.000-07:00

It was warm in the spring sun today, and having only been able to look at it through windows all week I was so pleased it stayed bright for my day off! We wandered off for a walk down along the old Railway line that is now an excellent cycle track. There's miles and miles of it slowly being reclaimed by nature - so well in fact the council are talking about making it into a nature reserve or conservation area for wildlife.

There's a certain fascination looking at these tracks that were last used in the 1970's as far as I know, now thick with saplings winding into undergrowth... much like the Old Ironworks I posted about recently, how quickly industry can be undone by nature when we think of it as quite the other way around usually.

The old tracks are great fun for the kids... (yes, I include my husband in that statement!)

There's a few Trolls hiding in these woods though, watch out!
I had fun snapping away randomly with my camera, but these below are a couple I was quite chuffed with... pure luck rather than skill!

We stayed out in the garden for the rest of the day trying to tame our own little wilderness while the girls made mud soup in their little red wheel barrow, mmm lovely!
Even our silly small grey lion was enjoying the sun, and found a plantpot that fitted his shape perfectly!
Hope you enjoyed some nice Spring sunshine today where ever you all may be...

Sketchbook mission #2... who is this bone-cracking, crow-cackling Raven-Kin?

2011-03-19T16:23:00.000-07:00

Well, the sketching everyday mission already failed yesterday having fallen asleep on the sofa instead! So tonight I tried to draw, but the old mind being a bit of a blank I decided to play around a bit more with the Raven-Kin... I wondered what might his nest be like? How would he move? What would his habits be between the dank marshland and the heavy skies? Would he nest in the sky-ravaged Mountains or the mist-choked Fens? What harsh unnerving songs would he croon to the dark in his ragged raven croak?

I could probebly fill pages exploring the nature of this creature and his habitats, but only if he gets insistant! I think this nest is too tidy, it needs more bones... and outlandish charms hanging from tendrils, and maybe some strange runic sigils scratched crudely by a claw into the rock... and cave paintings?

The drawings are ropey but at least I got a sketch or two out today, and hopefully the more I draw the more it might unseize my tired brain until it flows better!
But don't worry, I won't post sketchbooks everyday though, that would probebly get a bit repetetive no doubt! Just enough to get the ball rolling and keep me going...
I think this fellow needs a name now... perhaps once his name is spoken his story might begin to unfold itself ...

Sketchbook mission #1 The Raven-Kin...

2011-03-17T16:42:00.000-07:00

Yet again I realised I've gone a week without once picking up a pencil, so I thought it was about time I did something about it... So I've decided I must draw something, anything every day in my sketchbook just to try and keep my hand in and to break the artistic paralysis I so often suffer!
So I took up my trusty 2B determined to draw the first thing that came to mind, and unbidden came the strange, otherworldly wizened creature I had once drawn over ten years ago. I tried thinking of something else but no, he was still there, cackling in his harsh raven-croak unsettling way insisting he be drawn...
So here he is, the Raven-kin, Dream Thief, Fisher of Souls...
I don't think he's evil, but not a creature you'd want to meet in the misty marshes all the same...

He first created himself ten years or so back as an illustration to a song called Dream Thief for an album cover of one of my husband's early bands... I don't know where he came from then or why he wanted to come back again but I kind of like him in his darksome, uneasy way... Though he certainly can't go under the children's illustration part of my work!
Perhaps I'll paint him again one day just to keep him appeased...

Album cover from around 2001

This week's life drawings...

2011-03-09T13:03:00.000-08:00

Here's this weeks life drawings...
I was late so missed all the short poses unfortunately...
So having rushed, rushed, rushed straight from work to school, it was off to the dentist with big daughter, over to pick up littlest daughter, back to work to pick up husband, deliver some framed pictures, grab hasty supper on the run, dash into town... sneak late into the studio mid-pose, sit, sketchbook out, pencil, to paper, and draw... phew!

Not what you'd call a calm and focussed state of mind, but she was a lovely new model who just radiated serenity so I think that really helped!
She held great poses too, this first stretching, twisting one she held perfectly for 10 minutes! Not even a sway or a waiver, really impressive - shame I couldn't fit her on the page! Lacking hands and feet my drawing doesn't really illustrate just how stretched she was, the placing and weight balance of her feet would've been crucial really to show this... never mind, great pose.

10 minute pose

15 minutes

(getting to grips with my brand new charcoal pencil that's replaced the inch long remains of my favourite one...)

30 minute pose

And the final 30 minute pose (slightly levitating!)

Having arrived late I didn't get organised to try working in different mediums this week, but I am determined to break out of my comfort zone next time... I might have to leave my beloved charcoal at home to make me do it!

A young Dragon for World Book Day....

2011-03-02T12:51:00.000-08:00

All week this week at my eldest imp's school they are doing lots of book and story related activities for World Book Day which is on the 3rd of March.
Today they all got to go to school dressed as a character from their favourite book, and Elora chose 'Tell Me a Dragon' by Jackie Morris, a book both my imps enjoy immensely... they love imagining their own wild dragonkind and pore endlessly over the endpapers which are completely filled with wonderfully coloured Dragon's eggs of all shapes and sizes, all in various stages of hatching out!

We've got lots of Jackie's books and I enjoy them as much as the children do... in fact it was discovering Jackie's books that first inspired me to find the Children's Illustration courses that have got me started in the direction I want to go.
It was also Jackie that inspired me to start this blog... I know lots of you already visit hers which is here at Drawing a Line in Time

Elora made her costume with a little help from Grandma after school yesterday, so I got a very Dragony surprise when I arrived to pick to the children up after work! As you can see she's a rather mischevious young hatchling! But luckily she hasn't got the hang of fire breathing just yet...

She's got a good roar though!!

She's requested melted gold for breakfast which is apparently what Dragons of her kind drink... Hmmm might be a bit expensive raising a young Dragon hatchling I fear!!

Tonight's Life Drawings...

2011-03-01T15:21:00.000-08:00

30 minute pose

I made it to another evening life session at the Stony Street studios tonight, though it seems the evening sessions might not be continuing for too much longer unless more people start coming along. It would be a real shame from my point of view because the evenings are the only ones I can get to right now. So, out with the flyers and posters methinks...!
Here are some of the drawings from tonight...

I think its time to replace my two favourite life drawing pencils, they're only about an inch long now... a lovely soft black charcoal and a soft sepia charcoal/pastal pencil that I've done most of the last year's worth of life drawings with. Only trouble is I can't remember exactly what they were...

However I did enjoy using the big chunky graphite stick for the 2 minute poses - you just can't fuss with it and the weight really encourages strong bold sweeping lines, I think I like it!
I feel nice and safe with my charcoal pencils, but it's probebly about time I tried some other mediums... I might even take watercolours next week... A good excuse to go shopping for new art materials!

Fussels Old Ironworks... inexorable nature

2011-02-23T14:05:00.000-08:00

It being half way through half term we decided to take a day off to catch up with the children today... unfortunately work doesn't stop for school holidays so we have to do our best to grab some time with them when we can.
Rain didn't entirely scupper our plans, we managed to get out between showers for an adventure in amongst the tangled green ruins of 'Fussels Old Ironworks' in the next village.
It is an extraordinary place, though potentially extrememly dangerous if you don't take special care!

This tree root below looked just like the muscular forearm of a Dragon or Griffin buried by rock or overgrown in a sleep of centuries...

Everytime I go there I am still caught with the urge to explore in wonder its tumbledown archways and tunnels, fascinated by the way industry has been almost completely reclaimed by nature.
Water rushes everywhere, through sluices and underground culvetts, roaring through the walls where the huge wheel once turned.
It drips, every tree limb and broken wall swathed in thick fringes of bearded moss, ivy trails and ferns claim every fissure of the ruins.
In many ways it reminds me of the Film Noir masterpiece 'Stalker' by Tarkovsky that I posted a short clip of some time back here...

It was a dull day for photographs today and these don't do it justice, but in the summer it glows green, so verdant, so wild, yet it was not all so long ago that this place rang and smoked and steamed industry.

I have taken many pictures here over the years and it was a particularly great place for band shots... twelve or thirteen years ago I photographed my husband's band here, though it seems like yesterday! Some moody, some silly!

My brother in law

And a very young looking husband!

These I took on my cranky old manual Minolta that I loved, and I am rather proud of these... do click on it for a better look... I wish I could work out how to recreate this with my digital, the old Minolta is long defunkt...This stairway looks more and more precarious every time I visit but I love it... My Mum did a fantastic etching of this a few years ago, and many a band photo has been taken here too!

'Old Ironworks' Etching by Heather O' Brien

This seems to have turned into a bit of an epic post! I get a bit carried away with pictures sometimes, but I just wanted to share this special and unusual place... I will go back in the summer and show you how magical it looks all dressed in that season's glowing emerald green...

A Moon-Singing Fish...

2011-02-17T14:50:00.000-08:00

Images and words copyright of Carrie Osborne 2010

The Moon was very big and full tonight as I drove home, and made me think of the second of my dummy (or mock up) books still waiting to be finished. The writing of this story needs quite a lot of reworking still and has a long way to go with the artwork too, but this is the double page rough for the full-moon page of the story.
I have less confidence in this story than the other two I am working on, but I like the raw idea of it if I can just get it to flow better. I won't give too much away, you never know I might get a chance to submit it one day! (If someone hurrys up and invents a time stasis machine!)

A strong full moon does not agree with me very well, makes me unsettled and edgy and quite often physically under strain as well. I must be a good example of how myths of lycanthropy
might have come about! Even still there is a bewitching beauty to a full moon riding bright in a deepening sky, and I love the moon cast shadows of the trees in a quiet lane as bright almost as daylight.
Fellow blogger 'Mermaid in the Attic' has posted a hauntingly beautiful and powerful song she has written about the Moon called 'La Luna' earlier today, do pop over and have a listen. It is perfectly evocative of that elusive presence I associate with the moon... very good!
Bye for now...

Another Stony Street session...

2011-02-15T14:54:00.000-08:00

5 minute pose

Well I managed to make it out to the life session again this week...
We had a fantastic model, really strong and great poses... but unfortunately it had been a very long day for me and I didn't have the focus or the concentration I needed to do her justice.
It's so frustrating sometimes when the model strikes a really great dynamic pose and the light and shadows are just right, but the pencil turns to a lumpy cumbersome stick and my brain and fingers are at odds! Oh well...
Here are the best of the worst from tonight...

5 minutes

15 minutes

30 minute pose (some odd proportions going on there!)

And the final 30 minute pose

I felt like I was wrestling with it tonight but its really great to get out and draw finally! Looking forward to doing some more next time...

Remembering Gary Moore...

2011-02-07T13:25:00.000-08:00

Another great guitarist gone unexpectedly before his time, aged only 58 yrs. There's been tributes played all day on Planet Rock and some other radio stations as well. It can't be denied he had his part to play in our recent music history - notably with Thin Lizzy of course... and in this clip is playing his own tribute to the late Phil Lynnot...
And so, in my own way here I am paying my respects to Gary Moore, long live Rock n Roll...

At last, back in the Life Studio!

2011-02-02T13:24:00.000-08:00

5 minute pose

My first life session in six months!
I admit I did feel very rusty indeed having hardly drawn at all for the last few weeks... When I don't draw everything feels stiff and difficult and ideas can't flow onto the page because I'm so conscious of my hand getting in the way of my mind if you know what I mean!

So I intend to have another decent run of life sessions to break me back in. Just seeing the other people's drawings was very inspiring in itself - especially one lady who's style I just love.
Last night she was using chinese inks with homemade bamboo quills, brush and water - wonderful, wonderful results, so flowing and intuitive - and certainly made my own drawing style feel very stiff and self conscious.
But that's what is so good about working within a group, so many other approaches to learn from and be inspired by...
Here's a few more of mine again from last night...

5 minute pose

10 minutes

30 minutes
(just couldn't nail down the foreshortening on that knee - ooh that sounds a bit brutal doesn't it, ouch!)

And 30 minutes again, though there's some very strange proportions going on here... ahem!

Looking forward to next time, though I think its time to replace my favourite charcoal pencil - it's only an inch and a half long now!

Julia Mannings - a favourite Printmaker of mine...

2011-01-31T13:13:00.000-08:00

This is a short clip from Printmaker Julia Manning's website showing a bit about her techniques and inspirations. I have admired her woodcuts and etchings for a fair while now, especially her birds, so I thought I'd point her out to you - I certainly found it fascinating to see this snapshot into her studio!
Woodcut is something I've been itching to try myself for years since a brief foray at Foundation Art College many years ago...
Here's a few more of her woodcuts and etchings that I really like...

'In the Beginning'

'Chit chat'

'Wotan's Wut'

'A Rebel of Ravens'

'The Sparrow Hawk that ate the Collar Dove'

There are lots more fantastic prints to be seen on her website www.juliamannings.co.uk
Hop over and take a look!

A Unicorn for my portfolio...!

2011-01-06T11:49:00.000-08:00

Click if you want to see it larger...

Hooray! I have had permission to add my Unicorn commission to my blog portfolio, so here it is along with a few close up details... It will also be under the Watercolour heading of my portfolio pages underneath my thumbnail bar soon...

I was for a change actually quite pleased with this one, I think it turned out well enough to become a part of my Children's Illustration portfolio as well, although that's coming along very, very slowly!
I promised my youngest daughter Elswyth a unicorn some time ago, and I enjoyed this one so much I really must get on with doing hers... Here's as possible idea from last year with both daughters that so far hasn't made it out of my sketch book... I definately owe her one!

The Holly King and the Oak King, not quite as you've seen them before!

2011-01-03T14:53:00.000-08:00

Yes, I'm doing the proud mother bit...! Helping my elder daughter finish her christmas holiday homework - yes homework at 6 years old, she did such a fantastic picture of the Holly King handing over his crown to the Oak King, I thought I'd show it off! The Oak King is complete with green beard and squirrals after the acorns in his pockets...
I know traditionally in some versions at least each brother King slays the other to gain the crown, although in other versions the Oak King is newborn at Midwinter, his strength waxing as the Holly King's power wanes, but for now my children know a slightly less in depth version of the myth which I think is fine and they seem to enjoy.
I think my daughter's fine picture may have have inspired me to do a version of my own sooner or later, squirrals and all!

A New Year's toast... Slainte!

2010-12-31T14:11:00.000-08:00

A New Year's toast! To health, hope and happiness!

There's nothing better than a dram of the finest Single Malt out of a beautiful bottle, firelight wickering through whisky, warmest amber gleaming in glass, rich copper honey, sap resin pure... Reminds me of bronze-age embers, copper smelting, gold and bronze, Ore-Masters, Myth-makers and Sun-shapers...

... Slainte! And a Happy New Year to you all...

Belated Seasonal Greetings and painting with salt...

2010-12-30T12:40:00.000-08:00

Hello folks and a belated Seasons Greetings to you all!
I hope you've all had a happy, restful and creative time with your families...
My lack of posts of late is mainly due to the fact we've been working so hard and running on empty for so long, that once we were able to stop and close shop for the Christmas break, the exhaustion just came crashing down, crushing any hope of finding any motivation whatsoever! There was just nothing left...
But hopefully now I can start to climb back up, shake off the dragging depression and re-ignite my creativity, though it may take a bit of coaxing!
So today I started by reclaiming my work space, and Ta Da! - here is my little cubby hole, three large bags of children's paintings and drawings later, several random scatterings of toys removed and a great deal of tidying!

I wanted to do some experimenting with salt over wet on wet washes of watercolour and had tremendous fun! I love the way it changes moment by moment, though sometimes I wish I could stop it at just that right point, but the paint inexorably keeps moving... I became quite fascinated by it...

I'm not sure any of these experiments will be quite right for the images in pen and ink over the top I had in mind, but I do think I will do a lot more of them and something interesting may very well come... This was the best of this batch I think...

I haven't had permission yet to show you the Unicorn commission, but it did turn out very well so hopefully I'll get to show it. The other portrait commission however had a bit of an 'uncertain' reaction so I was too intimidated to ask permission to show that one... but I may show some close up 'details' later on...
Hopefully much more art to come, time and head space allowing! I feel I've been away from my brushes far too long!
Take care all...

I Shiver - Robert Cray

2010-12-09T05:56:00.000-08:00

I can't get enough of Robert Cray right now! He's got to be among the best of the best blues singers with guitar playing to match... His voice is just wonderful!
It's been in my head all day so I thought I'd share it, also its quite fitting for me today because I've got a rotten cold!
Take it away Robert Cray...

Ghosts of trees, ghosts of birds...

2010-12-07T14:40:00.000-08:00

It was an unearthly world we awoke to this morning, petrified trees ghosting from a pale freezing fog, crystal rimed and ice-stricken. A spectral land of mists, silent with no birds flying but one, a lone crow-shadow like a shrouded spirit across my path.
There were so many beautiful ghostly pictures I wanted to take as I drove to work through the wooded lanes, but there always seemed to be someone behind me so I couldn't stop, and we live more or less in the middle of nowhere!
Here's a few shots of the incredibly thick hoar frost...

And it didn't thaw all day, this is the first one again this evening! It has an unearthly beauty but it does nake for treacherous driving, especially out in the lanes... so if you're out driving about, do take care! And keep warm!

Aladdin's cave - a tale of ritual humilation! And one commission down, three to go!

2010-12-06T15:24:00.000-08:00

This belongs on the business blog really but while I'm waiting for the press photo for that post I thought I'd show you here as well what we got roped into last friday night by the Chambers of Commerce folk!
Twas a bit of fun, though I still can't quite believe how, painfully self concious as I am, we ended up taking part in a very public parade down the High Street lined with hundreds of people for the Christmas Lantern Fayre!
Basically a fair few of the traders, ourselves included were taking part in a competition where the public had to visit all our shops and guess which pantomime we were representing buy our costumes and window displays. Considering how bitterly cold it was that week I think we got the short straw by being given Aladdin! I think my husband turned blue just from the parade down the high Street!
I thought I'd show you a few shots of our Aladdin's cave window which I was quite proud of actually!

Other news is that I've finally finished the first of my christmas commissions and I'm actually quite pleased with it... I'm meeting the clients on wednesday to show them and I always find that really nerve wracking! I do hope they like it! Fingers crossed!
Hopefully I'll be able to show you soon if they agree to me posting it, though because its a christmas prezzie it might have to wait till after the day...!
Commission number two begins tomorrow!

The Weaver of Snow...

2010-11-27T14:53:00.000-08:00

The Weaver of Snow
by Fiona Macleod (c. 1901)

In Polar noons when moonshine glimmers,
And the frost-fans whirl,
And whiter than moonlight the ice-flowers grow,
And the lunar rainbow quivers and shimmers,
And the Silent Laughers dance to and fro,
A stooping girl
As pale as pearl
Gathers the frost-flowers where they blow:
And the fleet-foot fairies smile, for they know
The Weaver of Snow.

And she climbs at last to a berg set free,
That drifteth slow:
And she sails to the edge of the world we see:
And waits till the wings of the north wind lean
Like an eagle's wings o'er a lochan of green,
And the pale stars glow
On berg and floe...
Then down on our world with a wild laugh of glee
She empties her lap full of shimmer and sheen.
And that is the way in a dream I have seen
The Weaver of Snow.

I thought that since most of the UK has seen at least a few flakes today, this lovely old poem by Fiona Macleod, (also known as William Sharp) might be fitting!
Sorry not to have posted much lately... life has been overwhelmingly busy!
I do still have commissions to finish which hopefully I will be able to show you soon... but even finding time to paint these is proving tricky at the moment with our fledgling business demanding all!
I think the New Year will be my time to reclaim some time for art and resume both my portfolio coursework and my dummy books! ( I really hope so!)
But for now here's some art painted by Jack Frost on my car windscreen...

Keep warm!

Wild winds and whirling words...

2010-11-11T10:00:00.000-08:00

'Joy of a falling leaf' by Arthur Rackham

I woke this morning to a wild blowing gale rattling the sash and an early dawn mirk of stormlight chasing wind-tattered cloud across a ragged sky.
And on a breath the words of a Ted Hughes poem tumbled through my not quite awake mind...
It is one I have known and loved for years and the mood of the elements this morning woke them from my subconcious before I was really awake myself. So I suppose my bemused husband was woken by his crazy wifey randomly (and sleepily) quoting half lines of a random poem to the darkness!
But anyway, its been in my head all day so here it is as set out in one of my books...

Wind (by Ted Hughes 1957 - 1994)

This house has been far out at sea all night,
The woods crashing through darkness, the booming hills,
Winds stampeding the fields under the window
Floundering black astride and blinding wet

Til day rose; then under an orange sky
The hills had new places, and wind wielded
Blade-light, luminous black and emerald,
Flexing like the lens of a mad eye.

At noon I scaled along the house-side as far as
The coal-house door. Once I looked up -
Through the brunt wind that dented the balls of my eyes
The tent of the hills drummed and strained its guyrope,

The fields quivering, the skyline a grimace,
At any second to bang and vanish with a flap:
The wind flung a magpie away and a black-
Back gull bent like an iron bar slowly. The house

Rang like some fine green goblet in the note
That any second would shatter it. Now deep
In chairs, in front of the great fire, we grip
Our hearts and cannot entertain book, thought

Or each other. We watch the fire blazing,
And feel the roots of the house move, but sit on,
Seeing the window tremble to come in,
Hearing the stones cry out under the horizons.

Cheerful pumpkins!

2010-10-31T16:54:00.000-07:00

Well, being 11.55 pm and still just about Halloween, I thought I might as well post a few pics of my kids' pumpkins... the ones they made for the school disco last week had rotted and turned to mush so we decided to make some more!

Not that they'll scare many goblins off - they're the happiest, friendliest pumpkins I've seen for a while!
On the art front, my baby portrait commision has now been joined by another two, potentially three! So I better get on with it!! I think I need someone to invent a device that either slows time or creates more hours in the day!
Hopefully I'll get the chance to post some artwork soon...

An early Halloween, Acorns, Oaks and the writings of a great wordsmith....

2010-10-21T14:01:00.001-07:00

Being the last day of school before half term, the children had their Halloween school 'disco' tonight, a week early... I've only just recovered enough to restore brain functions! Very manic and very noisy! I can handle heavy metal concerts far better than a barn full of two to ten year olds running riot!
My eldest Elora has gone every year as a cat, so this year she broke tradition and went as a skeleton... then at the last minute buckled and added the cat ears!
Here they are very excited and proud of their pumpkins...

Then, looking on my camera I discoverd pictures from an autumn walk a couple of weeks back that I'd totally forgotten about, so I thought, it's still autumn so not too late to show some of them...

(This spidery ones suitably Halloween-ish!)

Here's some of the treasure me and Elswyth found on our way...

There's a very grand old Oak tree where we like to stop and rest, very Squirral Nutkin-like with lots of little hollow doorways in the roots. I love the expressiveness of the limbs, all gesturing crazed and contorted, and the fragile little girl gathering acorns, dwarfed by its presence...

And these limbs bring to mind one or two of Ted Hughes' poems...
I love the raw, sometimes brutal power of his wordcraft, he was so good at drawing out the elemental roots of the world, savage and wild as it has always been... both of nature and human nature...
Here is a short excerpt of a very long poem from 'Gaudete'...

Your tree - your oak
A glare

Of black upward lightning, a wriggling grab
Momentary
Under the crumbling of stars.

A guard, a dancer
At the pure well of leaf.

Agony in the garden. Annunciation
Of clay, water and the sunlight.
They thunder under its roof.
Its agony is its temple.

Waist-deep, the black oak is dancing
And my eyes pause
On the centuries of its instant
As gnats
Try to winter in its wrinkles.

The seas are thirsting
Towards the oak.

The oak is flying
Astride the earth.

How I love Ted Hughes. He has had a huge influence on my own writing and its time I started reading again I think... I have a shelf-ful of his books waiting, brooding bound within their pages, wanting to get out!
( I think there is a bit of Pratchett creeping in there, with images of restless muttering books flexing their covers ready to take flight from the shelves!)

And Elswyth's acorns have just reminded me of a bronze romano-british acorn in a little antiquities shop I saw years ago. Probebly the best part of two thousand years old found by some metal detectorist no doubt...
It was verdigreed and fashioned as a pendant and from the moment I walked empty handed out of that shop I have always regretted not buying it...
I always wondered who would once have worn it and what it meant to them... I really should have bought it!
Anyway, time to stop rambling on me thinks...!

The great Glenn Hughes, and a commision in the wings...

2010-10-13T14:48:00.000-07:00

For any heavy rock people out there I thought I'd just show you this clip (someone elses who was there not mine) of a fantastic gig I went to last night at the Fleece N' Firkin in Bristol...
The excellent Glenn Hughes, former Deep Purple and Black Sabbath front man, twas a great show...

Of course his latest venture is the power trio 'Black Country Communion' with Jason Bonham and Joe Bonamassa on tour next year, though by strange coincidence it just happens we're going to see Joe Bonamassa in Bristol tomorrow night as well!
Don't get to go out for ages then two come along at once!
Although my 3 year old Elswyth last night had thrown her arms around my neck saying:
' I want to keep you mummy cos I love you and I don't want you to go out' - talk about guilt trip for poor usually stuck at home mummy! But luckily I did get permission to go in the end from youngest little elfin one!

Also I have a really lovely baby portrait commision to get stuck into which will be a really enjoyable way back to my art that has been seriously sidelined of late. If I get permission to show it after christmas I will let you in on how it turns out, but it will involve at least one unicorn!
I've been itching to get back to some artwork lately so this is just the prod I need!

Hope you don't mind a bit of heavy rock! ;)

My beloved books of old...

2010-09-23T15:03:00.000-07:00

I have always had a great love for old books, the more well worn the better - the feel and the smell of them, the hand printed words pouring through your fingers as you flick through the brittle pages. There's something about holding these books with their smooth, worn decorated covers that you just don't feel with a modern new book... for me anyway...
So, I just acquired a little old book of Norse Legends, which has inspired me to share with you some of the other favourite old books I have on my shelf...
Here's the new one, it had a rather nice little quote on the opening page that was a nice surprise to find...
Another beautifully decorated title page from a book of Coleridge also has a nice quote...
(Click the picture to enlarge...)

Here's one of my favourite little books, my beloved Mabinogion full of the strange quirky Celtic tales of Welsh legend and of the oldest Arthur - no Victorian romantic chivalry here, but darkly chaotic tales of Kilhwch and Olwen and the Twrch Trwyth - the Otherworldly Boar, the Wild Hunt, strange manifestations, Giants, Hags, impossible quests and the birth of Taliesin the World's greatest Bard, formally the boy Gwion who shapeshifted many times fleeing the witch Ceridwen whoses cauldron of knowledge he had tended.
She eventually caught him when he shapeshifted into a grain of corn on the threshing floor and she into a black hen that swallowed him. In truly Celtic fashion she gave birth to him again nine months later, but he was so beautiful she couldn't bring herself to kill him, so set him adrift on the ocean in a leather bag to the mercy of Manawyddan of the Sea. He was washed up in the fishing weir of the unlucky Elphin where even as a babe he spouted the wisdom of all his previous incarnations... I could go on (and on!) Deserves a post all of its own really!

Here is a rather beautifully illustrated book of Siegfried the Dragon Slayer - this one was quite expensive for me at the time but the colour plates inside are more than worth it!

This is a really great leather book cover I was given as a gift by someone who knows exactly what I'm interested in!

And finally the utterly stunning Book of Kells...

This is a very large book with beautiful detail. I've had it a good ten years or so but everytime I look at it I see something new, there's just so much hidden away within the text, I absolutely love it!
I particularly love the details you can see like this stitched repair in the vellum. I would love to see the real thing one day, and perhaps the Lindesfarne Gospels and the Yellow Book of Lecan as well... long shot! I can only hope...

Anyway this was either a really interesting post or a really boring one depending on how much you love old battered books! I certainly enjoyed digging them all out anyway!

Some more long lost writings - the Sun Shaper...!

2010-09-14T14:14:00.000-07:00

This is a post for Kate of Kit & Kaboodle, and Aaron-Paul of The Lost Forge of Albion who were both kind enough to say they would like to read more about my Bronze Master character Torvachyll from this previous post... Thanks for the encouragement there guys, hope you like these excerpts... I will try and get it to make sense, but it is again a bit chopped up and moved around!

Just to explain - I briefly mentioned Torvachyll became the last of his kin in the previous writing post, the exact details of which I won't go into here except to say that it was the Solar Talsiman I described being crafted in the first excerpt that blinded his enemies to him and left him (just barely) alive and alone...

Here is a brief bit following that... Looking back at it now, I may have been rather heavily influenced by certain passages of Beowulf here...!

As the red orb of the sun slowly sank to lower the world into darkness, Torvachyll carried a blazing torch to the pyres, setting it to the hoard of wood and watched the hungry flames surge into the night. The blood-smoke rose heavy with sparks to obscure the stars, a dark wind rising to a wild howling lament, whirling imperishable flame leaping higher and higher, quickening dark, a savage flame fed upon blood and perishing souls.

Torvachyll, last living of Modhrin’mos stood harsh and bright with pain upon the hillside, cast red with the funereal flame, his eyes savage with grief and fury as he uttered his heart’s oath, his voice shuddering with rage and gathering conviction.

“Terrible slaughter has carried into darkness dear Kin of mine

With dreadful stride to the shade of endless night.

Now the flames shall grow savage and the fire destroy the fair sweet forms they wore in life,

The stricken silence resounds, desolate, terrible, on shadowy wings to fan the flames.

I shall raise a wind to shake the stars

I shall be the bright arrow that burns the air

The flash of sunfire sundering the darkness.

As the lean wolf to the stag, I will stalk thee

As the Sun across the sky I will not be stayed.

Unto my life’s end,

I shall deliver retribution.”

----------------------

And next a bit of an interim to carry the passages of time...

The skies turned, white mantle of winter descending the heights to cover the charred circles bleak on the ground of Modhrin’mos, where no fires any longer were raised in defiance of the pitiless night. Stars pitted the void, remote in polar frost, they fell in slow precession upon the arc of their silvered traceries, a dim etched pathway cast across the closed eye of night.

And yet life returned to the ice stricken land, and earth, blood darkened opened its umber throat to fern and tender shoot. Timid green crept wakening over the atrocity - the blood burned soil of Modhrin’mos. Blackened circles and the stumps of trees that gaped axe-severed necks to the sky remembered, a desolate ruin upon the barren hillside – tree-reft and child-reft.

In the new and unaccustomed stillness where sky reached exposed places long hoarded by the fallen woodland, saplings spindled up from the stumps of their forebears to endure in their place the frosts of autumn and the bitter life-hungering hold of winter. The sun rose and set irrefutable upon its course ever westwards into reddening flame, until the cost of four winters had scoured the land and passed silent into memory.

……………………………

Ok, this next passage is the following part of the last exerpt of the previous posting and finally lets you in on what he was crafting... (I shall reitterate slightly)

....He reached for the crucible, always eager with the awe of reverence. Abandoning the steady roar of the bellows and with sweat beading from his sooted arms, running from his brow and into his eyes, he lifted the fiery vessel from the furnace. The ore-light glowed from his avid face, grim with concentration, the sweat-streaked muscles of his arms stood out, his grip steady and strong upon the antler tongs as he tipped the crucible. He began a deep chant - a dark strong timbre and sparks cascaded, motes of fire streaming over his blackened hands as the white blood of molten metals flowed into the carven stone mould before him.

The orb of the sun rose over the mountain and the flash of sunfire was blinding as the dawn rays struck the cascade of bright flowing metal. Its white-gold fury drank in the blaze and grew, impossibly brighter. The fiery heat slowly travelled up his arms, hotter and brighter as if it would blacken his bones. His muscles trembled and burned, sweat poured from him until at last he fell back, the empty crucible tumbling from his scorched grip as the dazzle of molten Sun's Blood began to fade.

Stunned and half blind, Torvachyll blinked up at the rising sun, a silent reverence stilling him in answer to its bright splendour. This would be no ordinary weapon. Soon he would see it born into the world from its dark husk of stone and discover its secrets of power, whether it would be a weapon worthy of vengeance. But by the restlessness burning within him he knew already its worth and all weariness dropped from him, he awaited in half dread the sight of it.

And when the low dusk fell upon the hillside of axe-riven trees, Torvachyll last among the clans brought his life’s work into the dimming world. Dark shroud of stone falling away, he lifted the bright weapon of Bronze, yet raw and ashen from the flames – a great triple bladed spear that caught the bloodlight of the westering sun, flashing red along the slim graceful length of its haft that glimmered with Runes and strange glyphs. He turned it in wonder and the dimming sun flashed from the triple curves of the spearhead. Its balance was perfect; it sang poised in his hand, even unfinished it begged for flight. He knew in that moment he would never again craft anything to match its like, that all else shaped by his hand would be lesser and crude when laid beside this weapon of power.

There was one further working that he would turn in his hands upon this dread-glorious weapon, a risky fusing of powers that he had considered long and fully before turning himself to such a task. He had known well cautiously of the ancient meteorite buried deep in the flank of the Black Mountain, he had seen the terrible wounds caused by those flakes and slithers washed down with the rains and miss-chanced upon by the unfortunate.

And carefully he had gathered those blue-black flakes, remembering well the affliction of Fastheach of the Na’Duaer who once long ago had taken a part of the Moonshard from the Mountain and nearly died but for the Wyrdteller’s fey wisdom. He knew well the myth – how the Moonspear had fallen miscast to strike the Mountain, and knew also the dangerous nature of its power. He had gathered only those chips and flakes of strange rock washed down from the Mountain’s flank with the rains, as in his search of the stream-beds for ores he had often in the past recognised and wisely avoided those glittering grains – no theft of the Mountain would he make.

He had ground the glittering chips of mica to powder until his hands bled in slightest contact with the Moons’ metal-ore. All his preparations were made – the time was now, into the blind unknown, whatever strangeness would come of it.

He heated the head of the mighty spear in the furnace’s charcoal embers until its tip glowed white in the twilight. Then with great care he pushed the spear tip into the glittering blue-white powder and with a violent hissing and flashing of sparks and fire, the mica fused onto the spear tip. Even as it cooled in the chill night air the white-gold elegance of the spear head showed its piercing tip bright and glinting with chill blue fire – at once deepest black and whitest light that ached and burned holes in the darkness.

And when Torvachyll looked at his work, despite his own fury for vengeance and truth upon his purpose, he shuddered with a sense of something fatal and of a path of fate set in motion that now became irrefutable, an oath never to forsake. The curving edge that he tried to focus upon shimmered black in the black air, a deadly presence screaming into the vast ancestral night, yet he closed his hand strong upon the smooth haft, welcoming its fury into his soul and binding his fate with its sudden waking power.

“I name you Vrakas – vengeance taker,

Kinsblood and Sunfire.

With your waking to the world, I arise,

As the wolf to the hunt.

My arm shall give you purpose”

Torvachyll uttered with grim fire as far above, black Modhrin’s shadow stretched cold over an unpeopled land, and the pale brindled wing of the buzzard watching there swept as a fleet shadow across the moons.

I have one more exerpt involving Torvachyll after he's left his remote ancestral lands which I am thinking of posting at some point soon-ish if anyone's still interested... Hope you liked it... I know my writing can get heavy going at times but I can't seem to help myself, its just the way I like to write - so it's all very much un-edited! Well, its been interesting revisiting these old works, hopefully at some point I'll get to work on some new works...!