Small Stones.... fragments and thoughts, wingbeats in sun...

Shining Crows

                   Glinting

Like facets of anthracite

                      in the wind-bladed light,

Mobbing a Prince of the Air

                      with relentless irreverence.

Words by Carrie - February 2013

 

I have been thinking for a while now as a bit of a prompt or a discipline of sorts, to properly stick to a regular 'Small Stone' post, maybe at least once a week, both to keep the writing part of my mind open and fluid, and to try to make more frequent visits to my poor neglected blog!

A 'small stone' as I'm sure many of you are familiar with, is like a moment of distilled perception, a fragment, the words or thoughts that fall into your mind when you truly look or feel and respond to the world in its unfolding, in a moment in time.

This is very much the way I have always written anyway, before I ever heard the term 'small stone' and it suits me well. I used to never be without a notebook and pencil or scrap of paper wherever I went. A thought or a fleeting observation would scrawl its way into my notebooks in fragments. Sometimes that small fragment would spark on into another one and then open a meandering trail that might lead into a story. Sometimes I would gather various fragments up like pieces of a puzzle and discover the thread to bind them together into something other with a life of its own.

My most recent two stories for children that I have written were each sparked from a single small stone, a phrase or two that sparked an entire wild journey of words and images - one maybe a little flintier than the other! 

I love the unexpected leaps and turnings these moments of absorbed perception can take, and often love the fragments alone just for the shape and sound of their words.

This one arrived as I was watching a magnificent young Buzzard in the field beside our house, utterly confounded and grounded for all his broad brindled strength, by a pair of very bold derisive crows.

They would not let him be, every time he tried to take wing they would dive down and harry him relentlessly. He was outdone! He was forced to remain grounded for a good half hour or so in our field which gave me a rare good view of him... Eventually with expansive evasive manouvering he managed to flee to the woods hotly pursued by his jeering tormentors!

So, the first stone posted - I will endeavour to add another each week, and if I'm feeling really pro-active I might even start up a 'sketch-a-day' exercise and fill up those sketchbooks too!

Easter Dragons and Raven Prophets....

Here's a very happy Easter Dragon for you by Elora age 7...
It seems the Easter bunny still managed to find us at our new house which is great because we love Easter Egg Hunts!

I hope you've all enjoyed a Happy Easter Day! Signs of Spring are gathering every day, the Blackthorn blossoms in the hedgerows are flowering, birds nesting, trees are budding new green leaves... will it be Ash or Oak this year I wonder?

Oak before Ash we're in for a splash,
Ash before Oak we're in for a soak!

Though with hose pipe bans already and hard cracked earth we could do with a soak even though the early sunshine has been lovely...

April Oaks and Ash

Here's a picture of the Badger tracks Elora found last week on one of our spring walks, if you look closely there seem to be big badger tracks and small badger tracks here going in different directions...

And finally the temptations that come of running your own gallery got the better of me this weekend with this wonderful creature, made by local Bath ceramicist David Craddock...
This particular sculpture came in to our shop just when I was in the midst of my Huginn & Munnin Raven series of paintings, and has been whispering to me to take him home ever since!

So home he came to keep watch over his Crystal Hoard and to gaze enigmatically out over the woods where the Buzzards roost....


I feel he needs a name but have a feeling he will choose his own when the time is right... meanwhile the shadow-rustle of dusky feathers and wry taunting croak of glitter-eyed prophets fill my imagination with omens and half-heard mythologies, a whisper of wingbeats in the half-light...

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

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!

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!

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!

Huginn & Muninn II ...

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...

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

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 :)