paintings prints and stuff

error corrected - that doorway, gouache and tinted charcoal pencil Looking at that doorway again, I realised that with talking, teaching and not paying proper attention, I'd got the proportions of that downpipe way out!  I'd been reading it as a dark piece of wall (working from a photo in the warmth  in class on this one and I doubt if I'd have been so silly if I'd been working from life, bad print on typing paper too). So .... it was a case of washing out the offending area to narrow the pipe and then adding the sliver of bricks  and matching the suggestion of the steel shutters.  Thank goodness it's easy to lift paint from the S&B paper because of its brilliant sizing.  So today's class had a demo of washing out mistakes!

 Biro (ballpen) urban sketches in A4 sketchbook I've had a few sessions of waiting for family while they attend appointments.   Rather than be bored I've taken to sketching from the car while I wait - good practice for perspective even if not an exciting drawing in itself.   I think I'm going to keep this A4 wirebound sketchbook in the car for these times of boredom. and one I showed earlier, part of this series ...... more to follow.

Holly Cottage, Loddington. mixed media. Vivien Blackburn Yesterday I went with 2 friends to sketch in the garden of one of their friends who recently bought this gorgeous cottage. I decided early on that whereas my friends concentrated on eliminating the scaffolding, (up for the re-thatching) and re-inventing what was underneath, that I'd draw it as-was. I just did sketches (having lugged all but the kitchen sink ' just in case!' - oils, watercolours. charcoal, coloured pencils, several sizes of sketchbook ........) In the end I only used pencil, watercolour and a very little coloured pencil. I don't often 'do' architecture, simply because I love freer, more flowing landscape so it was a challenge. The cottage was built in 1673 with stone and brick from the earlier village nearby, wiped out by the Black Death. The houses were then burnt down, I suppose to stop the spread of the disease? The date is carved into the beam above the fireplace. It was last r