Different materials

Getting into a more autumnal mood has made me think about more natural colours and materials, using the colours inspired by the fig painting I painted a stone and placed it onto different materials. I was very happy that my painted stone on slate image was chosen by emma lamb for one of her colour your monday happy posts, from the all colours in group on Flickr.

Painted Stone on slate

Painted Stone on Paper

Bits and Pieces

I have been having a bit of a clear out today emptying the drawers and cupboards in my studio, I realised that I keep far to many bits and pieces and I need to be ruthless.

I keep a lot of jars with bits of paint residue on them, I like the colours on this one.

Bits of paint that collect on my knives.

A dried rose.

An old piece of machine embroidery.

The rose reminds me of a few lines from one of my favourite poems.

That the future is a faded song, a royal rose or a lavender spray
Of wistful regret for those who are not yet here to regret,
Pressed between yellow leaves of a book that has never been opened.
And the way up is the way down, the way forward is the way back.


From Four Quartets, The Dry Salvages, T.S. Eliot

I think I will put this all back in my cupboard and leave the decision until another day.!!

Would like to see

The new Grayson Perry exhibition on at the British Museum, The Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman. Artefacts made by unknown men and women from the museums collection are intertwined with Grayson's own work. Also visit the very witty blog of Grayson's 50 year old bear Alan Measles. The exhibition is on until the 19th February so plenty of time to fit this in.

Also the new Gerhard Richter exhibition Panorama on at Tate Modern until the 8th January. This is a major retrospective of this very diverse painter and includes his realist paintings, colourful gestural abstractions and paintings that respond to significant moments in history, it looks like there is much to see and enjoy in this exhibition.

BETTY

A couple of smaller exhibitions are:
Elaine Pamphilon and her partner sculptor Christopher Marvell on at the Medici Gallery in London this finishes on the 8th November. I like this more abstract piece of Elaine's.

HERE I AM SITTING ON THE BEACH WATCHING THIS WAVE AND STEVE IS TALKING POLITICS

WINGED BIRD

And Through the Garden Gate is a new Exhibition of paintings by Cornish artist David Pearce, showing at Cadogan Contemporary in London. I really like the limited palette of these paintings, beautiful soft earthy tones and very reminiscent of Roger Hilton. This exhibition finishes on 5th November.

MOOR HENS AND  MUSK MALLOW

AMONGST THE RUSHES

There is not a great deal of information on Roger Hilton but I have a great book called THE FIGURED LANGUAGE OF THOUGHT by Andrew Lambirth published by Thames and Hudson. Also found this great video of Rose Hilton (Roger's wife) talking about  the recent centenary exhibition held at Newlyn Art Gallery. Beautiful paintings and I am a real fan.

Fig

Having decided that it was time to embrace Autumn I had lots of plans this week for outdoor sketching, photography and collecting lovely dry crisp leaves. Unfortunately the weather has a different plan for me, one of staying indoors out of the rain. We have had constant rain since Friday and all our Autumn leaves are decidedly soggy!! I have decided to do some watercolours starting with some beautiful figs.

Embracing Autumn

The weather is changing again so I decided it was time to embrace autumn. Yesterday I picked up a few leaves and a lovely flower or berry head, not sure what it is but it starts of with the pink petals closed up like a pod and when it opens it has orange berries inside.

Another Palette

More sketching and just having fun, not trying to think to much about the actual paintings but trying to get the colours and composition right. I am working on some paintings and will post some photos soon.

Colour Palette

Had a back to basics day yesterday, sketching with pencil, charcoal, ink and graphite, and then working on some colour palettes. It was a beautiful day sitting outside surrounded by all my lovely paints and pastels.