A Mural For Kenilworth

In the Summer I spent time painting a mural for Clinton Primary school in Kenilworth.

This large area is their new art zone with several music rooms leading from it. I wanted to paint the landscapes that inspire me, the ones from my own childhood memories, the landscapes in Warwickshire and the changing seasons.

I hope these murals will inspire the children in art, music, dance and poetry.







From Stitching To Painting

I thought I would get back to some painting this week, again working from studies I made around Kenilworth in my sketch book.
This is quite large, A1 size, so I used a big brush with plenty of inks and water colour.

Tree Shadows & New Painting

The holidays have given me more time to spend on my art work, although I have taken to hiding the washing upstairs in a big pile and ironing as and when!
I have been stitching my ' Tree Shadows' piece which has flowed, in a very organic, rhythmical way, through the machine.

I have also been sketching and painting,' A Sea Of Grass' my most recent work, which holds many thoughts.

Yesterday I booked my tickets for my Mum and I to visit The Festival Of Quilts in Birmingham.
This will be my first visit and I'm so looking forward to seeing the fine art quilts and a day out!

Landscape Painting

The first week of the summer holidays and all we have had is cloud and rain!

My sister and I took our dogs and children for a walk through the fields and I not wishing to miss an opportunity, took some photo's of the landscape.

The fields had been full of blue flowers which I had sadly missed, but they had gone over to reveal a beautiful pale colour green, a perfect shade with the purple Borage and pink grass.
We walked to Kenilworth castle and I love this view through the trees.

When we returned home I started to do some more painting and sketching inspired by our walk.
Fingers crossed the weather improves!

May Stitching & Painting

Here is a painting I did early last week based on a few sketches I made and also partly my imagination.
It was nice to have a change and to experiment with my paints.

The last few days we have had blue skies and warm sunshine, Summer feels real at last, not just a distant memory and it feels good.
We have beautiful yellow fields here in May and the trees are full of blossom, my favourite time of year.
This has had a direct influence on my mood and colour choices and so I continued with my Matisse inspired brooches.
I do hope Summer stays with us longer this time.

Inspired By Landscape

Close up of foreground

Close up of sky

Oil Pastel Sketch

I have managed to list one of my paintings in etsy today for the first time.Here

This painting on paper is a combination of acrylic and oil pastel.

In shades of blue, green and purple.

Looking to the distance, a view from my imagination.

I think I may have to stitch this too, I keep seeing it in thread!

The oil pastel sketch is the magnolia tree in our garden.

It was bitter cold outside, the snow had started to fall as I gazed out the window.

The colours, I think, reflect the freezing temperature.

You will also find other items I have listed on etsy today, post cards and a few small brooches.

The sun today has been very welcome, although according to our weather short lived.

I hope you have a great weekend.x

Time To Paint

We thought the snow was going to skirt us by, but on Wednesday morning it was quiet, sounds muffled by the blanket of snow.

The next excitement was finding out school was closed, the children's and the school I work at.

So we were out early to the local park, wrapped up, like a pass the parcel , including me with three pairs of woolly socks!

Here is our Snowman playing football , the goalie otherwise known as "Snowlie".

Can you spot the snowball?

I can tell you, it took quite a lot of throwing to get that shot!

The afternoon was spent trying to get warm again and drying hat, scarves & gloves which were strewn over all the radiators in the house!

I wanted to make the most of this bonus day at home so I got my paints out and painted this landscape from ideas in my sketchbook.

I hope your having a good week and keeping warm.

From Paint To Threads

SOLD

I have been working from my sketch book again this week.

You can see how my threads become my sketches or is it my sketches become my threads?

My work can alter as I move between the two mediums.

I may still add more stitches to this piece.

Tomorrow I am helping to set up the A'level and community artist's work for our annual art exhibition.

So this may be used in the display.

It's count down to the end of the school term and it's going to be a busy week.

I hope I will be able to share some of the exhibition work with you.

Hope you have a great weekend.

Sketches

Happy Easter to anyone who may pop in and visit my blog and a big thank you for your kind comments.

Thank you also for some recent tags, sorry I have been a bit slow on the uptake.

I will try and do them this week as I am on holiday...at home.

We have been visiting family the last few days and I did manage to do some sketching so here they are.

I have used a mixture of paint, oil pastels and soft pastels in these drawings.

The tree drawing is from my imagination and the lavender field is inspired by an old post card with some added trees.

I can completely loose all track of time when I'm painting, my husband thinks I am in a trance like state, almost like I have been hypnotised.

I hope to have some more stitching to show you this week, but now it's back to eating chocolate!

Painting Trees

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I thought you may be interested in some of my tree paintings.

You can view my paintings on flickr, but not everyone uses flickr and some blog friends may not have seen them.

It helps to look back at past work to see how you develope your ideas.

I do so want my embroidery to come 'alive'

Hope the start of your week has been a good one.

Embroidery Painting

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I'm working from one of my paintings at the moment.

I will try and add my Christmas brooch to etsy and do my shopping list Saturday tonight.

There are never enough hours in the day and the light is not good for taking pictures.

I had better start making our dinner otherwise it will be cheese on toast tonight!

Painted Stitches

Hi,

The next stage of working is painting.

So this is a painting I have been working on along side my textile work.

Again the light is so dim , nearly dark! when I took these pictures.

Hope you have a good start to your week.x

Colourful Thursday

Hi,

This evening I have been working again on my embroidery paintings.

It was dark when I took these pictures so I propped them up on the sewing machine.

It's amazing how many ideas come from one painting, I wish I had more time.

I sometimes work also in reverse and paint from my embroideries.

Is my mark making like I paint or is it like I sew?

It just flows from one to the other and evolves as I go.

I will add to etsy tomorrow.

Painting With Threads

Just a quick post to show how my embroidery is coming along.

I wanted to use the strong , rich colours from my painting so I have embellished pure silk on to the wool felt.

I wish you could see the lustre of the silk , it is so beautiful to use.

It measures 10cm x 13cm.

A few more stitches to add and then it will be finished.

I did the original painting in Italy, a wonderful place called Alassio.

Little Art Works And Me

Painting in sketch book

Embroidery on felt

Dusted!

Today I actually did some dusting, I know it's amazing when I have so much stitching and painting to do!

Here I am on the mantle piece , yes the black and white photo!

Taken about 1969.

Not sure I'm brave enough to show a picture now, but maybe I should as I'm only going to look less young the longer I leave it.

Note I say less young, sounds better than older!

Now I know I'm getting older, when my thirteen year old daughter comes home with her new purchase ....Leg Warmers! they are all the rage apparently.

I have been working on this small art piece 8cm x 8cm approx.

My larger embroideries take months of work so I'm trying out different ideas using my paintings as inspiration.

What do you think?

I may add a few to etsy and see if any one would be interested.

I will be working on some ideas from this painting next.

So hope to have some thing new to show you soon.

It's been raining here most of the day so a good day to be creative.

Bye for now.x

Painting And Some Stitching

I did manage to get to life drawing this week but we had a lady with clothes on!

So this is more of a portrait.

I painted with acrylic and used some oil pastels.

She looked quite a formidable character, a stern staring expression.

I hope she never sees this!

To brighten up the page here is the felt picture I'm working on.

I am now adding some hand stitching, sorry the picture is not brilliant as the light was fading.

I will take some more pictures tomorrow in daylight.

Lastly my friend gave me this pattern from the 1950's.

I love it!