Archive
Autumn moves swiftly on………..
This has been such an odd autumn; it seems to have been divided into two halves, the crisp bright extra summer of September and then the relentless rain of autumn for this month. I remember arriving at university for the first time in October and the campus was glowing with autumn sunshine that year. The roundabout in front of the hall of residence had a glorious clump of frail but bold autumn crocus …at least twice the size of their spring cousins. How much gloomier it is to make a new start in the drab rain of this autumn, if the crocus are still there they will plastered to the mud and eaten by slugs or woodlice. This morning however the rain is absent and the sun is making the leaves reflect their subtle changes against a fresh blue sky.
It’s time to plant some bulbs, I have white hyacinth to bed out and white alliums together with dwarf iris, species tulips and some extra Tulipa New Design. Both bulb orders came with free offers so I have in addition some daffodils and extra iris. For my birthday I asked for Sempervivens and a pot to put them in …I got the pot and as luck would have it Lidl were selling six packs of Sempervivens for £5. I will probably under plant with dwarf iris as the leaves will not make a squidgy mess when the flowers are finished.
I have been to London to attend the private view of the Society for Graphic Fine Art Open. It has been very interesting, it could be a society to try and join in order to exhibit on a regular basis. However there are the economics to consider…my current pictures are quite small and therefore must have a smaller price tag but membership and the hanging fees are flat rate (up to a certain point) so doing only smaller works is therefore not as cost efficient as larger works could be, on the other hand reasonably priced smaller works must sell better on average as more people will consider them affordable. It would be good to make my hobby pay some of its own costs. I loved an etching of a prawn in the exhibition- wonderful lines and sugar lift which has an effect I really love. Naturally the only plate I used it on was one which I never did get to come right!
Stags horn fern and stag beetles come to mind looking at these- drawn approx. life size on cartridge with ink, pencil and coloured crayons.
Some time back I found an odd cluster of hazelnuts which were more baroque than the normal variant. This year I found the tree that they come from and have identified it as Turkish hazel, I wondered then if it might be drawn in ink and here are some bits from my sketch book (above). Previous sketch: https://lemonaday.com/2011/11/11/hazelnut-cluster/ #232
Something in the post……….and something rich and strange
This is rather nice, an old lemon has been accepted for the Annual Open Exhibition of the Society for Graphic Fine Art in London. It’s a sketch in ink and wash I did last autumn after taking lovely aunt for a jaunt to the coast at Shoreham in Sussex; it was a very stressful time as lovely aunt was becoming quite ill by that stage but she still enjoyed herself and pottered around the market entranced by the best stalls. The peppers were originally posted in April this year as I did not have posting time last autumn #218. https://lemonaday.com/2014/04/07/dry-orange-chillies-on-the-table/
The exhibition is in the Menier Gallery where they used to do something far more worthy…they used to make chocolate, sorry I am being silly they actually raise money to get art into hospitals. The exhibition runs 6th October to 18th October 2014.
Now for the rich and strange…this is not my definitive take on Begonia Escargot but I enjoyed making it especially the textured wash background as it involves several interludes for tea or coffee while the paint dries under clingfilm. #229
Lemon a day 