The first time with the cricut

 Usually I bake for the father's day stall at the school, but I'm on the tail end of the flu that's been doing the rounds, and nobody needs to be exposed to that...

Yesterday I went to Kmart. Bought some $1 jars, $1 mugs and some chocolates.

Any other donated sachets and chockos or handmade biscuits will be packaged up today by other Mums aren't getting over the seasonal plague.

The cricut got a workout last night.

No, I did not create the SVG file myself. Why spend 30 hours if youré feeling under the weather when I can buy the digital files on etsy for $1.97?

If time is money, you can do the maths!

I hope you're getting ready for Father's Day in your own way.

Eddie Koiko Mabo Library

What a way to combine architecture and landscape while sitting in a bush setting!

Today's drawing was so fulfilling. I also made a time lapse video (see it on my Tik Tok @bizarrequilter).

Page 8 of 40 in my personal visual diary challenge.

 

After school drop off I went for a walk through the local university. I had my beach trolley containing drawing materials, easel, table and chair, and a thermos!

I enjoyed a blissful time sitting in the dappled sunlight. I can see how my use of colour can change the image!

I saw roses painted this way....

 I saw roses painted this way, so I thought I'd try it with my pastels.

Another 33 images to go.

Drawing no. 7. A bunch of roses from the Blue Water plant show a couple of weeks ago.

I'd seen roses painted with a similar look, and loved it. So why not try with chalk pastel?

Yes.... I'm inspired by peoples winning flower and vegetable entries. Vegetables will definitely come.

The Marriage of Trees

 As a family we went out to the bush (our block of land), for some fresh air. A chance to sit and draw.

I took my easel, table and chair, while the boys wandered about exploring and making plans.

These two trees were so close, they seem to be intertwined as though married. 

I can almost feel how this would go in paint, rather than pastel. I can't wait to blend and layer the colours, using opacity and transparency for effect.

Can you see what I mean in these trees?

Newspaper and plaster as a sculpture

These were so much fun, I can hardly tell you!!

Brief: use newspaper and sticky tape to create a bird or animal to create a plaster cast.

 First, you screw up newspaper and wrap it in tape to hold its shape. This is the newspaper armature.

We were creating birds, I tried to create a flying bird... let's see what you think of it.

Next use overlapping pieces of plaster bandage (Same as in a plaster cast) to cover the armature.

In some ways, it looks more like a dugong, it's a bit hard to see with my hand on it.

This was quite a fun and inexpensive activity. Would you try it at home?

The plant market

 We went to a local plant festival! 

Tropical plant sellers from all over gathered in Townsville. So we drove out to Bluewater Community Centre and took a trolley for our shopping. We picked up quite a few tropical fruit trees for our garden.

I also took photos of the floral display competition, and turned one of them into a drawing.

The glass bottle turned out to look a little too simple, maybe I need to make the clear bottle all white. It had a white background in real life, so I can start to see how the artist chooses the composition with alterations. Not all artwork has to be true to real life.

It's not a photo, we can edit the background without using photoshop.

I do like the way I created a wall and table cloth behind. There is so much to learn!

New Spooky Shirt

 Another new spooky shirt for the kiddo.

He's been wearing last year's Halloween ones the most, for all this year!

I think I can make a couple more before the next Halloween.

I love to make him unique clothes that nobody else has, that are to his tastes only.

Make it Margaret Preston style....

 Make it Margaret Preston style, but do it in pastel.

These plants are blooming throughout my neighbourhood, attracting bees and birds. I picked up a piece bitten off by cockatoos and brought it home to my front yard for drawing practise.

I love the way the leaves turned out. 

I do see a bit of Margaret Preston style - she made woodblock prints of mostly Australian plants, then painted them with colour. The black background nods to this style.

You can see a time lapse video of the drawing on Tik Tok - username @bizarrequilter

A landscape study

 I work out!

Ha! Photo taken on morning bike ride.

A study on perspective. Keeping on working at building my drawing skills.

There's a time lapse video on my tik tok - see @bizarrequilter

The Fruit Image

Today's adventure exploring light and skill building.

I've set up a still life composition with our haul from the local market.

I love the way the pineapple turned out, but I'd like to improve the watermelon somewhat.

It's just the beginning! We must start where we are!

 

An experiment with colour and pastel

 I've bought a new black A3 art journal, and I'm using the soft pastels I already have. 

I want to build my drawing skills, so it's time to practise at home.

 

I snapped this photo on my morning bike ride.

First landscape with chalk (soft) pastel.

First impressionist style image.

You can see the creative process on my Tik Tok account @bizarrequilter.

I cannot wait to do this with paint! But I haven't started painting lessons yet.

Sacred yoni relief tile

As part of my art course, I've created a relief tile in buff raku clay.

The mood board is a theme I've always been interested in.

I created a number of thumbnail drawings, then on the day (today), I found that not all of them were easy to create in the medium.

So I used my moodboard and thumbnail drawings to tweak and revise the original idea.

This is what I came up with.

The sacred feminine and our lady of Guadalupe has always been a special theme for me, so it made sense to put it into a tile.

When I researched relief sculpture, I found I preferred sculptures with recessed sections. So this design allowed me to really cutaway in the centre to create that contrast with the recessed areas.

I'm looking forward to seeing this dried as greenware, then bisque fired. After that we underglaze and it gets fired again.

 

Life update

Drawing as often as possible.

These are marker drawings, no erasuares, and my first portraint drawings. More practise is needed of course, but we have to start somewhere.

The orange cat is our one eyed kitty, who returned after being lost for 2 months. The quilt in progress Here, Kitty Kitty is named after him.

And our bare rooted fruit trees arrived, and are now potted in big garbage bins with holes in the bottom. 

Hello Kitty!

More pots for growing pineapples and such.

yes, this is all in the front yard, there's not even room for the trampoline in the back yard. I feel like we are the Goodes from The Goode Life 70s tv show. I loved that show, very inspiring.

 

Different types of drawing

Exploring different types ot mark making here in drawing class. Using a marker, so there is no rubbing out, just adding to marks. Not erasing them. 

I'm really feeling the push to practise drawing at home. 

You can see some videos on my instagram @bizarrequilter of time lapse videos using soft pastel.

Charcoal. Oh! I really don't like working with black so much!

Some days drawing and cooking use all my creative mojo!

I feel like my art journey will greatly affect my textile art output, so I will add this to my blog.

It will be interesting to look back, and see how I might have been influenced by skill building in other areas.