Tag: colour

Portrait painting

Picking up paints again after a very long hiatus. I can’t say it feels like returning to an old friend. Painting always seems like a fencing duel to me – one in which you never quite know the rules. This study is just a progression from doing a lot of pencil portraits. I’m just trying to get better at drawing faces.

Painting like this is completely different to drawing. It feels alien, but my new found portrait/face study knowledge helped me get a result I’m reasonably happy with.

I think about the above a lot when painting. I was never taught to paint, but surrounded by many people who learned it academically. This always makes me feel like an outsider, or that I’m doing it wrong.

All I know is it’s just a journey and you have to ignore the doubt. Just listen to your own inner voice and follow that.

by Nathan Categories: ArtworkTags: , , , , ,

Scrumped Apples

Scrumped these apples in Youlgreave, Derbyshire. Apple trees everywhere and apples just falling and rotting.

There was an apple pressing session in the Village Hall. Prerequisite old dears in chairs around the edge, having a natter whilst the apples were being hand pressed.

The queue of people with bags and boxes of windfalls got bigger. The pressing was slow business. There were two apple pies in slices for donation. Perplexingly, there was just half a cup of fresh apple juice for donation too. It was delicious, but there should have been more! We were surrounded by hundreds of apples.

I met the man who planted the apple trees I’d taken these from. He planted them 40 years ago. They were not in his garden, but he was delighted the apples would not go to waste.

Image is A3, drawn in Prismacolor pencils.

by Nathan Categories: ArtworkTags: , , , ,

Life drawing

Just found in an old portfolio. It’s a conté crayon life drawing from classes in Liverpool. I was 19 at the time.

Sometimes you imagine your old work not being very good. I’m definitely better at drawing now, but I’m pretty proud of my 19 year old ability to proportion a human body as good as this.

I can’t remember the model’s name-apologies, this is rare for me. In the drawing breaks, she’d walk around in a floral dressing gown critiquing everyone’s work – a real character. Those weekly classes were a lot of fun.

by Nathan Categories: ArtworkTags: , , , , , ,