Friday 30 January 2009

Nice Jumper young man.

Stuffed Treats.

I went to the Horniman Museum last weekend, and saw hundreds of beautiful stuffed creatures. I have never seen anything like it in my life and of course i took hundreds of pictures which i will be inspired by for future works. I just thought i would share some of the best with you now.

Is he not the most funniest little creature you have ever seen??? I sure wouldn't want that little pesky thing running over my feet in the dark!


These were breathtakingly amazing! I LOVE THEM

There was just so much more like the insides of monkeys and pigeons and every type of bird you could possibly imagine and a massive..............walrus, you could even see the stitches down its front from where they stuffed it. If your near Forest Hill soon then go and see it. Its all done in such a timeless fashion as well, i hope they never change the displays.

Thursday 22 January 2009

Sweet Dreams!

On my way home this evening, just before i arrived at my destination, i noticed this sweet little man asleep on the train, obviously struggling so much to do his crossword that he fell asleep with exhaustion. I took a picture of course ( i love that feeling when your prying on a stranger and your adrenaline starts pumping because you think you'll get caught) and i just thoght i would share this little moment with you!


I really have to get back into taking photographs of interesting people, i have let it lapse since leaving university. Watch out ill be snapping away round the corner from you!!!!

Wednesday 21 January 2009

A delicious dinner date.

The Fox

and the Chicken


simply love to eat together!

Monday 19 January 2009

Blue Monday

So according to sources, today is supposed to be the most depressing day of the year, i have to admit i have felt a little sultry today, this feeling was added to when i got to my boyfriends and was informed that Tony Hart had died today age 83.


It got me thinking about the importance of HartBeat when i was a wee little nipper. I was rather young at this time but i have very fond memories of watching Hartbeat with my older sisters. And ofcourse one of the key characters was indeed dear little Morph. Morph simply brilliant and captured the imagination of young children and was a fantastic example of animation. A cheeky mischievious plastecine man and a iconic friend of Tonys, everyone loved Morph.

Then there was probably the most frustrating part of the show, the......................Gallery .Every childs heart would be beating faster as the music began and the camera started to shift along the wall showing all the entries. Every week children would be dissapointed if there picture wasnt up there but then the feeling if you were one of the lucky ones would have been the best moment in your life to date and every girl and boy in school would be envious of your success as an artist!!!! I dont think i know anyone who was lucky enough. I'm sure i didn't submit anything, i dont think i would of been quite confident enough and i was and i am still a perfectionist, so i never would of been happy with my drawing attempts and most certainly would of stamped my feet and got in a rotten temper if i wasnt chosen.

HartBeat was a great way to engage children with there artistic skills along with Art Attack. The imaginative giant collages using materials suh as paper cups to a garden hose were very resourceful and innovative. It was always so exciting guessing what it was going to be, a man climbing a mountain? or a big red tractor ploughing a field. I also have memories of trying things out from these such programmes and getting extremely cross because i wasnt able to do it (stamps her feet firm on the ground)




Children's drawings like the one above are some of the best pieces of work ive ever seen. I love them. There is such an imaginative naive quality exposed, and you know that they would of probably been finished in about 10 mins rather than hours. When i was at University i noticed myself regressing as an artist and beininning to enjoy some of the free qualities of drawing you have when you're young. I am still keeping hold of some of those qualities as i work now and one of my favourite artists at the moment is my 4yr old nephew Arthur, ill have to upload some of his captivating dinosaurs with stumpy legs, i may even try to do a collaboration with him, im pretty sure he would be the boss of me!!!

Thinking about all of these memories has brightened up Blue Monday and has given me some good ideas, so R.I.P Tony Hart, i'm sure you were an inspration to many artisits of my generation.

Sunday 18 January 2009

Sunday Birds....

Here are a couple of right birds! Was just discussing with my other half about going to the natural history museum to see all the Taxidermy birds, ive never been and i have a little weakness for stuffed animals.
Mr.Robin
Mrs Blue Tit


I wonder why its so satisfying to draw birds??Its nearly as satisfying as drawing little human creatures.

Saturday 17 January 2009

Handmade Books............

A few pages from my book about my very good friend James who i lived with at university. As you can tell my work usually centres around other people and strangers, you can call it an obsession if you like??

Click Nose. Ribbon Hand.
Food Fingers.
Here is James.

The Bearded Man book. I have a slight obsession with bearded men so................... i decided to make a book.




This book was about my dear friend Thomas Brooks, whom i also lived with. Each of the books about the boys captured certain aspects of their personalities that gripped me and would also be interesting glimpses for the viewer, as a stranger to them.

Hello


To start off my adventure on Blogger here are some images from my Degree Show in Summer 2008.

Shown here is the left hand wall, displaying about 34 framed pieces of work, most are drawings of people i had observed, including faces, hands feet etc. There were also small frames with text in. The text explained written descriptions of other strangers i had observed , what time i saw them, the date and where.


This shows the right hand wall of my space with another one of my large characters ( this lady was of my favorites that i photographed, she was angry with her child on the beach and was tugging at its leg). The shelves here were displaying five handmade books.




These are a couple of stranger men i photographed and drew on white bread and butter paper using black fine liner and felt tip. The technique i used made the illusion that they could actually be prints., which was very effective.