So what's the mamma jammer deal with a year of art?
It's all about inspiration and a love of creating. I create five pieces of art a week, one of which I'll show you how to do, this week's 'How To...' is a sweet and simple typography task. Lettering to the next level.
I'm taking my tasks from the fabulous artist and art author Lorna Scobie.
Wait a minute...
For those that are super spies, or just the slightly observant you might have noticed there's a bit of a time gap between Week 23 and Week 24. What the flying fudge is going on? I hear you ask. Well let's just say drawing every day, (except weekends, what I am a work horse?) takes a chunk of time, writing quippy snaps to go along with each art piece takes even more, can you see a theme? The point I'm most laboriously making is, time got tight. But with Covid-19 filling us all to the brim with fear goo and having to stay home a lot more I'm dragging this project over the line. Lets show that goo who's boss, by making beautiful, not so beautiful, and down right atrocious art. The point is to try so lets try together*. *That's my official sweetness limit hit, so lets make some mother forking art.
Day 116
Task; Write down the top three places you'd like to visit.
Monday 30th of March With the world locked-down tighter than Nun's chastity belt, this task seems rather cruel, but here we are. My two other spots, are New York, and Vietnam.
What you'll need
Thick Paper Watercolour pens
A Paintbrush
Colouring pencils
Step 1 Nice and simple write with the watercolour pen the word you're using. Don't be afraid to go over the word to create thick and thin lines. This isn't calligraphy, it's far more forgiving, as when we dampen the ink, (later) it will all blend nicely together.
Top tip: Thicken the straight lines while keeping the curls nice and thin.
Step 2
We're going to add a shadow line to the word to add interest. Think about where the 'sunlight' would hit the word if it was 3D and shade in the opposite side. I picked a sky blue to go with the soft pink, because those two colours remind me of the cherry blossoms. Colours that go well together: Orange and Blue Green and Yellow Orange and Teal Purple and Green Red and Pink (And that my one list per blog post, it's a thing I'm do now, roll with it.)
Step 3
Take your clean paintbrush and wet it. Lightly go over the words and shading and let the ink blend together. Let it dry. Now pick a colouring pencil a shade darker than the main colour, light pink+dark pink. The patterns will show up better.
Have a go at different combos and styles: art is all about experimenting, so go with what you like the idea of.
Day 117
Task: Look at plants individually, rather than seeing a scene as a whole and draw.
Tuesday 31st of March
I always loved botanists journals of old where explorers went to strange places and doodled their way around all the bat shit crazy animals and plants out there. But since I'm not getting out of old Blighty any time soon or even the house, I thought it would be spiffing to create an outer space travel journal, and just make some shit up.
Say hello to planet 398.58b of the Andromeda Galaxy, (our neighbours with their showy off extension*) I drew the images and then scanned the whole thing, added some text with Adobe Illustrator and Voila! My own crazy botanist journal of made up shit.
*Andromeda Galaxy has a diameter of about 220,000 light-years, making it the largest member of the Local Group at least in terms of extension, if not mass. See the joke now...? Did you see it, it's a play on the word extension, like the idea of a galaxy needing a conservatory is hilarious, but also Andromeda has the largest extension of all our local galaxies, so it's a play on words... well you get it. You get it.
Day 118
Task: Put some music on, take a coloured pencil, close your eyes, (seriously) and draw
Wednesday 1st of April
Let the chaos begin. These kinds of tasks are tricky, because when it comes to art I'm a control freak. An obsessive perfectionist who my close friends wouldn't recognise. Which I guess is what the task is all about 'letting go' and how letting go can lead you somewhere amazing. I don't think that's panned out with this art work though. I was trying to draw people dancing but just looks like a pissed up-orgy of stick men.
Day 119
Task: Paint some skies
Thursday 2nd of April
For Sky number one Cilla*I used watercolours and then lobbed a load of salt at it, because... I'm a weird and quirky artist (and it also creates that strange lighting effect on the paint, which looks cool) but it's mainly it's because I'm rebel scum. For sky number two, I went classic and swirled my paints like a swirly whirly twirly thing.
And last but not least for Sky number three I just drew a space cow... because. That's why.
*For my none British readers or just anyone born after 2003 which means you'll be 17 now, and I hate you Cilla presented the UK version of Blind Date.
Day 120
Task: Draw Strawberries with different materials.
Friday 3rd of April
Using a single object to highlight all the different ways you can draw a strawberry. Just when you think, 'Well I've used felt tips, ink and watercolours what else can there be?' BANG! What would oil pastels would look like? And then you think what if I created a strawberry with a watercolour base and then colouring pencil over the top? The possibilities as they say are... er... forever... no that's not right... unfathomable? No well you get the idea.
That's it folks
... Join me next Friday where I get, all natural, play with rug design and show you how to create your very own painted forest. I love to see your arty creations so head on over to Twitter and tag the shit out me. I'm also technically on Instagram but the social norms there confuse me, like life really.
If you can't wait until next week for more art, here is where it all began. Week 1.
