Graffiti

Whilst trolling past a boarded up shop near one of my favourite junk shop haunts the other day I spotted some Banksy style stencil graffiti sprayed on the wood and whipped out my camera to capture it! ;o)

Demons Will Charm You

This is the textured canvas piece I blogged about a few posts ago. Rob has done a great job of capturing the depth of the layers in the piece. I worked with acrylic paints and glazes, inks & textured gels (glass bead and sand), collaged on some shapes cut from Latin Bible pages and added some vintage green resistors. The title of the piece comes from a song lyric from Sweeney Todd and reflects the moods and emotions I went through whilst creating it.


Detail of canvas.


Detail of canvas with resistors.


Detail of collaged papers.

Valentine's Day Gift

Some husbands bring their wives red roses on Valentine's Day, or a box of chocolates or maybe some lingerie but what precious gift did my husband bestow upon me? See below....



Yes, my husband brought me a load of vintage capacitors and resistors that he found in the shed which are of no use to him! LOL Unromantic? Nooooooo, they are a much much more welcome gift than any of those boring traditional things! I've already used some of the green babies to finish off the mixed media canvas piece I shared a little snippet of recently. ;o) I should have some pictures to share of it soon once the lovely Rob has photographed it for me. Watch this space!

Treasure Hunting!

Once the snowy conditions improved earlier this week I had a jaunt to Dowhnam Market, a town about 20 miles from here just over the border into Norfolk. My paternal grandparents retired to this town (from Essex) when I was a baby and so I spent a fair bit of my childhood there little knowing I would end up living so close by as an adult. I've always had a bit of a soft spot for Downham and always enjoy visiting. ;o) On Tuesday I popped into a little antique shop that I love to browse about in and found some delightful treasures! The shop is a series of little rooms run by a lovely, somewhat eccentric and always talkative, elderly lady. The rooms are packed to the gunnells with all manner of interesting fodder for a junkie of all things used like me! At the back of the shop is a room where all the less interesting (to others!) stuff is heaped on shelves and all over the floor. Rummaging about I found an ice cream box full of wooden pieces, covered in filth and long ignored, they were just desperate to be liberated! ;o)



The shop owner didn't remember where they came from but they look to me like they have come from a church. Any ideas? I haven't cleaned them up yet but alot of the pieces are painted gold in part. There was over 80 pieces in the box including some decorative brass upholstery pins and a sweet little trowel.

Also in the back room was a huge hanger, I estimated about 150, of different brass escutcheons, I would've loved to have bagged the whole lot (and may go back to bargain with her I think) but I couldn't afford her price so had to be content with these few babies:



I also found this lovely silver coloured piece amongst a heap of tins, I don't think it's real silver, it's certainly not hallmarked, and I'm not sure what it is, possibly a napkin ring, but I loved the pattern and think it'll be a base for a pendant. It's about 5 inches long now it's flattened out.



Whilst waiting for my haul to be wrapped it was pointed out to me that there were more shelves of goodies behind where I was standing so, of course, I found some more treasures to up my ever increasing bill! These keys are gorgeous:



There's 42 in the bunch, all different, and none of them are longer than an inch or so.

Last but not least, I found this set of rubber stamps:



They're all wood mounted and haven't seen much use by the look of them. Not really sure what they would've been for, connected with the weight of parcels maybe? They'll be fun to use in art journals and collage pieces. ;o)

I'm in the mood for more scavenging now....

Sexy Texture!

I'm working on a canvas in the studio, lots of delicious layers going on to it, acrylic paint, acrylic glazes, sand and glass bead textured gels and inks to date, all in deep purple and magenta tones with some blues thrown in. I have no idea where I'm going with it and I think there are lots more layers to be added yet but I thought I'd share a little pic of it in progress!

Inside and Out

So, this is what it's been doing most of this week! Not a sight we see that often in this neck of the woods! I'd like to say I've been warm and cosy in my studio but it's not much warmer in there than it has been outside! However I have been working on various things, at least until I lost all feeling in my fingers and toes when I'd retreat to the open fire to thaw out! LOL



This was the state of my desk after I'd finished getting ready for the exhibition last week! And the floor around it was pretty much the same so first task of the week was to reclaim some workspace. That job done, I've been working on a canvas, building layers with textured mediums, acrylic paint & glazes and ink. I'm undecided whether it will remain a painting or whether it will be a background that I attach an assemblage piece to. I have a few pics in the camera so will post some tomorrow.
Rob and I have talked about doing some collaborative work together involving his photographic images and I would create assemblage/collage frames. I've begun a frame to compliment this image of Rob's:



It's from a FenVAC art day visit to a spartan little church in a village near here. It just invokes tranquility to me and that's what I'm trying to convey with the frame as a compliment to the image. At the moment I have collaged Latin Bible pages to the frame as my base and I plan to add some stencilling in black before adding an assemblage piece, possibly incorporating a glass test tube. I'm trying to keep the frame monotone but I feel some accents of red may creep in!

Inspired by this post on Something Sublime, Deryn Mentock's blog, I've also started a jewellery art journal this week. I keep an ideas book but it's scrappy and all over the place so I'm going to use my new journal to record my many and varied jewellery ideas. ;o) I'm currently trying to work out some pieces that will appeal to men and finding it very difficult!

The Art of Love Preview

So, the day arrived at last and I hung the Art of Love exhibition on Friday morning. It took me nearly three times as long as I planned but I was happy with the results. Mounting exhibitions is fun although when you're not just doing it for yourself it becomes something of a responsibility! Fortunately Rob was as pleased as I was with the way the exhibition looked. ;o) Every time I hang an exhibition, be it for FenVAC, myself or for Rob and myself, I learn something new. Grasping the mechanics of how to best exhibit artwork is a steep learning curve but one I wouldn't miss being on!



Rob and I held a preview for the exhibition on Friday evening and it went really well. ;o) We both made sales, there were plenty of visitors, lots of chat and laughter and hopefully everyone had a great time!



These pictures (taken by Rob of course!) hopefully give you an idea of the exhibit. ;o) Chatteris library is a small community library and is a lovely space to exhibit in. Rob and I hope to exhibit in other libraries in the area during this coming year and bring our art to as many local people as possible. The exhibition is at the library until 14th February and we both hope lots of visitors will take the opportunity have a look at our work in a familiar, relaxed setting.