Fresco from a drawing

Fresco on lime plastered wattle and daub frame 10 x 12

I've been keeping up my blind drawing, or morning drawing, depending on whether I can grab my glasses.  Jane Lewis lent me her copy of Barbara Rae's drawings and that spurred me on to use some colour as I draw.  The original drawing was pen with watercolour over and I thought that would be a good starting point for my next attempt at the plaster experiment. It hasn't dried fully yet, so I'm not sure what the final piece will look like but this feels more like me than previous attempts.  I like working in wet plaster more than on dry with casein, I think. 

pen and watercolour on paper

Figures in response to Delouis

Day one on a 60x40cm canvas.  Taking up the idea of the hat again and using memory (open gardens 2012 on Mount Desert Island) and imagination but letting colour, shape and mood lead me. Trying to be me, responding to colour, painting about what interests me, unashamedly: people, landscape, objects, colour, oh everything! What I was really struck and delighted by in Delouis was the way she uses paint.  So I'm going to focus on that next. I used my palette knife on the trousers - a departure!

Complacencies of the peignoir

soft pastel on paper 22 x 24cm 

It's easy to avoid things that others scorn. And then I read Messum's catalogue about Nancy DeLouis - she has an upcoming exhibition there and I have to admit feeling affected by her view of the world, a 'feminine' view. It's easy to think you need to change and go a different direction even when you get a thrill out of decorative work.  It's easy to see yourself as dated (rehashing) and then you talk to a few fellow women artists and feel that little bit more confident. 

I've been getting up early and enjoying those hours of the day before anyone else has risen.  I want to do everything, read, write and draw immediately and at the same time. It's often the everyday that take me in.

ZEST OF THE DAY

That hour between

fill of day,

nothing of night

Pre-dawn

milky, lemon zest

stolen before

morning peeled

from night

Ideas that feel

like balancing stones

Hope’s black, cold, clear

watery worlds Those

glazed limpet walls,

smooth, brittle lazuli

beads of dawn.