The Sisterhood of the Travelling Sketchbook #3

An update on the Sisterhood….

We are now 12 members, and have members in Europe and the United Kingdom. So our little sketchbook will be travelling around the world!! That’s exciting news. Adding to the members from last time  we have:

• Sandi from Wandin East in Victoria
• Viv from France (I think she is in the north) and
• Lynn who is in the south of France
• Constanze who lives in Munich
• and Lucy Ann in Kent, UK

[Apologies to Sandi and Constanze if you have blogs that I can’t find to link to. Also Chas, can you send me your postal address?]

So, I am going to work on the sketchbook this week. I did ask about more than one sketchbook, but I think that we will keep it at one for the time being. We can always send around another if we are having too much fun for one! Then I hope to launch the Sketchbook next week, send it off to visit the first person.

If you have joined the Sisterhood ~ and there is still time ~ later this week I will send you an email with the list of addresses and emails, and more detailed info about the project. This might be about as much structure as the whole thing gets!

I have been thinking about the finished sketchbook. We obviously have ages to decide what we would like to do, but I am wondering if we raffle/auction it and donate the money to an organisation for women’s health…… I suppose I should get it made first!

On a completely different note… there is only a few more days for you to use the coupon code in my Etsy shop, AnneLawsonArt. It gives you 10% off your purchase and is valid to the end of April. Just use the code APRIL16.

The glories of watercolour!

The joy with watercolour is the glorious colours you can create. Pigments interact with each other as weak as the water to create the most marvellous effects ~ well, that is the hoped for outcome. It is easy to end up with a mud~like mess. I have painted with watercolour for a number of years now, but still feel as if there is a huge amount for me to learn. So, I signed up for Helen Burrow’s workshop on colour mixing.

I have been to some of Helen’s workshops before, and love her teaching style. I was not disappointed with this one, largely because she structured the three days so that each exercise used skills from the exercise before. She encouraged us to play ~ it’s only paint and paper. As adults we rarely allow ourselves to experiment. It is so easy to let the end product dominate, forcing ourselves to stick to the tried and true.

The very first activity was playing. After drawing circles on the paper we dropped in paints of different colours. None of them had to be perfect, they were simply pompoms. It was wonderful to see how they ran into each other and produced new colours. You really loosen up when you are doing seven, eight, nine of them. While the original vibrant colours are stunning, look at the colours that are mixed where they meet. There are some interesting purples and neutrals here.

My colour mixing pompoms ~ beautiful vibrant colours (Photo copyright: Anne Lawson 2016)

For the next exercise Helen directed us to draw three “petunias”, to which we added specific colours. The first triad was cobalt blue, aureolin and permanent rose, all transparent and clean. The second triad was alizarin crimson, windsor yellow and phthalo blue, again transparent but rich and jewel-like. The third included opaque colours, cadmium red, cadmium yellow and cerulean blue.

The three “petunia” triads (Photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

Do you have a favourite combination of colours?

At last, I was developing a deeper understanding of the different colours. It is important to know how the qualities of paints [transparent, warm/cool, staining, their bias etc] to know which ones to use when. For example, transparent colours will create darker hues than opaque ones.

Our last activity for Day #1 was to choose our own triads and experiment. I especially loved the combination of quinacridone gold, viridian and my own purple (cobalt and quinacridone magenta). The mix is in the bottom left corner. BTW the four big blobs in the centre and right are wet on wet, the three down the left side are wet on dry. The last photo is of our show and tell at the end of the day, showing great diversity between artists.

(Photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

(Photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

(Photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

Day #2 and we were raring to go. There was more colour mixing as a warm up. Then Helen asked us to compare Windsor and Newton sepia with Daniel Smith sepia. They are probably the leading watercolour paint brands. She was encouraging us to look at the different brands because colours are not consistent across brands. Sepia is a good example. The W and N is blacker and duller than the DS, which seems to have more warmth and depth to it.

The next challenge was to create our own sepia! With some help from Helen I used burnt sienna and French ultramarine to produce a lovely soft grey.

Then we became a little more botanical, as we traced a photo of a rose and transferred the tracing to watercolour paper. Then, using our sepia mix we did a tonal drawing of the rose. The photo shows the finished tonal drawing, with a spray of yellow as I began the next part of adding a little colour to the painting.

(Image and photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

More colour added to the tonal drawing (Image and photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

So, by Day #3 we were ready to do a rose painting. It sounds daunting, but as Helen’s previous activities had lead us to this point, we had the confidence!

It was time to put the knowledge from the previous two days to use ~ looking at the photo to see what colours there were, understanding the value of those colours (was my selection enough of a range of values along the grey scale?), thinking about warm and cool colours, complimentary colours. Then to mixing. You can see by the colour chart that I had to work my way through a few mixes. The new gamboge and permanent rose, top right, was the first mix, then I worked my way to quinacridone gold and magenta. It is the quiz gold that gives the painting its glow. There are other mixes too, a cool, soft blue for the cast shadows and the warm quinacridone magenta and sepia mix for other shadows.

Colour chart around the tonal drawing (Image and photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

A new piece of paper, a new tracing of the rose and I was in heaven, gently moving around each petal to let the paint and water work their magic.

First wash on the rose. (Image and photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

There’s still a way to go, but I know that the colours are working and that I have put down a good foundation. I think I like painting roses!

 

The Sisterhood of the Travelling Sketchbook #2

Did you think that I had abandoned the idea of the Sisterhood of the Travelling Sketchbook? After I was so enthusiastic about it last week? Of course not. However, I have been doing a colour mixing workshop this week, and I haven’t been able to get back to the Sisterhood.

I am going to post about the workshop very soon, but as a tease I am showing you my rose painting in the header photo. While I am distracting myself, let me I remind you that I am offering blog readers a 10% discount on any of my art work in the Etsy shop. Simply use the coupon code APRIL16 for the discount before the end of April. To look in my shop click here AnneLawsonArt

To get up-to-date with the Sisterhood of the Travelling Sketchbook, have a look at my last post, here.

So far the Sisterhood is up to 7 people, but you are quite welcome to join. We have

• Kate, who began the idea, and lives in Mackay, Northern Queensland
• Elladee, who lives in Taylors Arms, NSW
• Sue, who lives in Mt Vernon, Washington
• Sandra from Teneriffe, Queensland
• Alys from San Jose, California
• Chas who I think lives in Melbourne
• and me, from Melbourne too.

If I have missed you, I am sorry. My emails are a mess at the moment, and I may have mistakenly overlooked one. Just let me know in the comments that you would like to be part of the fun.

As you can see from the list we have Australia and sections of North America well covered ~ but always room for more. It would be great if our little sketchbook could head to the UK  and/or Europe, South America, Africa…..Any one else like to play?

Do you think we need more than one sketchbook? I am happy to send one to each of you, which could be sent around. That means each person would be adding to seven sketchbooks and passing them on, at different times, of course. Would it be too complicated? It has the advantage of each person having their own sketchbook at the end of the project. Let’s have a chat about it in the comments.

Also, I did originally say that there were no rules……but there has to be one. Your contribution can’t include plant or animal material [no feathers 😦 ]. Australia has very strict quarantine laws, which ban the importation of such things.

So, any one else like to join the Sisterhood? Send me an email to annebags@optusnet.com.au    I promise I will sort out the mess before your email arrives! Chas, can you send me an email with your postal details? And Sue too, as I haven’t kept yours. I got your town from the wonderful mug mat you sent me!

New Look Etsy ~ and discount offer

Etsy is getting a make over. If you have a shop there you will know this and have been to see what your shop will look like. If you, don’t then it is to be rolled out this week. More on the look in a little…..

To celebrate the new look, which I like, I am giving my wonderful blog readers an exclusive coupon code. Using the code will give you 10% off my drawings and paintings. It’s simple to use:

1. Head over to my shop AnneLawsonArt and buy a painting. You can buy more than one, and only pay shipping on the first.
2. When you go through the checkout you can add the coupon code APRIL16 for a 10% discount.
3. Wait for the drawing to come your way.

Too easy! The coupon will be active for April and it is only available to blog readers.

As for the new look, it is designed to be more mobile friendly. My front page used to look like this (and it still does if you check it out today)

After Tuesday it will look like this (minus all the editing tools, of course!)

You navigate by scrolling, and information should be easier to find. I have been astounded by the hysteria generated by the changes. The common reaction seems to be “The sky is falling! The sky is falling!”. Then sellers sometimes go on to say “That’s it! I’m leaving!”, which is, of course, their choice. However, just this week I read wise advice that said, “Never make a business decision based on fear.” Make the decision based on reality ~ dropping sales, decreased views, hard statistics.

Apparently overall sales and views have been dropping anyway, so it will be interesting to see the impact the new look has.

I like the clearer, more minimalist look. I have always found Etsy easy to use, and with one exception, I think this will continue. The exception is the ability to rearrange my shop. This is the way to move items around the pages of the shop. The old way wasn’t perfect as it involved a lot of clicking. However there are no pages in the new way and so is harder to navigate. But after time I am sure I will work it out. (But I do feel for those sellers who have hundreds of items in their shop to rearrange.)

Pragmatically, just like the changes to Instagram, these Etsy changes are happening. I have no control over that. I can only control what I do and how I do it.

Remember, the coupon code APRIL16 is there for you to use until the end of April. The link to the shop is AnneLawsonArt

The finished teapots

I liked the way these two pots have turned out. Putting the time into the drawing certainly helped.

Both are available in my Etsy shop AnneLawsonArt. For more details of the green one click here

Jade green teapot (Image and photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

and for details of the gold one click here

A pink one and a blue one are in the pipeline.

How does drawing teapots become drawing spirals?

You know me by now….I like to jump around from project to project. So instead of finishing my painting for the exhibition I decided to paint teapots. I have painted them before, and from that my friend Liz lent me one of hers to paint. I love its sensuous curves, and the wide belly looked like it would be good to experiment with watercolour washes.

Liz’s wonderful teapot.

So off I went and created these two paintings. The photos show them with the original drawing.

Moss green teapot with original drawing (image and photo copyright: Anne Lawson 2016)

Golden teapot with original drawing (Image and photo copyright: Anne Lawson 2016)

However I wasn’t happy with the proportions of the original drawing, so more paper and more drawing. I began with spirals, to help form the elliptic shape of the pot.

Working out the proportions by using spirals (Image and photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

I did pottery many years ago (and would love to return to it). My teacher showed me how to make a teapot, and I remember him telling me about the spout. The end of it has to be higher than the lid and to attach it we cut off the side of the pot. I used those ideas to help me ‘sculpt’ the drawing.

Spirals on the spout! (Copyright: Anne Lawson2016)

While I was understanding more, I still wasn’t happy. More paper, more drawing. Some geometry, some measuring, and some understanding of angles. One trick I have learnt is to think of angles as a clock face. It helped me to see that the line of the spout went at about where the 5 is on a clock.

My drawing started with the complete pot and went in a clockwise direction around the page. (Copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

Now I was more confident that I understood the pot and could draw it more accurately.

(Image and photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

The next step was to trace the outline of the drawing ~ this makes it easy to transfer onto good watercolour paper for the painting. Now that I am looking at this simple line drawing I wonder if I haven’t made the belly of the pot, under the spout, too wide. I will notice more inconsistencies as I paint.

Simple line drawing on tracing paper (Image and photo copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

Lastly I did a tonal drawing. This is a map of the dark areas and highlights. Drawings like this are an invaluable reference tool, helping give the painting a 3D effect. To make it I put another piece of tracing paper over the line drawing and started to really look at where the darks and lights are. You will see that I left the highlights white, because when I do the painting I have to remember to leave these areas the white of the paper. It is the darkest darks that add oomph to the drawing. Often artists are too scared to go as dark as is necessary. I haven’t done a very good job of modelling the belly of the pot, but there is enough there to help me understand some of the tonal complexities.

Tonal drawing to map out the darks and lights on the pot. (Image copyright: Anne Lawson, 2016)

I love working my way through drawings like this. It reminds me how lazy I can be, with my first attempt being ‘good enough’. Until, as I painted and realised that it wasn’t good enough, because I had been listening to that lazy part of my brain that says “It is a teapot. You know what a teapot looks like. It looks like this….” The problem with this process is that I don’t take the time to really look and analyse. Where is the edge of the lid in relation to the foot? The top of the spout to the top of the handle? What angle does this line take? Is the pot as tall as it is wide? (Actually it is wider.) Where would the spout attach? How does the handle attach?

So, instead of drawing a teapot I ended up drawing lines and angles and spirals and negative spaces. Now I am intrigued to see what the painting looks like. I will certainly let you know!

 

Adventures with social media

If, as I said last time, I want to raise my profile as an artist, than I have to do more than just dabble in social media. I love to seek out knowledge. I have found some good books and sites that have helped me, from where I have been taking ideas and synthesising them with my own experience and knowledge. I want to use this post as a way of getting my thoughts about social media out of my brain, so I will share those resources on another post soon.

Artistically I want you to see, on all the different sites, my love for the beauty and delicacy of the natural world. I paint feathers, shells, and other treasures that come my way (and some teapots!), plants from the outback of Australia and from Flinders Island. So my activity on whichever form of social media has to show this. The place online where I can exhibit many of my works is the Etsy shop, AnneLawsonArt. Therefore social media has to link back to the shop. And one thing I have learnt is that if there is no link, then people cannot follow it!

Of course the shop is not just an exhibition space. I sell there, and I would like to increase sales. To do this I need to tell the story of my work. What inspires me, how I create the works, how a piece could look in people’s homes. Building up my profile as an artist is entwined with selling my work.

I have explored different sites; some I can’t be bothered with and others I enjoy. When I wrote about joining Instagram, Meeks, a talented writer, wrote, in the comments, how lucky visual artists were. The internet loves photos and I enjoy the sites that are photo dominant. They are perfect for artists.

So, some thoughts on the ones I enjoy and can see a reason for being on……

Shop update

This is not strictly a social media site. It is a feature offered by Etsy ~ sellers post photos with short captions, then link the photo to an item in the shop. The fantastic thing about it is that it goes to the Etsy feed of anyone who has bought from my shop or made it one of their favourites. In other words I can speak directly to people who have already enjoyed my art! It’s a great way to invite customers behind the scenes, to show how a drawing could look in a frame or my creative process.

Instagram

You know that I am a newcomer to Instagram @annelawson54 but already I am a convert! I love looking at the work of so many artists, liking, commenting. I love exploring hashtags. Mostly I love choosing photos to post, selecting ones that tell people more about me as an artist. The more I use it the more I can see ways to tell the story of my drawings and paintings. I am challenged to find appropriate hashtags and interesting  ways to encourage people to visit the Etsy shop. It looks like being fun too, with challenges that pop up and people to interact with.

Pinterest

Just in case you don’t know Pinterest is a like a big filing cabinet, a place to keep all sorts of bits and pieces you collect. It took me a while to join because I knew that it would encourage me to explore all sorts of fascinating but time wasting worm holes. What made me sign up was the realisation that many of my views on Etsy came from Pinterest. This month I have had 282 visits. I needed to have a presence there. So I am Anne LawsonArt 

I use it in a couple of ways. The first seven boards are of my work and each item I pin links directly back to the item in the shop. This is important because the images can be repinned and then float off into the virtual world. I want them to be like kites, with a string back to the Etsy shop. It is not fool proof, but it gives me some control. It makes me smile when Pinterest sends me an “We have found pins you might like” email and one of the images is a feather of mine!

The other way I use it is to pin things that I am interested in ~ blogs on watercolour brushes, inspirational art, sketchbook ideas, things to read and so on. I always make sure that there is a link back to the original site. That’s courteous behaviour.

Like Instagram I am only beginning to understand how to utilise it properly. For example I have found out about group boards, and want to find out more about them.

Facebook

Like most people I have been on Facebook for a few years, and I set up my AnneLawsonArt page not long after. My blog links to it, and I post photos about my work. But it is only recently that I have understood what a unique platform it is for me. Again, things to learn. I have left it in the corner a little too long, while I have been playing with the shiny new sites. It doesn’t bring a lot of people to the Etsy shop, but I know that people see my work there. A painting friend remarked that she hadn’t seen any of my work on Facebook for a while, making me realise that people do take note, even if they don’t “like” or comment.

Facebook is almost an amalgamation of many of the good points of the other sites. Photos are vital, but there is room to write a decent caption. I can post a series of photos that tell a story. There are groups where I can hang out with people who share my passion. I can link back to people who inspire me, or blogs that give advice that others might find useful. I like to share the work of others because I don’t want my online presence to always be NEW ITEM IN THE SHOP!!! or BUY!BUY!BUY!

Which brings me to here, my Blog

It is so different to the other sites. This is home. This is where I sit down with you guys, my friends, with a cup of coffee or a glass of wine and chat. You let me chat away about my art, or anything else that I feel like talking about. The thing that got me into blogging in the first place was that I could talk about the things that I wanted to talk about. It is fantastic, and humbling, that there are people who enjoy listening to me! Your likes and comments are important to me, they remind me of the wonderful supportive blogging world.

I don’t think a lot is going to change here. Last year I made an effort to answer “Yes” to the question “Does an artist live here?”. Lots of posts are art inclined, but not all. It depends on where I am and what I am thinking about. Some of you have bought my art and that is fantastic! I appreciate your support of my work. But I certainly don’t want my posts here to always be linking back to the shop. This is home. The art work is hanging on the walls, you can look or not as we sip that glass of wine and natter!

So…that’s where I am at the moment, splashing around in various social media places. If you are there, give me a wave. 🙂 And let me know in the comments if you have a different take on these sites or others.