Since arriving back in South Africa I have been busy with creating botanical interpretations of flowers that inspire me. The latest is a series of orchids along with a cactus, poppy, and alpine flowers.
Cutie Pie
Loved sketching this animated little face with the bow tie. I experimented with some new water soluble pencils I was given for my birthday. They work much like the aqua pencils in that you draw or colour with the pencil and then wash it with a wet brush. I love using my brush with a…
Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc, a peasant girl living in medieval France, believed that God had chosen her to lead France to victory in its long-running war with England. With no military training, Joan convinced the embattled crown prince Charles of Valois to allow her to lead a French army to the besieged city of Orléans, where…
St Brigid of Ireland
Saint Brigid was born Brigit, and shares a name with a Celtic goddess. There is much discussion over her birthparents, yet it is generally believed her mom was Brocca, a Christian baptised by Saint Patrick, and her dad was Dubthach, a Leinster chieftain. When Dubthach’s wife discovered Brocca was pregnant, she was sold to a Druid landowner. It is…
St Scholastica
Scholastica (born in Italy c. 480 – 10 February 542) is a saint of the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Churches. The most commonly told story about her is that she would, once a year, go and visit her brother at a place near his abbey, and they would spend the day worshiping…
Purple & White Tulips
Some more fun with flowers, this time purple and white tulips.
Golden Hibiscus
I have been so busy painting and sketching other things, I forget how much I love painting flowers. This Golden Hibiscus was for a commission. I used 2 really fat brushes to paint this, which is a change for me considering I usually work with very small brushes and lots of layering and glazes. This…
Icons
I have tried to summarise the historical development of the Icon because I find the history of these beautiful art works fascinating. Its a long blog, but considering the history behind the icon it’s a brief summary! Not quite the venerated monastery for painting icons, but it’s my creative space and I love it, especially…
Random Commissions
Sometimes I get rather unusual commissions from people where they want something very specific. They come to me with examples of other works, or a technique they want me to emulate of very specific subject matter they want to display on their walls. Usually in the case of these types of commissions it is more often…
Playing with Icons
Icons remain something I love painting. Much to my excitement I received a commission some time back to do two rather unusual Icons. I needed to get some of my other commissions out of the way that had been piling up before I could start any icon work though. What remained a challenge for me was…
Brothers Portraits – the oldest
And the other (older) brother for a proud Grandma to hang on her wall…. Mapping out the shape of the face and the areas of light and dark, and of course those checks that just keep on coming back to haunt me….. I always start my drawings from left to right. As a right handed…
Brothers Portraits – the youngest
Portraiture remains one of my favourite forms of drawing. My latest efforts are of two young brothers drawn for Grandma to hang on her wall… Below are illustrations of my progress on the youngest of the two little tykes. Always well supervised… Plotting out the drawing The checks that keep coming back to haunt me….
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