Sketch books

 

In the past I was always very precious about my sketch books. I wanted to keep them pristine, so didn't draw on the page in case I made a mistake and had to rub it out. All the drawings and images were glued in.

The one below is from 2002, the image is of the Sutton Hoo excavation and the painting is the treasure being excavated on hand made paper. I used the sketch books as diary's and filled them full of angst ridden  waffle about how I was a failing artist.

Life has taught me that I don't have time to angsty about being an artist, its who I am and I will always draw.

Fast forward 20+ years, my worry about perfection has gone, now I draw directly on the page, some of it is good, some of it is bad, but it all fits together and is a diary of my life.

The following drawings are from my current A5 sketch book, I also have an A6 and A4.

Woolacombe                                                        Lynton

 

I like to draw from life, the boys are a big part of life and watch me drawing. Of course they want to draw too and when we are out and there's nothing for them to draw on I let them draw in my sketch book. 

I would never of let them anywhere near my precious sketch books years ago.

The above drawings were drawn at half term on Dunster beach, I drew the path of the river Avill running down to meet the sea. I told Bert to draw what he could see, so he drew the nuclear power station at Hinkley Point and a container ship in the Bristol Channel.

I take my sketch book everywhere and draw when we're out dog walking. Phil has long legs and walks a lot faster than me, so at some point in the walk I will stop to draw while he carries on walking with the dogs. The drawing above is of Holdstone down,  I continued drawing and did some colouring when I got home.

The view from Daddy's garden of the hillside on the other side of the river, in Lynmouth.

Lynton, from Holman Park looking up towards Station Hill. Sketched on sports day in between races and tidied up when I got home, I might continue with this one.

Yesterday we went to Crow Point, the first time since our car disaster, this Appledore drawn from Crow Point beach across the mouth of the river's Taw and Torridge. It must be at least half a mile across the river, probably further, so it's difficult to make out details, even the close ups on my iPhone art very good.

I will tidy it up, but probably won't take it any further.

And finally the boys drawings at the back of my sketch book. 

As I said previously I've told Bert to draw what he see's and that sometimes the only place he will be able to see what to draw is inside his head, but that doesn't matter and not to listen to people who say otherwise.

A couple of weeks ago I'd forgotten what I said to him, we went to a meal with some friends, when he got bored I gave him my sketch book and he drew his food, knife and fork.  I am so proud that he remembered my advice.

On the other page Maggie drew a snake (I think) and wrote his name.

I'm so proud of both of them 💙💙

Photo's on my Phone 9th of May - 25th May 2024

The sun shone a lot, the dogs were hot, so we dumped them in the river under the bridge in Lynmouth and accidentally had a cheeky pint.

The next evening we walked the dogs on Countisbury Hill, the photo of Tinks is to remind myself that old dogs are just as disobedient as young dogs. The sun was still shining so we had another cheeky pint at The Blue Ball on the way home.

As the sun was still shining Mummy and I took the boys to the beach, they all swam, but the sea is still cold for me. I'll wait a few more weeks till the water warms up.

Then the sun stopped shining.

Monday's walk was at Crow Point in the wind and rain!

I started a new drawing of Woolacombe its a stunning massive sandy beach. It's a famous surfing beach and you can see Lundy, so I decided to draw some of the houses instead!

 

I sold a drawing of Ilkerton Ridge at the Paracombe Art Exhibition, so we walked the dogs on Holdstone Down to celebrate, the view is stunning in every direction.

I did a sketch and am going to do a drawing of it at some point in time.

My lovely friend Jacquie (who runs our local dog shop - https://www.thelynvalleydoghouse.com/ )

organised a big pup meet. 

I don't have many photo's, luckily Jacquie managed to capture this one of Siri in the paddling pool, he got thrown in the river on the way home!

Then the car started smoking, its at the garage, no idea how much its going to cost or whether it can be mended. I did suggest we leave it at the garage, sell everything we own, buy a van and travel, but Phil said he didn't want to sell his special tagine, so guess we won't be taking to the road after all.

All our adventures for the foreseeable future will be at home, we have feet and the cliff railway.

Ilfracombe update - 25th May 2024. Still no bottom left corner, but I've nearly finished the yachts in the harbour.

On being wrong June 2021

 I've always had my own level of perfection, if a colour was wrong in a blanket I would frog the whole thing rather than leave it imperfect, sometimes I'd frog 2 or 3 times until it was right. 
I don't think anyone else would of noticed that it was wrong, but I couldn't live with the mistake shouting at me every time I looked at it.

I've noticed the same is happening in my drawings. My "Cindy's Deck" panorama of Lynton is wrong, I don't like the tree's on Hollerday Hill, Countisbury isn't right and I'd like to redo it in black and white.

But....... maybe I'm wrong, maybe I should leave it as it is and move on to a new view of Lynton.

I've always believed you should never go backwards, even though that's exactly what I've done in the last few months. I've gone back 20+ years and started drawing and knitting again. Although the knitting is just as bad as its always been, 20 years life experience has changed the style, technique and level of professionalism of my art work. So its not really going back its moving forward with something that's been on hold for a long time.

The reason for this blog post is that I am working on my next panorama this time of Lynmouth, I've finished the first drawing and am over halfway to finishing the second. 

This morning I was really excited to lay them together to see the full effect, even though Im really happy with both drawing Im not happy with the way they fit together. 

I have several options, 

1 - Pretend they are 2 separate drawings

2 -  Redraw one of them completely 

3 - Just ignore the fact that the trees aren't big enough over the Bath, the slipway has a bump in it and the water in the harbour is flowing the wrong way

Normally I would scrap one and start again, but maybe I should leave them as they are and let the viewer either not notice the mistakes or think that they are intentional. 

When they are framed they will have a bigger gap between them and the mistakes might not be noticeable at all.

I think I need to leave them as they are and keep my fingers crossed that the 3rd drawing fits a lot better with the 1st.