Mini Monday - Bricks & Mortar

Monday again, and another installment of my Mini adventures. I decided I wanted my house to be built of brick, a building medium that was just coming into vogue in the late Tudor era. To achieve this, I painted a sheet of mat board with several layers of various brick colours ( acrylics) until I got a pinkish brick that I liked. Then I set it aside while I painted the bare wooden house pieces with a coat of gesso, and then a pale grey.
I decided to start with the foundation stones at the bottom, and to make them, I cut out pieces of mat board in appropriate shapes and sizes, covered each one with glue, and them smushed bits of paper towel into/onto the surface to create a rough texture. After letting them dry, I painted them first in grey acrylic, and then sponged on a mix of light ochre and pale grey. When they were totally dry, I glued them onto the base of the walls.
Now it was time to cut and past each individual brick into place. This took HOURS! Days!! As you can see, the house is in three sections. There were times I lost the rhythm of the lines of brick and had to remove a row and start again. I began to wonder who's bright idea it was to do a brick house before I had finished gluing that last brick in place.
I added some grey mortar between the bricks that was a mix of grey paint stiffened with some glue, but it was not as successful as I had hoped. Still not sure the best way this could be done, but I decided that what I have is fine until I learn a better way.
Then I put the kit windows together, painted the frames black, added "leaded" window clings to the "glass" and popped them into the window frames.
Now it was time for the decorative trim around the main front window and the door, and for the door itself, but you will have to check in next week to find out how I did that.

Mini-Monday

As some of you know, I have become enthralled with the hobby of making Miniatures. Long ago, (but as an adult) I was given a doll house kit and my Father was supposed to make it for me so I could start a miniature collection. No one ever convinced him that he was supposed to do this, and years later, I finally decided to give it a go by myself. This is what the pieces looked like when I took them out of the intimidatingly big box. I should have started taking photos at that point, but I never imagined that I would get very far, so I didn't.
What you are looking at in the photo is the upper floor and part of the roof. They are the only parts left undecorated. I thought that on Mondays - Mini-Mondays - I would show you bit by bit, how the house is coming along, both the construction, and the all too often destruction. There's a lot of that.
I gave my house a name - The Laurels, after my Grandmother's family home back in Ireland. It was meant to be a rather large, three part ranch house, but I am transforming it into a modern day house that was built in the Tudor times and decorated in various eras after that. In the history that I have made up for the house, Queen Elizabeth the First gave the house and land to one of her knights as a reward for his loyalty and bravery. Yes, I get really invovled with my fantasies! :-0
So I invite you to come along on Mondays and watch as I bring The Laurels to life.

HORSE!!!

The Canadian Museum of Civilization has a wonderful exhibit on now about THE HORSE. Naturally we went as soon as were able. This exhibit opens with the tiny, dog-sized creature that eventually became the large, noble horse. As we stepped into further the hall, there was a wonderful diorama of three stages of the horse's development. Did you know that they were once leaf browsers and had longer necks and short teeth? When they moved to a plains environment, their necks grew a little shorter and their teeth elongated to cope with the coarse grass. Short teeth would have worn out fast on the grasses they now ate. The whole "horse experience" was heightened by the sound of whinnies and hoofbeats all around you.
The Horse subject is so vast that it is only natural that not everything could possibly be covered. What was done, was presented with respect and a depth of knowledge, and although we were somewhat disappointed that there wasn't more of the exhibit, we thoroughly enjoyed what there was. At the very end, like a breath of West wind, the wonderful band of Joe Fafard horses (metal sculpture) galloped across the end of the hall, colourfully lit so that the herd doubled in size against the backdrop. Great stuff!!
Naturally, I now feel the need to return to horses for a couple of paintings before I get back to my dog art. This little 5 x 7 coloured pencil Friesian is called EVENING STAR. I love to do the Baroque horses in a fantasy medieval setting. It is available matted, for $98.00, shipping and tax included. Inquiries may come to me at anderson.animalart@sympatico.ca

Dinosaur Week

This past week, I spent an hour a day doing art lessons with a Grade Three class. It's been a long time since I was in a classroom, but I remembered that Dinosaurs were always a hit. I decided to see how the children did, making a little model Dinosaur Habitat, complete with a Dinosaur of their choice. I got a cardboard base ready for each child, then we talked about Dinosaurs and their world, I gave them instructions and examples, talked about the difference in a scientific project where everything had to be correct, versus an art project such as we were doing, where they could add some imagination, and off they went. The children had to listen carefully, do each step in order, measure, draw, cut, paste, and assemble their Habitat, and they did SO well! I drew simple, cartoony dinosaurs for them, but they had to try new-to-them coloured pencil techniques, decide on colours (I mean, who knows what colour those Dinos were!), then choose how close to the lines they wanted to cut. They also had the option of doing their own Dinosaur from start to finish, but most children chose to use the pre-drawn ones. Look at the individual creativity that went into these . . .do you see the dino-footprints in the top photo, and the swampy areas in the bottom right one? Someone decided on a magnificent volcanic erruption in his model, and many of the children managed to get very real expressions on their Dino faces.

I could have put all 23 images up here, but had to choose just a few. Every one of the 23 projects is an A+ Well done Grade Three!!

Horses In My Life

A few weeks ago, our City newspaper, The Ottawa Citizen, asked readers to send in their (short)stories about how horses impacted their lives. This was to help publicize the opening of a major exhibit, THE HORSE at the Museum of Civilization, and several of the stories would be chosen for publication in the Saturday paper.
Well, I was thrilled to discover last Saturday, that my story had made the cut, and there it was, in the Ottawa Citizen. I'd like to share it with you.
"Being a horse crazy child, I often played at being a horse, pretending to have the freedom and power of these gorgeous animals. I read about them, wrote stories about them, drew them all over my school books, the walls, or on any available paper, and dreamed of having a horse of my own. That dream was realized as an adult when I bought a wonderful, middle-aged Morgan whom I named Ceilidh (Kaylee). Together, we made life-long friends and had marvelous adventures. We were together until his death at age 33.
Horses have made a huge difference in my life. Ceilidh and the other horses at the barn, expanded my understanding of kindness, patience, and the quietness of the soul. They gave me confidence in myself. They inspired me to a career path of painting and writing about horses and dogs, and that has taken me places I never even dreamed of. They have enriched my life in every way, and even on a bad day, just seeing a horse can make me smile."
Although I did not send in the above image, I think it is an appropriate one to use here to illustrate this blog, as it is about the Horse in legend and story, and is the panel I did for the Horse Gift Mural, a truly amazing project that I was privileged to be part of.

FOCUS

Something I learned early on, is that you have to develop a deep concentration for your work. You really have to focus on what you are doing. This graphite, Black On White, took a great deal of focus, not only on the black Friesian, but on the background. It's hard to see in this photo, but the sky is filled with tiny snowflakes, each one painstakingly shaded around. (Black On White is available).
This topic of focus reminds me of an incident in the studio when I was at art school. After the lesson, we students would all troop off to get our equipment: a stool to sit on, a large wooden drawing board, and a funny bench sort of thing that had a flat bottom that sat on the floor, a tall upright, and a narrow, slanted board that held our drawing board and materials. This unsteady arrangement went by the quaint name of a "Mule". One evening, we were all busy concentrating on our assignment, and the only sound in the studio was the quiet classical music that was always played. We were all totally focused on our work. Suddenly, there was an ominous scuffle, then a terrific crash, as one poor student, deeply concentrating on his work, forgot that the treacherous Mule had to be kept in balance while we worked. We heard the gasp of horror, the sound of the stool, then the student hitting the floor, the bang of the drawing board, followed by the crash of the mule as they hit the floor miliseconds apart, and finally, the echoing clang of the pencil box as it bounced and rattled on that hard, unforgiving floor. Total silence followed, then the sound of throats being cleared, light coughs, and snuffles as we all did our heroic best to not scream with laughter. To our credit, we managed this, then helped the hapless student pick up his things, made sure he was all right, and then, to spare his feelings, went back to work as if nothing had happened.
I feel this is a cautionary tale, letting us know that focus is a neccessary thing when drawing/painting, but like everything, we mustn't carry it too far.
By the way, notice anything different?

Playing In Puddles - Watercolour, it's what I do.

These past few weeks, I've been enjoying writing about my love affair with watercolours. I decided to do this while I was reading a wonderful book on Art Marketing called "I'd Rather Be In The Studio!" by Alyson B. Stanfield. ( If you are looking for a book that will give you great insights and tips on getting yourself (as an artist) moving as well as a virtual artistic energy boost, I highly recommend it!)
One of the things I read, was that if I have experience and am educated in something, I should talk/write about it. Now, I grew up being taught to NOT talk about myself, especially about the artist in me. So the idea of talking about my painting, and about myself as an artist was a Big Deal. But you know, I have really been enjoying this.
I have always been attracted to the bright, clean look of watercolours, and when I finally got myself to art school, too many years ago to admit to) I made sure I took all the watercolour courses and I loved them all. Well, except for the class that insisted that we splash and dash paint on the paper. I think that's when I realized that I need to paint in a realistic style. Bravo to all who enjoy the freer forms of painting, but I am simply not a person who can "emote" and fling paint. As you can see by my 11 x 14 watercolour painting "How Does Your Garden Grow?", I love detail, and one way to get detail in watercolour is to use a dry-brush technique.
You can literally use a dry brush dipped in paint that is fresh from the tube or that is sitting, wet, on your palette. You can also dampen your brush, take off any excess moisture, and run it across paint that is damp, but not a puddle. For really tiny detail, I often use an all purpose synthetic brush, and often in a size o or even a 00. I don't paint every hair on an animal, but I sometimes like to give the impression that I do.
I'm enjoying passing along little watercolour tips that I have picked up over the years, and I hope they help you find more enjoyment in the paintings - yours and mine.