Postcard a day 1

This is a thing I’ve decided to do. Not really every day, but rather on the days when I’m too busy, too tired, too distracted or too something else to haul out the serious painting gear and have a go at that. Or any other creative thing for that matter. Such as this week which seems to insist on being slept away mostly, I’m a complete zombie. Lovely weather and all, I’d much rather break in my bicycle! But there’s no forcing it, I’d not be safe in traffic.

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I have no idea how many people are running a something-like-this-along, most likely 100’s. But I just set the challenge for myself to feel like I wasn’t missing out on picture creation while I do other things, as well as taking the pressure off making a “real” big painting in case any of that nonsense happens. I may do a search on the topic one of these days, but I’ll be more likely to just sit and browse pretty pictures for hours or days instead of making stuff, so for now I won’t.

I’m also not going to post every day or even regularly, just when I feel like it. This is meant to be a treat for myself, not a competition or an exercise. And sometimes other matters are more pressing or I’m simply having so much fun doing other stuff that I forget. 😉

If you want to -along you’re more than welcome to, and we can do the linky thing and all that, but I refuse to make any rules or schedules, just so you know! Just post your cards and comments – or we can swap!

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I started out with a piece of watercolour paper that I dipped in my woad vat while testing if it was exhausted or what. It was indeed a wee bit tired (not that I know if a fresh vat would have made more of the paper, I’ll have to test that later), so the next day I dribbled some of the plant watercolours on it, tore it into 4 pieces and had a go with a glue stick because I hated what I’d done with the dribbles. I’m sooo rusty at this collage thing. And I know I should probably stick to one topic rather than trying on all the things I’m rusty at, but it seems I can’t help it. Ok, I haven’t really tried very hard not to, so I don’t know if I could.

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I also considered to just copy cat a lot of stuff to keep the flow until I get into it properly, I don’t like to but I hear it’s great for cranking your skills. At the moment, the exercise is primarily about accepting that I make poor choices and that my cards are sometimes useless in the decorative sense. Maybe I’ll have an “ugliest card” competition at the end of the year where you can vote for all the monsters. 😉

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This tiny format is a HUGE challenge for me as well. I want to cram all sorts of things on there, which is impossible. And why postcard and not just “a tiny image a day”? Well, I like to pretend I’m making something useful I think. And I know I’ve framed pretty postcards and put them on the wall, so really, it’s just a name.

Maybe I’ll put old stamps on the back and write pretend messages to and from imaginary people….

Then there’s an entirely different matter. I appear to have developed a slight hand tremor. I can feel it if I try to draw or knit with small needles for instance. Why I have no idea, it doesn’t run in the family that I’m aware. So I guess I should not count on any type of precision work in drawing etc. but have to develop a style where it doesn’t matter. I hope this is it, though, I’d hate to give up making things with my hands. I’ll have to pay attention to how tired I am when it happens. It’s certainly not very good for calligraphy or fine scissor work either! 🙁

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Some old pieces of tissue paper with ink. I thought they might be more interesting with some doodles on all that white space, but can I?

Et postkort om dagendanish

…har jeg tænkt mig at lave som projekt.

Jeg har overhovedet ikke kigget ret meget eller for nylig på de 100-vis af lignende websider man kan finde derude, for så får jeg aldrig løsrevet mig fra at bare sidde og kigge og beundre. Men jeg tænkte jeg kunne bruge det som en slags livline, så jeg føler at jeg trods alt laver noget billedagtigt i de perioder hvor der ikke rigtig er plads til det. Som denne uge der insisterer på at være zombie-sæson, i det gode vejr, hvor jeg hellere ville ud at lufte min cykel lidt. Men jeg ville ikke være trafiksikker, der er ikke noget at gøre…

Ikke noget med at vise dem hver dag eller regelmæssigt, bare når jeg gider. Hvis nogen har lyst til at dele lignende projekter er det super, men der er ingen regler!

Jeg begyndte med et stykke papir som jeg havde dyppet i vaidgryden da den var ved at løbe tør for farve. Så driblede jeg lidt andre farver på, det blev grimt, så limstiften kom frem…

Det er meget meget længe siden jeg har lavet collager kan jeg godt mærke, og jeg tror aldrig jeg har arbejdet så småt, så det er udfordring på mange planer. Måske jeg går i gang med at kopiere nogen yndlingskunstnere, det siges at være en god måde at forbedre sig på, og så sker der da lidt når min egen fantasi ikke ruller som jeg vil det. Nu må vi se.

Jeg farvede også lidt papir i cochenillegryden, og jeg tror jeg hiver mine bladtryk fra sidste år frem også og klipper lidt i dem – eller laver nye.

Måske sætter jeg gamle frimærker bagpå og skriver fiktive beskeder til og fra ukendte og indbildte personer…

Til gengæld har jeg på det seneste opdaget, at jeg ryster en smule på hænderne. Det er ikke noget der ligger til familien, så jeg kender ikke årsagen, men jeg kan ikke tegne særlig nøjagtigt, og jeg kan mærke det hvis jeg strikker på tynde pinde. Ret irriterende, jeg håber ikke det udvikler sig yderligere, og så må jeg jo bare finde en tegnestil hvor det ikke ses.

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Plant watercolours

Heidi told me about making water colours from plant dye, so I just had to give it a go even though I don’t really have the time or energy right now for another project.

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I still need to work on getting a more concentrated solution, the day I did this I had to go out, so I couldn’t let it sit on the stove to steam for hours. There’s also a matter of how long it’ll keep, my first jars were too tall for the fridge, then I managed to not have time to test the liquid for days. Then it got cold and rainy and not good for picking flowers… you get the idea.

So I’ve just been doing some washes, layering the solutions to see how dark they would go, adding iron and copper as well as soda ash and vinegar to modify. Nothing happened in fact, it may need to be heated – again, no time. And then I noted several days after, that my swatches had changed colour. So there is a possibility for modification, but a high rate of unpredictability or a steep learning curve in knowing what you’ll get eventually.

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I started out with coreopsis and tagetes, meant to do a batch with weld also. But, well. The tagetes turned out very greenish yellow and the coreopsis nearly brown, so I’ll have to do perhaps birch for a warm yellow (or Dyer’s chamomile, which I only have in a dried variety by now)

Then there’s coffee and tea, tea with iron. I’m thinking mainly backgrounds for illustrations, to start off on something not white.

I tried getting direct prints from the flowers by “hammering” them into the paper, but just got brown smudges. The colour is not waterproof after drying, so wetting these papers again for eco printing would probably wash most of it away.

I’ll investigate some more, at some point, for now I hand over the torch in case somebody else has the urge or would like to share their knowledge. I used 10% alum in proportion to weight of the liquid.

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Plante-akvareldanish

Et meget kort og forhastet forsøg på at lave akvarelfarve fra planter. Det fungerer – men er lidt upålideligt mht farveændringer via kobber, syre, base, jern osv, da farverne først skiftede på papiret flere dage efter jeg havde malet det på. (og allerede smidt varianterne ud). Måske det virker bedre at opvarme hver enkelt variant eller lave dem mens det oprindelige bad er varmt.

I virkeligheden havde jeg hverken tid eller ork, skulle i byen den dag jeg kogte blomsterne, så jeg kunne ikke lade dem stå på blusset og dampe mere ind, vejret blev skidt til blomsterplukning og jeg har bare for meget at se til.. Men hvis nogen skulle få lyst og måske endda dele deres erfaringer, så er bolden hermed givet op. Der er brugt 10% alun i forhold til væskens vægt.

Jeg brugte tagetes og skønhedsøje, egentlig ville jeg også prøve vau og birk, men det er det så ikke blevet til endnu.

Calling all watercolourists

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I bought this structured paper by mistake – must have either clicked the wrong box or left my head under my arm that day – and while it’s a lovely, heavy watercolour paper, it wasn’t what I was looking for to do ink/linedrawing as a base for watercolour painting.

So, having forgotten most of what I even know about watercolour, I’m a bit clueless what to do with this. Any suggestions for technique, media and otherwise from those of you who are watercolour experts (or pastel chalks?!) would be greatly appreciated. From those of you who do not watercolour, do you know anyone who you could send to my page, any gallery links, tutorials, anything?

In another word: HELP! 😉 (please)

And now of course to try and find online the type of smooth, hard paper I was looking for. Hot pressed, yes?

I’d also like to know which watercolours brands and types you prefer working with. My old W&N look a bit tired and almost used up. I don’t want the really, really cheap hobby store type, you get exactly what you pay for is my experience.

Sometimes I just feel like working smaller, as well as wanting to improve my drawing.

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Akvarelhjælp søges

Jeg har fået købt noget meget tykt, struktureret papir som slet ikke var det jeg ledte efter til blæktegning og akvarel farvelægning mm.

Og da det er mange, mange år siden jeg sidst har leget med vandfarve, så aner jeg faktisk ikke helt hvad jeg skal bruge det til! Forslag ønskes. Hvis ikke du selv har erfaring med akvarel kender du måske nogen du lige kunne sende herover, sprede budskabet? Gode links til gallerier, tutorials?

Og hvad er dit yndlingsmærke i akvarel, skal det være faste blokke eller på tube?

Art recycling

I’ve got soo many old photos, mainly negatives, that I really still quite like. And never really done anything with after clicking and developing. Yes, I have some harebrained assumption that I’ll one day scan them all in super dooper quality all ready to use, show off, play with, manipulate in Photoshop.. I also have some old 3D images that I might like to revamp (haven’t done any 3d graphics for years), old notes keep surfacing with sketches and ideas. I even have a roll of old, half finished paintings somewhere (the garage probably).

So I’m wondering if it would be fun to mix and match, use oldies but goodies in new contexts, print out photos and sample them onto paintings or fabric, use 3D art as background for masked photos – or should I let bygones be bygones? Always look ahead for/at fresh ideas, let old horses have their rest and ride the young ones?

I’d like to hear from people, apart from recycling actual materials, do you ever revamp old finished or unfinished pieces? (I have an ulterior motive for asking – I think my camera is close to going on the blink. Exposures seem to be happening at random, so the shutter could be suffering from the over 30.000 exposures that I’ve seen as the first likely breakpoint on the Canon 20D. I’d love to get a new one, but that means $$ have to happen…)

New photoshopped background

And speaking of old canvasses, my acrylic paints survived 10 years in an uninsulated garage, the oil paints did not. I do however have some very nice quality canvasses that are either halfdone or I don’t like the motif, colours are great to build on. I know I can’t use my acrylics on top, so what, apart from investing in oil paints (which is ridiculous in a tiny house like this unless we want a perpetual headache and cat hair built into the paintings), can I do to salvage these? I hate to just throw away perfectly good materials…

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På dansk

Jeg har længe haft en ambition om at scanne alle mine mangemange negativer ind, fordi jeg aldrig rigtig har fået brugt mine billeder inden det blev digitalt og mange af dem er jeg egentlig stadig glad for. Der er sikkert også mange som er kandidater til Photoshop collager eller andet lir, man kunne printe dem og sample (har vi et dansk ord for sampling?) på malerier eller stof, blande dem med (gammel) 3D grafik osv.

Jeg finder også tit gamle noter omkring billed- eller farveideer jeg har haft og nogen giver mig stadig billeder på nethinden.

Det kunne være sjovt at høre fra andre, uanset om vi taler strik eller billedkunst, om I genbruger jeres gamle ting eller om I kun ser fremad. Ideer får man jo nok af… Og hvordan genbruger I det så? Det kunne være fedt med noget inspiration…

Vidste du, at man kan kommentere min blog uden at være wordpress medlem? Bare udfyld navn er nok. Det er så hyggeligt med dialog fremfor monolog!