Grungetta

Spent many restorative hours yesterday painting and talking about art at my Art Spa for the Soul Workshop. It was a wonderful day and, given that I've been really down in the dumps lately, just what I needed for a bit of creative pep up.

Here's the piece I worked on - the result of a number of exercises mashed up together, lots of loose sketching and play

More about the workshop in a forthcoming post, just wanted to share this with my friends at Sunday Sketches.

Doodles on Doodles...

and whiskers on kittens...

Just playing in my journal and letting the paint take its own direction and map out the story.

This one speaks to me of adventures in Arabia.

When she arrives at Paint Party Friday she will have tales to tell of secrets in the sand, ancient treasures and mystic stones.

From the stars

Celeste, daughter of moon and sister of stars

The subconscious is a mighty powerful thing. Hiding at the back of my mind was the Stargazing theme for the Artists' Playroom weekly challenge. After I had scanned my original piece (below), the urge to play further took over and so out came the PhotoShop. Grabbing the first texture that caught my eye, suddenly Celeste was looking down on me from the stars and I had my entry.

Having a painting frenzy this evening, so no time to write. I have to go now, the colours are calling...

Whispering trees

I swear these trees were talking to each other. A very private conversation, because as soon as I whipped the camera out they fell shtum. A couple of regal ladies a little past their prime, they gossiped of summers past and tried not to notice each other's somewhat threadbare attire.

Meanwhile on the other side of the river, the oaks stood guard over the landscape and consulted the clouds about the weather.

A book with bite

If you loved Twilight but craved for the story and characters to be just that little bit more 'grown up' or you got rather frustrated with 50 Shades (no, not that kind of frustrated... more the kind where you fancied the touch of some actual plot that holds together or characters that you might actually enjoy spending time with), then you'll love this!



It's one of those books that found its way onto my Kindle. I've not really any idea how it got there. Perhaps the saucy cover picture caught my fancy while I was browsing the lists on Amazon or maybe it was free that week.

That's the trouble with Kindle I find. It's not quite the same as having a pile of coloured paperbacks waiting patiently for their turn to be read. I'll buy a book then promptly forget all about it. I'm a bit of a sucker for the freebies you can pick up every week so my home page tends to get clogged with The Complete Works of Shakespeare or anything that looks a bit steamy or opens the door to a fantasy realm filled with fae and vampires.

What is it with the sharp-toothed immortals that so captures our imaginations? This is a vampire romance with a heavy dose of adventure and intrigue thrown in among the fang fascination. Naturally the lead man is devilishly handsome and lucky for our heroine his 500 year existence doesn't show on his features - just his cultured mind.

The villain was born in the tradition of a Bond baddie (think lots of henchmen and a tendency to unveil his dastardly plans so he can revel in their glory, while giving the game away should the good guys live to fight another day).... but there's nothing wrong with a bit of Blofeld mixed in with your psycho Klaus (Vampire Diaries fans will know who I'm talking about!).

Anyway I have to go now. I've just finished Book 2 in the series and can't wait to get my teeth into the next one...

PS - Oldish drawing of mine which you may well remember.

An unusual vase

I was doing my homework. Not only is it a bit late - it's not even what was asked... But hey, this is the world of art and nobody really minds (I hope!).

These funky flowers were supposed to be in a vase, but Tahiti here wanted to carry them around with her all day so she stuck them in her hair and weaved a dress from the vines and blooms then danced around singing hippy songs and hugging trees (carefully, so as not to crush the petals).

I'm taking another class... Yeah, what can I say, I am a total art class junkie. This one is the Brave Girls Art School.

She started as a doodle but then I just kept going. The coloured pencils started taking an interest and before I knew it I had a whole sheet of paper covered in bright shades. She pretties up my mood. I like her.

It's nearly Sunday, so I'm going to post for Sunday Sketches.

Hair-raising

Hair-raising

I'm not too sure where I'm going with either of these pieces, they are just finding their own way.

They both began with pieces torn from magazines.

The hair-raising lady had her missing body parts drawn back in with a liberal dose of colour and imagination. She feels almost finished, though part of my sees a pencil sketch of something appearing through the blue background... What it might be is still floating around my right brain somewhere...

The second piece is sharing a story of a tender heart exposed, laid bare. I should point out that the 'Chinese' calligraphy is purely a product of my imagination - should it actually spell anything I would love to know! Imagine... my subconscious may be able to communicate in other languages... what a marvel that would be!

I may continue with these today or just leave until their stories more fully reveal themselves to me.

Sharing today with Paint Party Friday.

An open heart