Category Archives: Water Colours

Art-ing again

11 Sunday Feb 2018

Posted by in Animal Love, creativity, Drawings, Fashion, Red Bubble, Water Colours

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I’ve had a big break from drawing, painting and pretty much anything that equates to visual art. But recently, I’ve needed to feel my pen and pencil glide across the page and see immediate results of my creativity in action.

Writing novels is great fun but it is a long (and sometimes lonely) process. I can’t show it to you, you would have to read every word and immerse yourself in the story to see it, feel it, sense it, experience it. But with art, you can view an image and have an immediate reaction.

My artwork is very much a personal expression tool. I’m not the best of the best at it, but it’s who I am at any given moment in time.

So here’s me through images at this point in my life.

I’m obviously animal obsessed. Maybe that’s because animals accept me for who I am and don’t require much from me? Maybe it’s because (for me) animals are safe for me on an emotional level. I don’t know exactly, but I feel drawn to them in my artistic expression.

Last weekend, all I did was draw and play with watercolour paints and some new alcohol based ink markers. I watched a few art classes on Skillshare.com and picked up some tips but mostly, I felt inspired to create visually again.

There’s nothing worse than looking at a blank page and wondering… “What am I going to draw, paint, sketch?”

Some of the above images have been put through Gimp and cut out and put on t-shirts at RedBubble under ShaplandArt. I’m not the best with digital image manipulation and always have to go to Google to figure out the next step. It takes ages but I eventually end up with something on a t-shirt that I’m pretty happy with.

I guess I can only improve.

 

Romance Love Rabbit T-Shirt by ShaplandArt

Romance Love Rabbit T-Shirt by ShaplandArt https://www.redbubble.com/people/ShaplandArt?asc=u

An Impression of Spock and the creative life

26 Tuesday May 2015

Posted by in Acrylics, Water Colour, Water Colours

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Created: 23/5/2015 Watercolour and acrylic on pastel paper. Artist: Selina Shapland

Created: 23/5/2015
Watercolour and acrylic on pastel paper.
Artist: Selina Shapland

It’s been a while since I have updated Selina’s World.  I’ve doing a lot of creative writing and articles too.  My days have been about creating images in my mind that I can translate through the written word into my reader’s mind.

This last weekend I finally had the creative bug to paint and so that is how “An impression of Spock” came into the world.  I sat on the couch and allowed myself to fall into colour, light and shadow.  I allowed the right side of my brain an opportunity to speak to me in symbolic language.  I needed that more than I can say.

You can see my artwork above.  It is completely hand drawn from eye and there are still some things to work on in this artwork, but I am pretty happy with it.  It is watercolour and acrylic on pastel paper.  I had a ball doing this piece of artwork.

I also wrote and published an article on how art has helped my heart to heal.  It is about art therapy, for those who might want to jump across to Self Avenue and check it out.

I hope your days and nights are filled to the brim with creativity.

S x

It’s almost the end of the working year

18 Wednesday Dec 2013

Posted by in Sketches, Water Colours

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Image

Today was a little tough for me at work.  Not a bad day, just one that wasn’t the best of the best of the best, as they say…

I think I am very much looking forward to the Christmas / New Year break to allow myself to chill out and regroup for 2014.

So, as I do when I have to process things inside me, I have turned to my art as a way of expressing things that I cannot verbally say.  This image above shows a sketchy kind of painting of an Eagle the my partner works with here in Australia.  I loved the photo of this bird and felt inspired to use his side profile as my muse to let out some of the ‘stuff’ inside me.

I couldn’t tell you what I was thinking about as I do not know.  I was just being while I played with pen, graphite paint and watercolours in one of my visual diaries.

It turned out pretty okay so I thought I’d share it.  Oh and the grey thing at the bottom of the photo with the owls all over them are my legs in my PJ’s.  Yes… I paint in my PJ’s.

I haven’t been doing much art lately, but I can feel the urge and the inspiration kicking back in.  I am grateful when this happens and I feel inspired in my arty life again.  So who knows what the holidays will inspire me to create.  I am going through a jewellery phase, a creative writing phase and now it seems my drawing and painting phase is coming back online – woot!

A little trip down 2004 Visual Diary Memory Lane

21 Thursday Nov 2013

Posted by in Abstract, Acrylics, Drawings, Oils, Water Colours

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Where to start?

I was having a look through some of my recent and much older visual diaries tonight and felt inspired to share some of my works with you.  A number of them are still works in progress and these are only progress shots.  They are also an indication of the type of themes that interest me as an artist.

So, let’s take a little tour…

Ink and mixed media inspired work from Man Ray's Photography

This was created in my visual diary, 22/8/2004.
Inspired by Man Ray’s Photograph entitled ‘Tomorrow’

When I was in art school back in 2004, I fell in love with Man Ray’s photographic works.  I loved the multiple exposures and creative effects he brought to the world through his photography and I wanted to honour that inspiration in my visual diary.  The image above was created with black indian ink, lace, ribbon and glue.

Ideas for paintings in my visual diary Created: 22/2/2004

Ideas for paintings in my visual diary
Created: 22/2/2004

This image shows some cropped painting ideas that I put together for an art assignment way back in February 2004.  We were asked to take an image and hone in on a part of it and explore painting it.  I created the two paintings in my visual diary as a test to figure out if I liked the image enough to go from watercolour, to acrylics and into oils.  The truth is, I actually ended up choosing a very different image to crop for this assignment, however, I have always loved these two sketched up paintings.  They feature an unconscious African Elephant from a National Geographic magazine that I was drawn to at the time.  Inspiration for art can be found in all sorts of places.

Eyes sketched in my visual diary as I formed ideas for further artworks. Created: July 2004

Eyes sketched in my visual diary as I formed ideas for further artworks.
Created: July 2004

This image shows a page from my 2004 visual diary where I spent many hours observing eyes, human and animal.  I was and still am fascinated by the depth of expression and emotion that eyes can convey through art.  This sketch formed the bases for some other creative artworks that came along.  I always meant to fill up each square but never quite got around to finishing it…

Mixed media exploration of culture and beliefs in my visual diary. Created: 4/6/2004

Mixed media exploration of culture and beliefs in my visual diary.
Created: 4/6/2004

This has to be one of my absolute favourite piece of art play from my 2004 visual diary.  The reason I love it so much is that it explores the concepts of Heaven, Hell and Purgatory in life through images that I cut from magazines that came in the male.

I have many notes written in my visual diary next to this mixed media art play as we were challenged by our art teacher to explore our concepts of the culture we lived in and the context it has in our lives.  As I was cutting this out and gluing it into my visual diary, I was contemplating how people think and wondering things such as: does the level of your bank balance and physically acquired items determine your personal happiness?  Or is there more to life than the physical items we surround ourselves with?

I considered a concept that some people can find themselves feeling numb and unable to relate to life unless they are actively shopping and acquiring items… I considered the animals we take for granted and was particularly drawn to the cow hide in the original image.  I thought a lot about the concepts… Do our earthly actions affect us in the afterlife?  Is there really an afterlife?

To me, I am open to that concept, but not all people are.

Fascinating stuff.

Anyways, that’s my trip down my 2004 visual diary memory lane.

More creative art is still yet to appear on this blog.  Thanks for taking the time to read my blog and feel free to share the arty creativity.

Letting Love Flow

18 Monday Mar 2013

Posted by in Abstract, Drawings, Water Colours

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Watercolour painting

Created: 31/12/2012
Artist: Selina Shapland

This watercolour and black ink pen painting was inspired by something very profound for me related to my father who passed away in 2000 from throat cancer.

I never thought he loved me.  It is as simple as that.  As I grew up, I saw a man addicted to alcohol who was in a great deal of emotional pain.  I perceived him through the eyes of a frightened child and did what I could to survive in a unstable life.  My mum did everything she could, with the knowledge and experience she had at the time to protect my brother and I from our father’s misguided alcohol induced aggression.

So many years of walking around and picturing my father in my head as a monster, someone who didn’t care for me, rejected me, discarded me have taken their toll on my nerves and I realised over this past weekend that I have been holding myself in emotional bondage to an out of proportion perception of who I thought my father was when he was alive.

I have tried to go to forgiveness and I have chipped away at letting go of this internal defining label, yet I felt I was battling demons bigger than I could handle.

Life has a funny way of helping me out when I am emotionally constipated and this was one of those times.  I went to a course on human behaviour and values which is where I had a profound realisation that my father did love me, very much.

The exercises were tough as I could no longer hide in a victim mentality and had to face that my father was a whole person, not half a person, not a complete bastard at all.  My internal perceptions were suddenly, radically changed and as I worked through the exercises to understand how his actions benefited me and how all these traits I hated are also a part of my own human foibles, tears began to flow.

The pain that rushed out of my chest where my heart pounded is indescribable.  I felt my father with me and was suddenly transported to all the times when he had tried to show me love but because I was angry with him for drinking himself into a stupor, I blocked out as irrelevant.

I cried.  I cried so much that I could hardly breath and I realised that I love my dad so much for who he was not who I wanted him to be.  I loved him for the first time for all his faults and let myself accept the love that he had tried to express to me finally rush in.

There are no words to describe what this kind of thing feels like… so I began to draw and allow myself the gift of creating a representation of what happened for me during this release.

Dad, I love you. I know that I am the person I am today because of you.  I know in my heart now, how deeply you loved me and I am finally opening up to letting love flow between us.  It does not matter to me that you have passed over as I believe that love knows no bounds and wherever you are, I know my love will reach you.

 

Watercolour Woman 2012

18 Monday Feb 2013

Posted by in Abstract, Water Colours

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Watercolour abstract portrait of a woman's face

Created: 31/12/2012
Artist: Selina Shapland

 

I was inspired to create this painting, my last painting from 2012, by a photo of a blond woman on a tattoo magazine.  She had that retro cool look and I loved the way she peered out from the magazine to watch me.  I tried to capture that look in my painting.

I love the imperfection of her beauty as she very much represents that beauty in the human body that is our character, our trial by fire and yet it is partly hidden from the world as we try our best not to let other people see the experiences and scars that lay hidden in our minds, hearts and souls.

I call her ‘Watercolour Woman 2012’, the face of the in-between-ness of humanity…