Sunflowers and the Arty Lifestyle

I couldn’t walk past a trio of sunflowers while out shopping for essential groceries. The bright yellow drew my eye and I whisked the sunflowers from the bucket and into my basket without a second of hesitation.

I new the moment I saw their pretty faces that I wanted to draw them and paint them with watercolour. And here they are. 03B68C32-EAB2-4F5F-87F3-A26BEA9174E3

I spent all day sitting on the veranda sketching these beauties into my watercolour visual diary and the rest of the day painting them in an attempt to capture the life of they beamed at me.

It was a day of pure creative happiness. Blissful time spent drawing and painting without worrying about anything at all.

I did several other drawings/watercolour paintings of my sunflowers. They were too beautiful not to capture them from various angles.

Earlier in the week, I played around with more black ink and watercolour to create this beautiful King Protea. Unfortunately, while I was outside sketching it something small and green fell on the page. F7FD804E-8CC6-46AA-8EBA-69C61BD43D3C

I thought it was a seed pod from the over hanging tree. When I brushed it off the page it squished a small insect creature into the paper and so this one is very close to nature.

I’m so sorry little nature bug – I didn’t mean to turn you in to art collage in my visual diary!

It was so delightful to see this flower evolve on my page. I do love it.

My arty lifestyle has been developing each day and each time I draw. I’m still doing my 100 portrait challenge but needed some time out to focus on drawing other subjects. Since my last post, this is the only portrait I’ve done.

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This guy is from Sktchy app and he’s an artist too. A brave guy willing to allow others to draw him in the ‘all-together’. I did this one on Procreate (I’m still learning the program – it’ll take me my whole life time to figure it all out I think) and practiced foreshortening as well as anatomy drawing and getting a likeness.

Then it was on to drawing my partner’s motorbike. It’s his pride and joy, and he is so happy that the Government have allowed riders to go out on their bikes again. Although that’s for a test period to see if we can ease some restrictions and still reduce the amount of cases of COVID-19.

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So I probably won’t see him much over the weekend as he’ll be hitting the road with this baby.

I drew his motorbike on my iPad with Procreate too. It’s my first go at drawing his motorbike. It seemed too complex for me at first but then as I slowed right down and focused on negative space and then just the shapes – circles, squares, curves etc – came together on the virtual page. I am very happy with this first go and am thinking of developing a series of drawings all about his motorbike. It could be fun and that’s what art is really about for me.

Now my arty eye has been draw to illustration and in particular how to create characters on the page using objects (as well as myself 🙂 ). I am having so much fun with this style of drawing and it is so freeing for the imagination.

First you start by drawing what you see and going for some accuracy. Check out my drawing pens.

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Then you start to be playful with the pens and pencils, creating joyful characters of them.

Here’s a page from my A5 visual diary. On the left you’ll see my ‘Playful Pen’, then you can see how my imagination is starting to grasp the idea of turning pens and pencils into playful characters.  On the other page, I have more realistic drawings – my Lamy Pen and my watercolour pallet which I did from observation. Down in the bottom corner, I drew my own eye watching my drawing to show how much I was looking, looking, looking at what I was doing.

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Lastly, I’m learning how to turn myself into a character. Here’s me showing my art and writing to my fan base – my fur-babies, Jack, Rocket and Miss Poppy.

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This was soooo much fun. You can expect to see more doodles like this showing up on my blog as I keep playing around with ideas and documenting my daily life in fun ways.

Until next time, I hope you are staying safe and indulging yourself in a creative life. Creative expression, no matter what form it takes, helps you to come home to yourself and see yourself through the things you make.

Go get some ‘Big Magic’ like Elizabeth Gilbert talks about and just have fun!

Portraits & Botanical Drawings

I’ve been keeping-on-keeping-on with my portrait practice. Last week I hit portrait 65 of 100 of my portrait practice challenge.

I’m happy to say that my ability to see what is in front of me and draw that is improving. This means I am becoming much better at drawing portraits that have a likeness to the person and that makes me feel great. Sometimes their features are a little out of proportion like the lady above… I made her nose a little too large and had some trouble placing her eye on the far side of the three quarter view, but overall I am pretty happy with how my portrait skills are going.

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It’s a great way to spend time when I am not working (from home). My art practice is giving me space from the stresses of the world and helping me to figure out who I am and how I am seeing the world from day to day. I have noticed that if I am having an off day, emotionally-speaking, then my drawings can either save me and pull me out of that funk or they are a reflection of the inner turmoil I have been experiencing. I think that’s one of the wonderful things about art. It allows space for the mind to process what has been happening.

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A couple of weeks ago I was missing my fortnightly life drawing class so I spent a few hours reconnecting with how to see and draw the human figure with a fabulous yoga pose provided by a Sktchy muse.

The pose was quite a challenge for me to draw and I think I did a pretty good job of it, however, I can see a few errors. It’s always this way for me. I can’t see the errors at first but after a few days away from my work, I can see where I was in the process of drawing and seeing. And I can see where I have gone just a little off course.

Still I enjoyed the process of drawing that yoga pose and it inspired me to get on my own yoga mat. I’m no-where near as flexible as the lady I drew but that’s not the point. I have to keep reminding myself that yoga is about coming to the mat and working with my body where it is. Giving myself some inner love and acceptance.

What can I say… I’m a work in progress!

So this weekend I moved away from doing portraits and the human figure to embrace some nature. I came across an inspirational idea to use a thick felt tipped pen to create botanical compositions. The above drawing was completed today and I had a blast. It’s a combination of gum nuts, eucalyptus leaves and wattle.

So many hours of work but so much fun. I’m still learning where to go darker and when to hold back. But for my first botanic composition I reckon I managed to create a lovely piece of art.

I’m also embracing imperfection and messy art. I am allowed to make it my own messy creation cause when you stand back it looks great… even if its a bit of a messy-mess up close.

Yesterday, I played with the felt tipped pen in my A5 visual diary. It’s got creamy paper and is lovely to draw in. I found an image of a Protea and created this drawing, then I had to put prismacolor pencils on it to make it pop. I do love the combination of ink pen drawings with my prismacolor pencils. It’s so satisfying to see the work come to life on the page.

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And finally, last weekend, I spent a number of hours outside observing my lemon tree which I have carted around from one home to another in a pot – always whispering promises that when I finally have a home of my own I will plant it and give its root space to stretch out.

I’m still working on finding a place to call my own. The lemon tree has faith in me.

If you’re interested I did the above drawing on my iPad using procreate. I’m loving procreate and learning how to use it to capture art in a new way. There’s so much to learn.

Butterflies have been flitting around my home in abundance lately and laying their eggs on my lemon tree. It doesn’t have so many leaves now that the caterpillars have munched their way through the green leaves!

But I don’t mind. I’m sure my lemon tree isn’t too keen on being eaten like that but it will bounce back. It always does.

The act of sitting in my fold up chair and sketching my lemon tree was truly therapeutic and de-stressing.

I hope that my arty creations inspire you to take pen or pencil to paper or to try out your own creative line work on procreate too.

In this difficult times of isolation and social distancing, I think the practice of art and creative writing, journalling, singing, dancing, playing instruments – anything creative – is a soothing balm for the soul.

Happy creativity. May you draw, dance and be wild in your creative abandon. Don’t judge yourself. Just know that each attempt is a reflection of where you are at that moment in time.

I love that.

Art inspiration during tough times

Aslan and Lucy – a Procreate impression
Artist: Selina Shapland
Created: 1st April 2020

I’m working from home and am almost through my eighth week of recovering from a bulging disc in my lower back. Brisbane is in a kind of partial stay-at-home level of lock down, so it’s important for me to have hobbies to focus on.

As I have felt better I have been able to do more art and what a sanctuary it has been during these tough times.

As the news updates me on the current situation of the spread of the coronavirus, I have been able to spend time with my iPad Pro creating the image above (with thanks to an excellent inspiration photo from the Sktchy App).

When I uploaded the artwork shown above to my facebook page, a dear friend/author/excellent editor, commented that it reminded her of Aslan and Lucy in the Voyage of the Dawn Treader where Lucy is grown up a bit more and Aslan said she wouldn’t be coming back to Narnia.

My dear friend made me look at this artwork with new eyes. She pointed out that that moment in the story was beautiful and poignant.

I was so touched by her comment and it made me look at my artwork differently. Initially it was just a digital drawing of a lion and a woman looking out into the vastness of the unknown, but once she put that comment on my photo… it felt right to me.

Blue biro fantasy drawing in my A5 Visual Diary
Artist: Selina Shapland
Created 31/3/2020

The night before I was inspired to draw another Sktchy inspiration (same muse) with a fantasy edge. I had a wonderful time exploring her form on paper with my blue biro pen and creating the horns.

I can see that my hand eye coordination is improving as I continue to draw, and I am so grateful for the life drawing classes I had been going to before things shut down for our own safety. Thankfully there are many online art resources and connecting with creativity isn’t too difficult to do as long as you don’t indulge the inner critic in the process.

I try to shut my inner critic in a small room with a puzzle to work on while I am busy creating. She kind of helps me sort through complexities in my life and doesn’t bother me too much when I need time out of life to draw, paint and write.

Rocket and I spending quality time together


Life as I’ve known it, as we’ve all known it has changed since the Coronavirus has moved from one area to another spreading illness.

I am doing my best to love and appreciate all the people I have in my life and my animal companions. I’ve been reminded once again just how precious life it. All life.

And we can all play a part in stopping the spread of the virus by staying at home, washing our hands and practicing good social distancing. It’s a tough change for everyone and for some it is heartbreaking.

So, please take care. Care for yourself, your loved ones and the stranger down the street. We’re all interconnected and this virus has proved it in a way I never could have foreseen.

In this time of interconnection, I want to send out my heartfelt gratitude for all the people who are on the front line of healthcare, managing essential services and those who are keeping us safe by ensuring we’re following the guidelines. And I send love and hope to those who are feeling afraid. I send love to all who have lost loved ones to this virus too. I can only imagine how tough lock down has been for people around the world and the grief many are feeling as those they love have passed away.

My own mother is in a care facility and we are not able to see her for safety reasons. I am grateful that this safety measure has been put in place. It’s tough not to see her and to know that she doesn’t understand why we can’t come to visit, but it is for her safety and the safety of every other older person in residence as well as the marvellous staff who care for them.

I hope you can take a mini break and be playful with a touch of creative expression. I believe it is a heal balm for tough times.

Farewell for now and let’s all pray for a cure for this virus.

Still Standing

My lumber spine is recovery slowly and I am standing more than ever! I feel like singing, “I’m still standing, yeah yeah yeah!” – lyrics from some song by Elton John. I never said I was a big music person, but I do love art and writing. And I love creative living.

I’m standing at the breakfast bar typing this up before I go to the osteopath to be pulled in all sorts of directions which has been helping my back to recover.

It’s been a difficult couple of weeks as I haven’t been able to do as much art but it’s given me plenty of time to lay facing the ceiling and contemplate my novel’s next steps.

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As the two weeks have gone by I’ve been able to stand more and I was able to do this portrait on procreate. I am so happy with it because it’s my first procreate drawing. It took my mind off the pain and helped me learn some of the pencil and pen tools in the app. I’m not sure I’m going to be a big user of digital art apps but I did enjoy this process.

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My best friend helped me get to the art store so I could get an easel. That adventure resulted in a messy charcoal portrait of this guy. I think I made him into a cross between a zombie and a caricature. I had a lot fun doing this one, even with his creepy eye.

Then as I have been able to sit for slightly longer periods of time, I have been reading Fiona McIntosh’s book, How to Write Your Block Buster. It’s the second time I have come to her for inspiration to get my creative writing heart beat pumping. And it works. She has such a down-to-earth approach to writing that inspires taking even the smallest action on my novel.

I’ve been jotting down the plot for The Living Death of Toddy James and editing the manuscript in 10 minute intervals as that’s about how long I can sit for.

It feels good to be living a creative life even in the smallest of moments of the day.

I feel like my novel is going to start deepening and broadening as I go now and that’s wonderful. Writing stories is a creative activity that fills me up. I need to make more time for this creative expression, and I will. As I heal my back and move through the emotions of my mother’s Alzheimer’s Disease my mind is clearing and the fog is lifting.

I’m so grateful to be writing as well as doing art again. Creative living is rich living.

The Start of Creativity 2020

The start of 2020 has been full on for me. I’ve had the challenging experience of making a difficult decision (with my brother) to admit our mother to permanent aged care. It was a very difficult and emotional time but mum seems to be doing well and I can only hope that she enjoys her time in the beautiful homey residence we chose for her.

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My mum in her new residence. Love her so much!

So in between rushing to Canberra to do all things aged care I’ve also managed to injure my lumbar spine and have a bulging disc. It’s horrifically painful and is limiting my ability to do art and write. I have to write a sentence and walk around as I don’t have a standing desk and the only comfortable positions for my back to heal are laying flat and standing up.

But over the first two months in between all this change I have managed to go to life drawing once and do more portraits as part of my portrait practice challenge.

Here’s a few photos of the portraites I’ve been working on:

And a couple from my January life drawing class:

I’ve also signed up to learn more about figure drawing with Proko. I would love to develop my drawing of the human figure and have less perspective errors in my drawings. So it’s going to be a fun year of creative exploration. There are so many great drawing tips from Stan Prokopenko on YouTube too. So if you love drawing and want to get better at it, you may want to check him out as well.

I hope you have a creative day no matter how you like to approach your creative expression.

 

Celebrating Art in 2019

I have been delving into a daily art practice since May this year and I want to share with you the joy that this form of creative expression brings me. To do this, I have put together a six minute video showing a lot of the portraits I have done and some of the creative ways I have drawn people and random things that interest me throughout this year. I have learned not to be so precious about my art and to be okay with unfinished drawings. I’ve learned to be self-compassionate and to enjoy being fully present in the moment.

When I am doing life drawing or sketching random people I am practicing my observation skills and my hand-eye coordination. I’m seeing and recording what catches my eye and details that are important to me. When I am doing portraits I am attempting to get a likeness, to develop my own style and most of all, I am trying to capture a sense of their spirit through my drawing.

This year, I have written my novels sporadically and I felt awful that I couldn’t write the way I wanted to. I have two novels in various stages of editing and it’s been too much for me to focus on that while also dealing with the pain of my mother’s Alzheimer’s disease,  and the flow on effect this disease has on my life. My brain has felt like cotton wool every time I have come to write my stories so this year I turned to my art practice as a place of solace and healing.

2019 has been an emotionally difficult year and I think 2020 may have a bit more of that to offer me but I am going to continue my writing and my art practice because that’s my way of living a creative life.

So, I hope, if you take the time to watch the youtube video below, that you enjoy it and that you are inspired to create, write, draw, paint, sing, dance, make music, do whatever creative expression muse calls you to do on a daily basis from now on. Because, making art is a celebration of life as we see it and relate to it. That’s what I believe.

It is also my belief that creative expression brings out the best of humanity and can call attention to important topics and causes too. So if you have something to communicate, please don’t hold back on expressing yourself through your chosen medium. Let yourself out to play, move away from judgement and into self-compassion. Move into acceptance of where you’re at and know that with every step you take you are making progress.

This is David, my partner. He is a volunteer fire fighter and last week he was out on a strike team fighting fires in Bundaberg, Queensland. These people are volunteering to save crops, animals, people and property while dealing with smoke and heat and harsh weather conditions. They don’t get paid and many of them take annual leave from their day jobs to be there for those in need.

Dave’s portrait is number 44 of 100 of my portrait practice challenge. It’s a portrait but it is so much more than that. To me, it is about honouring the volunteers who put themselves on the line for our community every time a fire threatens to devour whatever it in its path.

He sent me this photo when he had a chance. It was meant to be confirmation that he was safe and well. But I looked at it and saw a man doing his best to care for those in need and I wanted to honour that through my art.

I hope Dave’s portrait inspires you to make art that comments on the good work people do in this world too.

I may not blog again until early 2020, but before I sign off, I want to share with you that I am grateful for you touching my life, for the positive and supportive comments made and I hope that creative living provides you with a safe place to play and be yourself without judgement too.

Have a great end of 2019 and may 2020 bring you many hours of creative fun and joy! 

 

Creativity Keeping Me Steady

I’ve completed 39 of 100 portraits in my 100 portraits challenge. I have no time frame to do them in. I just want to practice and keep learning how to develop my own creative expression on paper.

The images above are the my three most recent drawings. Two are cross hatching with a micron pen and the one in the middle is charcoal and white poc marker pen. Each one took about a two hours to complete and I am quite happy with them. I’m learning how much shadow to lay down, how to capture the light on the page and how to follow the form with each cross hatching stroke. It’s not always easy and I make mistakes but the act of drawing takes me out of the critical mind and keeps me steady in life.

In November I went to Canberra, where my family live and I was born, to see my mum. She has Alzheimer’s Disease and it was time to go back to collect more precious memories and to touch base on a face-to-face-heart-to-heart level. The day I arrived my mum seemed unwell and by the next day she was in emergency. She had an infection and so I spent the week at the hospital. My brother has been mum’s main carer and he is doing a brilliant job of caring for mum and it’s difficult to stop infections from happening when the person you look after can’t tell you they are unwell.

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It was a difficult and precious week.

I took a photo of us holding hands, even though mum didn’t know who I was.

At one point as she started to recover, the nurses had lowered the bed to the floor and I sat beside her. My hand held in hers. She rubbed my fingers with hers, smiled for the first time in a long time and whispered, “You’re lovely. I think you’re wonderful.”

Tears welled in my eyes. I choked them back and said, “I think you’re lovely too and I love you.”

Her blue eyes turned to me once more and she said, “I love you too.”

And then she receded into whatever space one goes to when they have Alzheimer’s Disease. Her eyes grew distant and she stared around the room once more.

That is a moment I will treasure for the rest of my life. Even writing this now my heart is aching and tears are making my vision blurry.

My mum is teaching me all about living in the moment and how to appreciate the smallest murmurs with the deepest love.

Mum was still in hospital when I had to return to Brisbane but I knew I’d be back in a few weeks time to see her once again. Her light is still strong and I have more precious moments to collect when I am there. Moments that will be locked away in my heart for the rest of my life.

So, once I got home and was greeted with lavish licks from my dogs and a semi-tolerant stare from cat, I knew it was time to start capturing moments that held meaning to me through my art practice.

David, my partner, happened to be sitting down watching TV and I noticed his foot. Strange as it might sound, I knew I wanted to draw his foot and catch an impression of him in my big green chair.

Dave_FootI got out my micron pen and sketched his foot using extreme foreshortening and then his knee and then his other foot and leg, and then I added the rest of him at a distance.

When I finished this drawing I was delighted. It has become one of my all-time favourite drawings. It is not perfect. In fact it is filled with imperfection, but what it captures is love and life in action. I also hold a memory of this moment that I can relive every time I see this drawing. To get David to sit for me to draw him, I bribed him with an ice cream and an episode of Star Trek Deep Space Nine!

And this is how creative art has been helping me to stay steady in life as I deal with anticipatory grief over my mother’s health conditions.

I also had a glimpse of creative writing again and in that moment I took to my novel with renewed interest and care.

Staying creative – drawing and writing what is in my heart and what I find precious – during the ups and downs of life brings solace to my heart.

I’m learning how important the ordinary is and how extraordinary the ordinary things in life really are.

Until next time, with gratitude for the time you have spent here reading my blog, I wish you creativity in your day. 

Mindful Creativity

I’ve been exploring mindful creativity through my art and journal writing practice. It is way of connecting with my inner creativity and continuing to learn that art and writing are tools which bring me completely into the present moment.

My portrait practice has slowed but I am continuing to make progress both in creative expression and accuracy. The images below include portraits 30 and 31 out of 100. There are also graphite drawings of eyes with glasses which I did as part of the Sktchy course with France Van Stone.

As I draw a portrait, I have found that I am looking at what is in front of me and my mind is engaged in seeing the tones and values, the contours, the various shapes and I am no longer labelling what I see. It is as if my mind enters a space of surrender to what is before me. It is a sweet space to occupy and it allows my subconscious mind the space to unravel things that need to be contemplated.

I have also been writing a daily journal with the prompt, ‘today I noticed’, and I what I have noticed is that I am more in tune with what is happening inside me but not in a self-aggrandisement way. Reflection on my inner self through this journal exercise has given me space to explore who I am in the moment and to learn to allow the thoughts that float in and out of my mind to pass through while I only catch the threads I choose to connect with. It is a mindfulness skill.

This writing exercise is also helping me to be fully present in the moment. One day in recent weeks I found myself jotting down how the swallow-like birds zoom around me as a walk to work in the morning. They race each other zooming around in ever widening circles. They movements filled with playful joy. Their inverted ‘V” tails flashing past as these tiny  blue-black birds whoosh past my legs, hovering two feet above the grass and dancing on the air currents.

Taking a moment of time to notice these gifts of nature helps my creative life to expand. I write down what I notice and my imagination expands. My vocabulary for writing expands and so does my visual vocabulary of symbols increase.

Being creatively mindful isn’t about the end result or producing something that I can sell or show off. It’s about the moment, the journey and the experience within.

I am loving this mindful creative living through art and writing. I love that I can learn and grow and play. It is refreshing and positive.

If you have read this far, then I hope what I have said here inspires you to develop your own daily mindful creative habit. And it is my hope that you will find the richness of the universe in those moments too.

Until next time, happy creating and being in the present moment.

 

Art and Writing Practice

It’s been some time since I last wrote a blog post. I’ve been continuing my art and writing practice while also working.

Below is my latest portrait. I’m continuing to practice my portraiture skills and my crosshatching skills. This is portrait 29 of 100.

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Portrait 29/100 of my portrait practice challenge. Created: 13/10/2019 Artist: Selina Shapland

Below are some progress photos of my most recent portrait.

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The inspiration photo came from the Sktchy app and this is another artist in that community. I had a lot of fun capturing his squinting eye, practicing proportions and capturing the way he looked at the camera with one eye open.

Below is another pen crosshatching portrait practice piece.

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It’s the first one where I’ve drawn teeth and got them looking like they are sitting inside her lips. The green pen was fun to use and gives her a soft quality. The inspiration photo also came from Sktchy app.

Around all of my other drawing, I’ve been learning to use procreate and draw animal portraits.

Here’s the iguana I did with the Sktchy School class.

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I’m so looking forward to developing my digital art skills and seeing how my creative life blooms with the mediums available on this excellent creative app.

I’ve also been writing a daily journal with the prompt: “Today, I noticed”. It’s a ten minute exercise where I either write in a paper journal or on my scrivener file and allow my daily experiences to flow through me and onto the page.

One of the excellent things about developing a daily journal practice is that it frees up my mind allows my creativity to flow. It’s really helping me to move through writing blocks and plot knots. As a result of daily journaling, my novel writing has sprung into life and I am thoroughly enjoying fleshing out the areas that need to change from telling to showing because I am not bogged down by mental thoughts.

Living a creative life means that I need to be willing to empty the mental and emotional bucket through writing and art. Creative living is a sanity saver for me and it reduces anxiety in my life. My brain has time to process other events happening in the background of my life and I am more in tune with life in a way that flows when I willingly come to writing and art.

I’m also touching on exploring memoir writing and personal essays of memories in my life. I love that writing gives me such a safe place for self expression.

If you’re interested in seeing my portrait art and my life drawing progress, I post most of my photos on instagram now. It’s a way of sharing without using up all my google space for photos. So I am choosing to only show select art here now. My instagram feed is on this blog if you’re interested in checking it out.

Thanks for dropping by and for checking out my blog. I’m in a weird place right now as I deal with some emotional home life stuff so I may not blog as often as I would like. Sometimes I wonder if I have anything to say that is worth reading… But maybe that’s anxiety talking and not the reality of the situation. I don’t know.

Anyway, I hope that as I explore creative living that I inspire you to explore your creative life too.

Until next time… have fun!

Arty fun has been had

In recent weeks, I have been diving deeper into my art practice.

My writing brain is having a holiday from the pressure of editing my novel. I’ve felt a bit burnt out with my writing lately and needed to give myself permission to do something fun where I have no pressure to be at publication standard. No-one has ever put pressure on me to write to publication standard, but I have and I’m a harsh task master.

I have been on holidays and it has helped me to fill up my creative bucket through art.

Below are some of the portraits I have done as part of my portrait practice challenge. These are all black pen and one of them I used yellow and orange pencils to make the flower pop.

The portraits below include a self-portrait I did which is now the basis of my next Skillshare course, called Draw a Self-Portrait in Graphite.

I also experimented with black brush pen to create the quickest portrait I’ve ever done of the young man in half shadow. Then it was back to graphite to capture eyes.

Eyes, eyes, eyes. All one eye studies which I did as part of a Sktchy course with France Van Stone. I’m still doing this eyes course and loving it. I’m about to move on to pen drawings, so I’ll keep you updated when I get those done. The eyes below are of my family, partner and friend as well as one of my own eyes.

Then it was time to tackle one of the most emotionally difficult portraits I have ever done… my mother’s face. She has Alzheimer’s disease and is often lost and confused. The day I drew this portrait (below) my heart ached and I shed quite a few tears as I processed the grief I feel time and again as I come to terms with what is happening to my mum.

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I learned how to combine ink with watercolour and pastel pencils to create the two portraits below.

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These portraits were quite a lot of fun to do. The one above is my boss. It’s not an exact likeness but I caught the fact that he loves bright colours.

Below is the one I did in the mini Sktchy course with Margriet Aasman. IMG_0789

This one below is my latest portrait. I did it yesterday as I completed an online sktchy course on how to draw a portrait using charcoal medium. This was quite a challenging medium to work in and I had to get used to pushing around the willow charcoal to create the features, and not go too heavy on the compressed charcoal when I went back into bring the eyes to life. I thoroughly enjoyed this class with Neil Rogers.

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I’m going to keep developing my portrait practice. I’ve done 18 portraits so far and I have been adding to my understanding of how to capture the face as well as get a likeness, then how to allow my own style to emerge. I’m looking forward to what the next eighty-two portraits look like as well as seeing how my preferences for mediums change.

Of course, I haven’t only been doing art classes, I have been learning how to draw in my visual diary and use watercolours to enhance what I want to capture. Above is a sketch of my dining room, multiple watercolour (in graphite watercolour as well as colour) mushrooms, an apple that I ate and painted one bite at a time, three pears.

And to top all this creativity off, I went to an Archery for Authors event where I learned to use a bow and arrow. I’m not the best aim but I killed a balloon and when we went outside to play with long bows, I hit the bullseye!

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It was a fantastic morning. Now if I choose to have a character in one of my novels that uses a bow and arrow, I’ll actually know what I’m writing about.

Until next time, I hope you are living an inspired and creative life.

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