Today was the last day of CJS17, so we ended where we started, with organiser Nathalie Kalbach. Nat showed us how one of her journal pages was inspired by Cy Twombly. I’m a Cy fan, so jumped straight in. I used gesso, Distress Paints, pencils, archival ink, Pitt Big Brush pen and stamps.
Yesterday’s artist was Julie Fei-Fan Balzer, again someone whose work I love. The piece she inspired us to create starts with a layer of various mediums so I had to leave it to dry overnight given our summer’s not exactly hot! Although this was scary to do – it involved pouring thin black paint right over the top of the previous layers – I would certainly use this process for something like a journal cover.
I used Golden garnet gel, Golden light modelling paste, Galeria black lava texture gel, Galeria medium grain gel and Golden gloss polymer for the initial layer. The colours are Golden fluid acrylics, Reeves copper paint, Golden Micaceous Iron Oxide fluid acrylic and Zinc White fluid acrylic.
Today we were inspired by artwork from Gina Lee Kim, who specialises in mixed media seascapes based on watercolour backgrounds. I completed mine and was okay with the colours etc but disliked the sloping horizon. I left it overnight and this morning decided to cut it beneath the textured horizon and reposition the top so the horizon was flat. Of course it didn’t line up properly so I had to trim the edges a bit and, rather than lose half my yacht sails, I chose to keep a sloping top to the picture. I’m much happier with it now.
I used W&N watercolours, watercolour pencils, Dylusions white paint because I didn’t have gouache, light modelling paste, and some scrapbooking paper because my origami paper is hidden in my stash somewhere!
Today’s video with Andrea Gomoll was about using watercolours in mixed media. I used pan watercolours and Neocolour crayons, with light modelling paste underneath and copper paint stencilled on top.
From time to time I test out new directions, usually after being inspired by reading about and watching other people’s work. I love watching other artists on YouTube and letting that inspiration feed my work. I don’t want to copy their work and, even if I did, I am a hopeless copyist. What I do as an artist is what I do! Sometimes Tony will see a work and ask if I could do something similar. The answer’s always no. My hands and brain are wired to create in a certain way, so when I watch a lot of someone I can see their influence in my new work, but it always ends up looking like mine…
Recently I have been reading about Flora Bowley, and my dear friend artist Martha Marshall put me onto Jane Davies. Here are to test pieces; I am sure you can see the influence of their style. I’ll be doing more pieces in my art journal until the new way of working becomes part of what I do and feels integrated into my art practice. I’d love to know what you think of these directions.
Cath Sheard Art 