Tabla de contenidos para Issue 23 en Creative Artist

The natural world gives me immense pleasure. I have my mother to thank for teaching me, as a child, to appreciate nature. I have enjoyable memories of clambering over rocks with her on sunny days, catching skinks for her aquarium or playing with the many different dogs she bred. Coupled with an adventurous nature, I soon exchanged dolls for climbing trees, collecting birds’ eggs or moulding animals from clay, sourced from my backyard. All these experiences fashioned me into the person I am today – a wildlife artist. When not exploring my surroundings I immersed myself in drawing. Growing older I found work and later family life crowded out the time to pursue my art. From time to time I caught a glimpse of where I wanted to be when…

From bone sculptures, circular textures, bolted books, moon bowls and landscapes, there is surely something to delight everyone. Director Ami says, “Putting this exhibition was actually easy, these were works that didn’t quite fit into any other exhibition this past year, but they were just too good to pass up. I decided to make a category - an exhibition for all those interesting works and call it Anything Goes! We try to include as many talented artists that we can, we are just unfortunately limited on time and space. This exhibition features the art of several great emerging Wellington based artists including David Boyle, Jenny Hartley, Ellen Hodgetts, Lynne Wakem, Christina Litras and Shane Gallagher”. For more information about this exhibition, please visit www.artriumgallery.co.nz .…

• Use a glass palette with neutral grey toned paper below so that when you mix colour you can do so in proper relationship to the neutral mid tone. You can more easily judge your choice of colour and tone as you mix them on the palette. Getting the tonal relationship right has a significant impact on the overall effect of a modelled form and a convincing sense of realism. • Use cotton rags, rather than paper, to wipe off excess paint or medium from brushes. Paper will loosen fibres and the brush will drag fibres and dust onto the surface of your painting. • I leave my brushes overnight with conditioning coconut oil based cleaner and wash my brushes after every use each day. This protects the brushes and…

Materials • Reference photo • Cotton gloves • Biro • White carbon paper • Fiberglass brush • Very fine steel wool • Scratch knife – curved edge • Scratch knife – straight edge • Ampersand scratchboard • Watercolour brush or airbrush • Black ink – Art Spectrum or similar • Fixative Scratchboard. What is it? Scratchboard is a board with a thin clay coating covered with black ink. A scratch tool is used to scratch through the layer of black ink revealing the white clay underneath. You can buy board that is pre-inked, called scratchboard, or un-inked, called clayboard. There are also boards that are coloured beneath the black ink. You can use a variety of tools, basically anything that scratches. Nibs, steel wool, fiberglass brushes, emery boards and tattoo…

• I use good quality canvas that is pregessoed and stretched by a professional framer! I no longer purchase pre-cut stretcher bars due to the fact that they still seem to warp when stretching a large canvas and they limit me for size choice. • On receiving my stretched canvas I apply a final coat of gesso to ensure the surface is as smooth as possible. • I tend to use round brushes rather than flat ones and stick with my old favourites for years!! They vary in sizes from #0 to #12. Of course I use much larger brushes to block in the colour of the sky and the water and sand in the very beginning. A flattish 25mm synthetic brush is perfect for this. • Occasionally I will…

Born in Damascus, Syria in 1975, Sara belongs to a family of intellectuals, who always encouraged her in her path as an artist. She graduated from the Painting Department of the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Damascus in 1998. Since then she has been constantly involved in the art scene. Diaspora is about her feelings and mixed thoughts about the critical situation in her homeland. “As with many others populations in history, it seems that it is the turn of the Syrians to flee their homeland and scatter around the world. I define this as a real diaspora because it forms mass dispersions of an involuntary nature of a group of people maintaining a myth about their peaceful homeland; they regard the cities they left as their true home,…

Scratchboard is a sheet of masonite coated in fine kaolin clay and sprayed with black India Ink. The International Society of Scratchboard Artists defines it thus: “Scratchboard Art is a 2-dimensional, subtractive medium that involves the use of abrasive tools to directly remove a surface layer of one value (typically dark) to expose a secondary layer of a contrasting value (typically white). “The majority of the values within the artwork should be achieved by varying the amount of surface layer that has been removed or left. “Reapplying of transparent mediums over the initial scratching is permissible, but the integrity of the underlying scratching should remain visible. “Works may be colour or black and white.” Clayboard (officially spelt Claybord) is the same as scratchboard but without the layer of ink. This…

Materials • 140lb Fabriano Hot Press watercolour paper • H Graphite Pencil • Stylus with a small head and slightly larger head • Dr Ph Martin’s Bleed Proof White • Faber and Castel Polychromo coloured pencils: – Burnt Ochre – Burnt Sienna – Cream – Dark Indigo – Dark Pthalo Blue – Earth Green Yellowish – Indian Red – Ivory – Light Cobalt Turquoise – Light Flesh – Light Green – Light Ultramarine – Mauve – Middle Cadmium Red – Naples Ochre – Olive Green Yellowish – Pine Green – Raw Umber – Walnut Brown – Warm Grey II – Warm Grey V • Derwent coloured pencil – Turquoise Green Step One Using 140lb Fabriano Hot Press Watercolour paper and an H Graphite Pencil I made a faint drawing of…

Hi Brett, I have dabbled in art on and off for forty years and having part completed a commercial art course in the 1970s, I appear to have, until recently, missed the concept of drawing the negative spaces. I still primarily draw what I see but recognise the negative space concept as having a place in all drawings. My interest here is where did this concept come from and how long did it take to get accepted by the broader art world? With thanks, Wade, Bidwill. Hi Wade, I just love negative spaces as they really are purely abstract shapes that can’t lead you astray with preconceived ideas of what you are drawing. They are a great proportional judgement tool as if they are…

• Don’t use cheap materials even if you are just learning; the results may be inferior and can, as in my case, dampen one’s resolve to continue. • Pay particular attention to composition, light and shade, lost and found edges. You will be scratching for a long time so get it right from the start. • Once your picture is ready to be transferred onto the board sit with it awhile. I make a copy of the proposed artwork, and pin it to the wall in a place I pass every day. After a week or two I will know if I need to tweak the image, discard it or proceed as is. • There will be a point in your work where you will feel like giving up. This…

1. Optex Mini Photo Studio Kit – $119.00 http://www.digitalcamerawarehouse.com.au/prod6570.htm The Optex mini photo studio is a great product for people wanting to photograph small scale objects. The two lights give an even illumination of the subject and the various coloured backgrounds make for a versatile piece of kit. It’s suitable for small scale sculptures, macro photography of objects, detailed photographs and anything that’s smaller scale. Those wanting to sell their works will find the quality of light out of one of these to be quite good. The kit is portable and easy to set up and the diffusers on either side provide a nice, balanced and soft light. Because the lights are constant (not flash), any camera will be able to make use of the set-up even in automatic mode.…

Materials • Fine oil primed Belgian linen on museum quality cedar stretchers • For the Sketch-up General’s Charcoal 2B pencil Fixative • Paints – best quality for the hue– Titanium White– Naples Yellow Italian– Yellow Ochre– Cadmium Yellow– Italian Pink– Cadmium Red– Crimson Lake– Alizarin Crimson– Ultramarine Blue– Azure Blue– Video Blue Pale– Cinnabar Green– Terre Verte– Mars Red– Transparent Mars Red– Burnt Umber– Burnt Sienna– Mars Black • Painting medium – Langridge Low Toxic paint medium • Langridge Retouch Varnish • Solvent – Langridge Low Toxic Solvent • Brushes- soft hair badger and sable – Flats and Filberts from #2 - #20 – Sable rounds #000 - #2 Step One Using a charcoal pencil, I sketch up the composition. Once this is in place, I fix the drawing layer…

• Keep a flat brush handy, and regularly brush over your picture to avoid pencil dust being rubbed into your picture. I use a 4½ cm Hake brush but a cheap DIY painting brush would do the job too. • Once I have applied coloured pencil and need to rest my hand on it to reach other areas I place a piece of paper under my hand and am very careful not to drag that piece of paper as I move my hand. • Unless you have a specific colour in mind such a something akin to black, I find if I randomly apply one colour on top of the other there is a chance of it becoming ‘muddy’. Always test the mix before applying it, this way you avoid…