Last Of The Bluebell Photo's

My email problems are sorted out now so I have gone back to my original and preferred email address although the alternative will reach me just as well.

I have had very little time for art this week but I did manage this pen and ink cat drawing. I found it very difficult due to the large amount of white on its face and chest. It does look a little better enlarged but I am not too happy with it. It would probably have looked good in scraperboard but I don't think I am au fait with the technique enough to do it justice. Perhaps when I have practiced a bit more I may try it again.

Do you remember my post about the stunning etchings of Flora McLachlan a while back? Well I heard from a lady, Neile, who read my blog that she is exhibiting as part of the Oxford Art Week event this week. She will be at St.Giles Church in Oxford if anyone is in the area. Unfortunately I cannot go but I am sure she will be very successful. Her work is really beautiful. You can read about Flora on this Art Weeks page here.

Aren't these two paintings by artist Dawn Stacey gorgeous? Such a beautiful use of colour and detail. Dawn is a very successful artist who originally studied for a textile degree but then went into painting. Her artwork is composed of various layers and decorative surfaces and collage. You can check out the rest of Dawn's work on her website here.

Lilies In The Royal Pavilion

Heron On A Quiet Spring Afternoon

I visited Hatfield Craft Fair on Friday and it was cold... very cold. They have moved the fair from just outside the main house to a very draughty spot on a hilltop nearby. The original Palace of Hatfield was the childhood home of Elizabeth I but there is only a tiny remnant of that now. I spent quite a while photographing the ancient trees (there are over 800 ancient trees in the forest) and I will put some of them on the blog next week. The craft fair used to spill over into the lovely old outbuildings and stables of the house and it was wonderful to walk around but I think the atmosphere has gone now. Not a wise move in my opinion. Still, the fair itself is enormous with many huge marquees cramed full of lovely goodies and handmades. There were lots of things I would have loved to have brought home with me but I restrained myself and bought only cards and a lovely silver engraved heart necklace. The marquees below represent only a tiny fraction of the fair.

These are the last of my bluebell posts for this spring. These are from three different areas. I have a huge collection of bluebell photos now from quite a few local areas where they grow in large numbers. You can click on them to make them larger if you like.

Tony Foard is an English potter who creates beautifully delicate raku figures of African women. He produces other ceramics as well but is best known for his tall, slim ladies. He pays great attention to detailing the faces and figures and gives them gorgeous gowns to wear. They are really stunning to see grouped together like in the images below. His work can be found in galleries in the UK. You can see more of Tony's work on his website here.

We came across this fascinating old garden door on the Earl Howe estate at Penn Manor when out walking one day. You will have to click on the photo to enlarge it as it is partly in shade. It is a composite door with three different panels, one of which is extremely beautifully carved. The middle part is completely plain and the other side panel is very rusty and old looking. The very decorative part was obviously never meant to be in a garden door but was probably an interior feature. Judging by the border it must have been a huge thing originally. Amazing what you can find in the countryside.

Valerie Armstrong is a multi-talented artist who creates work in the form of paintings, drawings, collage, monoprints, collographs, illustrations and folding screens. She also trained and worked as an art therapist. My favourite of her work is defintely her collographs though. The three images below are all collographs and they have a lovely narrative and contemporary feel to them. I never can resist birds of course. You can find lots of Valerie's work on here website here.

Gossip

Watching The Weather

The Message

I have added a few new images to my large collection of greetings cards. The paintings are by artist Alex Egan who produces really lovely fresh and spontaneous watercolours of animals and birds and lots of other things too. She has some delicious chicken and geese artwork. The cards are produced by greetings card company Wildcard and you can find Alex's page on their site here. You can find Alex's own website here.

Mother Hen

Hare Study

Gwendolin And Brenda

Temporary New Email Address

If anyone has emailed me and got returned mail it is because my email server is misbehaving in a big way for complex cyber reasons. I cannot get anything on the farawayhills at the moment so I have put an alternative email address on my profile. It is not because I am ignoring anyone...honest.

Scraperboards and Bluebells and Blossom

I really enjoyed the two giveaways I have just completed even though they were quite a bit of work. All but three packages have been posted now and two of those will go on Tuesday (Bank Holiday on Monday). The third one is just waiting for an address. I know some bloggers have already received their prizes but please let me know if anyone doesn't receive theirs.

This quirky little piece is Bird Guardian

I was browsing in a local art shop on Saturday when I came across some scraperboards and tools and I decided to buy them and have a go. I have been meaning to try this technique for ages but haven't actually got around to it till now. I must have been one of the very few school kids who never got to try this out. I think perhaps our art master Mr Woods didn't like scraperboard. It took a little while to get the hang of the scraping tools but I am very pleased with the result considering I am a complete novice. I think perhaps I should have made the bird and the girl's face whiter but the scan has made the whole thing greyer than it actually is in reality. Perhaps a photo would be better. The tools were very cheap as I didn't want to spend much until I had decided whether I liked the technique. I have decided that I do and I will invest in something of better quality. It is a very similar process to linocut in that you are carving white lines and therefore you need to plan your work much more carefully than you would a drawing. I think it will be quite a little while before I can produce anything remotely like the Cathie Bleck artwork below mine...haha.

White Bird

Here are some seriously professional scraperboard images by American artist and illustrator Cathie Bleck, although Cathie uses a slightly more complex technique by using layers of ink in her work. She is truly a master of this medium with so much detail, energy and graceful lines in her work. Cathie has her own website here with lots more black and white and coloured images. You can also see lots of her work on the Enid Lawson Gallery website here.

Cheetah

With The Wind

Polar Bear's Dilemma

I found this delightful childrens' poetry book in a charity shop the other day. It is a collection of poems compiled by Nicola Baxter and illustrated by Cathie Shuttleworth.

Cathie is an English artist and illustrator who hails from Suffolk. She has illustrated many books over the years and her style is wonderfully delicate and detailed watercolours. These are just the sort of illustrations that I loved as a child. Cathie has also branched out into very clever paper sculptures and you read all about that on her website here.

I couldn't resist uploading a couple more cherry blossom pictures. All the blossoms are fading away now, especially with the very wet weather we are having this weekend.

I like Jill Stewart's quirky and decorative metalwork a lot. She lives in the north of England and creates lovely clocks, mirrors and jewellery among other things, using differently coloured metals. Her work is very decorative with etching and texts and she obviously loves birds and forms of nature. You can find Jill's website here.

Clocks

Earrings

We found a wonderful bluebell wood whilst out geochaching last Sunday. The bluebells weren't out properly that day but I made a return visit later in the week and captured them in all their glory. There were two shots of the wood but Blogger, in its infinite wisdom, decided to delete the other one and as you all know you cannot fit anything into the post once it is uploaded. Still, not to worry as I have lots more bluebells to come yet...lol.

and these are the individual flowers that make up those gorgeous swathes of blue

I love Karen Birchwood's beautifully delicate and fresh approach to painting. Her work is filled with colour and light. Karen originally graduated in textiles but has now moved to painting in the Kent area of England. She takes her inspiration from the landscapes of "the garden of England" and is also inspired by the likes of Mary Fedden - another favourite of mine. She has lots more lovely artwork on her website here.

Red Mug

Garden View II

Wild Flowers, Romney Marsh

The lithographic images below are the work of Czech graphic artist/printmaker Marina Richterova. She was born in Russia and you can see that influence in her work. I love the intense detail and the melancholy of her art. You can see masses more images of her work on Celebrities on the Web here. If you click on the images on the right sidebar and then click on the image again you will get an enlarged version of the picture.

Haiku

Donna 2006

Butterfly Dreams

The Pilgrims

Portrait In Red Chemise - In Honour To My Father

PASS THE BOOK GIVEAWAY DRAW WINNER

This is my latest offering - The Hen Collector


PASS THE BOOK GIVEAWAY DRAW RESULTS

At long last I have the winner of the lovely Miss Read "Pass The Book" giveaway. I have been very naughty and kept the book far too long but it is now ready for the next stage of its journey along with a few of my goodies. I had such a lovely response to the giveaway (thanks to Carolyn of Love Stitching Red) that I decided to have six runners up as well and they will each receive a print of one of my drawings. Sorry it has taken so long to post this but you would not believe the time it takes to photograph everything, put all the names into my little basket, visit websites to check names, do the links and then take out all the myriad of spaces that Blogger seems to think I need in my blog...I don't. Anyway enough excuses.

The winner of the book and the items below is....GINA of Fan My Flame. She will receive the goodies in the three pictures below.

The six runners up I have chosen will each receive a print which you can see below (4th picture down) They are:

Caroline of Caroline's Studio

Fibrefrolics

Debrina of Debrina's Diary

Cathie of Clevelandgirlie

Chrissie of Niminyfingers

Stephanie of Primitive Folk Art - so addresses when you have a moment ladies

Gina has won a selection of my designs made into greetings cards

three mini prints of my woman who planted trees series and an original pen and ink and watercolour drawing

and lastly the book that started it all together with one of my photographic prints of a local bluebell wood which I took a few years ago and four handmade cards. The cards and envelopes are made from handmade paper (not by me) and I have woodblock stamped a design (again not mine) and have added some little birds (mine). The inclusions are tiny blue flowers, leaves and stems.

SIX RUNNERS UP

In the spirit of good blogship I decided to have six runners up and they will each receive one of the two designs below. I intended all the six prints to be identical but my printer disagreed and would only print the first three. Luckily I had another three prints of a different design so I will surprise you with which one you receive.

The hen lady is new but the other print is an older drawing which was originally a digitally coloured sketch. I liked it so much I decided to make it into a "proper" digital drawing.

I found this tiny ladybird in its little wooden home. So sweet and bright but quite a nip if you are not careful.

I first became aware of Danish artist and illustrator Lisa Graa Jensen when I bought a pack of her designs as Christmas cards. I was definitely won over to her gorgeous colours and wonderful design sense. She is one of my favourite artists. She is very well known and an Internet search will turn up lots of examples of her work but you can find a nice selection here at Alresford Gallery and, of course, Lisa's own site here.

Pigeons Over Surrey Hills

Winter Woolies, Surrey Hills

More Than Just Friends

I popped round to my brother and Lesley's house the other day and, as usual, Poppy obliged on the photographic front. The other cats were rather more challenging to photograph. She looks almost vertical in the second photo but she didn't fall in the pond, although when they were kittens they had a couple of duckings. I bet that water tasted rank.

Sarah Noel is a ceramic artist who lives and works in Wales. Sarah's work has a fascinating quality whereby her figures are ancient looking but contemporary both at the same time. Her inspirations come from medieval carvings and European and American folk art. Her figures and families in boats are intriguing. You can see lots of her work at The John Noott Galleries here and here.

Eve I

Woman With Whistle

I have always been totally fascinated by rooks and I spent ages the other day watching a local rookery and taking masses of photos. Unfortunately the light was failing but I think it probably adds to the atmosphere. The noise was indescribable.

When I was browsing the excellent Nantais Gallery the other week I came across a wonderful artist and printmaker called Hanne Grete Einarsen. She produces paintings and woodcuts and you can see some of her woodcuts below. They have a lovely graphic and almost naive quality about them. I guessed from her name and subject matter that she is Scandinavian but I cannot find out anything else about her on the Internet. Most of the sites with her name linked are Norwegian so I would guess she is too. You can see some more of her work here at the gallery.

Fox I

Fox II

Reindeer I

Fish I

Dorothy Pavey is an English artist with an incredibly light and fresh touch with watercolour. She creates the most beautiful paintings of the English countryside and gardens and flowers. Dorothy lives in the Cotswolds which is one of the loveliest of our counties and spends time out with her camera recording what she sees on her walks, although she also visits South Africa and other counties of England. You can see more of her paintings on her website here.

Bluebell Wood

Poppies And Daisies

Garden Gate And Bench