Red Cat - day 27

The other day I was reminded that I have some chunks of burnt sienna. It can be a messy thing to use so did this in the studio, at an easel - the only drawing this month that has been and I think you can see the difference - more movement, more swing. I also used the whole width of the paper - still only a4 sized, but it'll be the biggest drawing of the bunch - for me charcoal, chalk and my bits of sienna rock are for big drawings - unlike ink, pencil and watercolour that seem to suit small better. There are always exceptions though - I can see possibilities in using the liquid graphite on a big brush, getting big sweeps of tone on the paper, then going in after for detail.

This kind of idea getting really has been the big benefit of doing the 28 drawings later every year for me - I'm all fired up with possibilities now and hopefully you'll all see the benefits in my work over the next year.

Oh, and I just had to do a cleaning one at some stage - after all, it's what she does the most, after sleeping.

Oil Painting of Mrs Cat - Day 26

Finished - maybe. For today, at least. At this stage I generally stop, put the painting up on my studio wall somewhere and see if it annoys me while I'm working on other stuff. In a week or two I'll take it down, have a closer look and either do more to it or decide it is done and put a layer of retouch varnish on it.

Then it goes back on the wall until I decide to either do more to it (it it's crying for attention) or send it to a gallery. Depending on how long it's been it then gets a final coat of varnish or gets taken directly to the framer.

After that it depends very much on other people what happens - although I have a sneaking suspicion I might just keep this one for myself!

Monoprint Failure - day 25

OK, so today is a cheat in that I actually did the print yesterday - but I had the ink out for the linocut and really wanted to experiment a bit more - that's what it's all about, right?

Sadly my experiments didn't go very well - there clearly is some kind of trick to doing monoprints, either that or the ink I've got is just too cheap - it was drying out before I had finished drawing. Also the charcoal paper I used was probably not the best thing as the lines on it have come through clearly. Again, more research needed - this is one of the reasons I like doing the 28 drawings later challenge - it gives me so many ideas to explore until the next one!

Cat Statue - Day 21

Right from the start of the month I knew I wanted to do a little statue at some point. But I've never done any three dimensional making so wasn't sure what to use. Initially I thought I'd use fimo or clay, but then I saw some plasticine in the art store and since it was both much cheaper and less complicated it seemed like a better option.

However I may have bought too small a pack - this little statue is only a couple of inches high, so adding any kind of detail was pretty difficult, especially without tools. If I do it again maybe I'll use a pencil or something to draw on whiskers. Still, sometimes simplicity is a good thing, and thinking in three dimensions was a nice change.

Day 6 - Relaxed Kitty

Day 6 and I didn't have much time at all this morning. Kitty here was determined to be awkward, refusing to let me draw her on her chair by keeping moving, then following me through and jumping up to be stroked as soon as I sat down - very nice, but no drawing could be done. Eventually though (when I was almost late leaving the house) she got bored and decided to stretch out in the hall instead - hence this very quick brush and ink sketch. Then I threw her out and went to work!

28 Drawings Later 2015 - day 1

Hello everyone again - it's 28 Drawings Later time of year again.

This year, my plan is to draw my neighbour's cat, Vader, every day - she's not always up, so some will be drawn from life (like today) while others will be from photographs - she really doesn't seem to like being photographed, though.

I'm going to be using all the bits and pieces of stuff that have been shoved to the back of drawers. Today's drawing is on a piece of ampersand pastelbord I brought back from New York. It was quite lovely to draw on, using pan pastel initially, then chalk and charcoal pencils.

If you'd like to see previous years, they are at 2014 , when I was preparing for my first solo show, 2013 , when there wasn't an organised thing, so I blogged every day instead. In 2012 I just kinda drew what was around me, similar to 2011 which was the very first one and I was new to sketching, new to blogging and just generally a beginner - the encouragement I got that year really encouraged me to keep developing ever since.