Finally done!

I decided to enter the Society of wildlife artist open exhibition this year, to held at the Mall galleries. Consequently this meant I had to finish or start something to enter. After much deliberation i chose to do 6, 4 new ones and finish 2 I had already started, due to the fact it was a wildlife exhibition i figured that my hummingbird might be in with a fair chance of looked at. So as i had already put an acrylic base for the painting, thought it might be appropriate to continue with another layer in oils. Took a couple of weeks to  finish even though its only 14" x 10" but the details were so small.

I took the original photo of this bird in Antigua I quite liked the blurred background and lights, if I had stuck to my usual formats I would have had a much plainer background to push the bird out more

 needless to say it wasn't accepted.

My next one was to finish my lemurs, again in oils as you can see a little plainer in the background giving a bit impact to the tails and eyes. This painting also took weeks to complete, which meant that I didn't get to start any more painting for the exhibition. Again i was hoping for this one to be pre-selected at least, again this one also failed pre selection. So no luck this time.

Another exhibition another set judges may well yield better results so I'm gonna keep trying until someone does!

Where has the year gone!!

I cannot believe it's July already, this year seems to have whizzed by without me noticing. I'd like to think it was because I was so busy painting that I didn't notice! alas no - as of today I don't think I have completed a whole painting this year, many started projects but none finished. Although i haven't been idle i did get some jewellery making done, check these out....

Ear cuffs No piercing required just wrap around your ear.

They are all on Etsy if anyone would like to buy one

http://www.etsy.com/shop/SocietyInk

I have also been working on a very large fishy pic, goldfish to be precise. in watercolour if you work in watercolour you will know the difficulties of covering large areas with colour that doesn't look stripey or blotchy.  This painting is no exception in as much that some of the areas are still quite large pieces that have very dark colour on them. The only way I have found to cope with this is to mix up paint from tubes in a tray to a milk consistency and then with large brushes wet the area to be painted with an under coat, so for me it was indigo undercoat. Two reasons for using this staining colour 1. it covers very well and intensifies the black that go over the top 2. If I'm going to lift any of the lighter parts out I can do so but still have a blueish tint to the paper which works well with any thing black.

OK that done let dry

repeat the process with your next colour in my case blue-black on wet paper again, I usually advocate mixing any darks with deep colours such as purple, blues or deep greens to give the dark more body. In this painting it wont be needed as it is a reflection through glasses which will be slightly grey in places as the light hits the glass.

As for the fish you can see from the above photo that I started with a base coats of Winsor yellow and Vermilion diluted for the fins. These are then let dry before re-wetting the paper with water and applying intense colour do this gently as you do not want to churn up the under layer. keeping this intact will leave room to lift highlights and edges of scales when it's dry, as you can see the yellow shows through really well.

If you haven't guessed already the picture in the background is Aubrey Beardsley' Peacock skirt. It does actually hang behind the fish bowl on my desk!
Try some distortion paintings there good fun but a little time consuming.

New website

Started the new year with a new website!
It's not  totally complete but the essentials are there- the rest I will add over the next few months.
http://www.societyink.co.uk/
I also started the new year with a new newsletter if anyone is interested mail me on kathrinemacleod@gmail.co.uk and I'll send you a copy.
I hope to be able to get one sent quarterly for the moment but will see how it goes.
If your not already a member of the Society for all Artists then you wont get the January edition of the Paint magazine which has a special feature on yours truly check out page 35 if you do have a copy.

The feature is on Paint parties which I do, so for those special occasions think of spending a day with me painting!!