Art Exhibition Latest

The art exhibition is proving to be an amazing success and is also introducing lots of new visitors the wonderful nature reserve of Swanwick Lakes.

The preview evening was very well attended. During the evening the Deputy Mayor and Mayoress of Fareham enjoyed viewing the artwork and Christina Hart-Davies (Botanical Artist and Illustrator) formally opened the exhibition.

Dawn and Jess - the two wonderful Education Officers at the reserve

Sarah presenting Christina with some flowers

The artwork that has been completed during the artist in residence year was displayed on boards according to the different habitat types found on the reserve. There were also displays of Sarah's sketches of rare and vulnerable plants as well as sketches of wildlife from her trips to New Hampshire and Maine.

The exhibition is on until 5pm tomorrow Sunday 30th October, so why not come along and see the exhibition for yourself ? We look forward to seeing you there !

Exhibition here we come !

I have just written the last posting for the Swanwick Lakes Art Project blog, so rather than re-write a posting for here, I have copied it across - happy reading !

On Sunday the last 'Meet the Artist' session took place at the reserve and it was lovely to see people and chat about the project.

The time is racing by now to the exhibition from the 28th to 30th October. The invites for the preview evening have all been sent out and the final framed pictures will be collected from my framer in Devon this weekend.

A small article about the project was in Hampshire Life magazine this week and it was interesting to see what their graphics person had done with the image of the Fly Agaric painting. Not too sure about it - but at least it has impact!

As for more artwork, this is coming to an end. I have started to experiment with acrylics on natural linen canvas, which has been great fun so a couple of the last paintings will be in this format. I have been using Daler Rowney Cryla artist's acrylics which are very creamy and seem to blend very well. So many people have said to me that acrylics dry too quickly, but Jonathan Latimer (who illustrated and wrote 'Orchards' published by Langford Press), recommended using a slow-drying medium which is added to the paints on your palette.

The two acrylic paintings that I have completed so far are shown below. The Lesser Water-boatmen canvas only measures 10 x 10 cms and the other canvas is 20 x 20 cms.

One of the paintings that I used for demonstrating at a local art group is also now finished and framed. Those of you that know me, know that I love drawing and painting fungi, and the colours in this bracket fungi were just too rich to ignore !

As well as framed paintings at the exhibition, there will also be some unframed but mounted and pages from my sketchbooks that I have started and not finished over the years.

As autumn is now here (all be it for a week's Indian summer this week), I thought that you would like to see another study of fungi. It is a sketch of an Orange Birch Bolete, drawn in Scotland in 2002. A more detailed painting was developed from this study and both will be on show during the exhibition.

I hope to upload another posting before the exhibition, but if I don't get time, I would like to thank everyone that has followed my blog on here and from Flickr. It has been very exciting having people from all over the world interested in my artwork and the project. I look forward to keeping in touch with some of you as we spread news of the highs and lows of being natural history artists and the joy we get from illustrating the many aspects of our natural world !

This was the sight that awaited me when I visited the reserve last week. There were berries and hips everywhere ! I particularly like the Guelder Rose (above) and the Dogwood berries, but at the moment there just doesn't seem to be enough time to paint everything !

The preparation for the exhibition is really going at a pace now, with what I keep thinking will be the final lot of framing, but more pictures seem to be evolving. We are really grateful to Ecological Planning & Research Ltd who are lending us the screens for the exhibition in the study centre and today the fabric arrived to cover them - all 11 metres of it.

As well as working on the project I have also been exhibiting with the Marwell International Wildlife Art Society at Marwell Zoological Park near Colden Common. My painting of a Hazel Dormouse seemed a little overwhelmed being surrounded by pictures of big cats and other exotic creatures ! Never the less several other artists also exhibited paintings of native wildlife.


Alongside the exhibition there was an Art Market in an adjoining marquee over last weekend and I had a small pitch, showing some additonal work, selling prints and cards and also spreading the word about the Swanwick Lakes Art Project. Alas, there were not many sales, but it was great chatting to visitors about the project and I really look forward to seeing some of them at the forthcoming exhibition.
Whilst running my stand I also had the opportunity to 'demonstrate', and decided to work on one of the final pictures that I will painting for the project - that of a White Admiral butterfly and two Jay feathers, there is still one more feather to do !

The other medium that I have begun to explore is acrylic paint, which I am finding very exciting and different to use than watercolours. I am hoping that there will be some completed canvases ready for the exhibition, all be it small ones - watch this space !

Pictures of the art market stand follow:

Heron Lino-print

As part of the art project at Swanwick Lakes Nature Reserve I had previously painted a pen and wash illustration of a Heron.  I loved the photo it was based on and have been itching to design a lino-print of the Heron too.  The full story and creation process can be seen on the art project blog: 

http://naturalyear-swanwick.blogspot.com/

Montage of the various stages of completing the print.

The first print-run.

Forthcoming Art Workshops at Swanwick Lakes

Ruby-throated Hummingbirds

I was lucky enough to see a male and female Ruby-throated Hummingbird in a garden in north New Hampshire.  They were feeding on a flowering shrub and presumably returning to a nearby nest site on the edge of the woodland bordering the garden.

The sketches were completed from photographs that I took at the time, and due to the intense heat over here I declined to use watercolours and used coloured pencils instead.  I think I may have said before, but I really like the way that the pencils lend themselves to sketches of birds.

More details of the Hummingbirds and other species that I have sketched, can be found on the Swanwick Lakes Art Project blog at:

http://naturalyear-swanwick.blogspot.com/

Lobster Buoys

Whilst travelling along the coast of Maine it is quite common to see old lobster buoys hung up outside houses.  There is something appealing about the aged ones that you see, the variety of colours is what appeals to me along with the imperfections.

In gift shops in some of the towns you come across hand decorated painted buoys offered as household ornaments, these just do not do it for me !

Their main purpose is to be tied to the rope that is then attached to the lobster pot when it is dropped into the sea.  The buoy, as like other buoys floats on the surface and each fisherman generally has their own colour buoys to identify their lobster pots.  The modern buoys are now made out of plastic.

Whilst in Maine I started to paint several buoys taken from the image above.  I used Daniel Smith watercolour paints along with some from my normal palette, that consist of Winsor and Newton and Old Holland Artist watercolours.  The painting was completed on Strathmore 400 cold-pressed watercolour paper, which I loved using.  It was a welcome change after using hot-pressed paper for a long period of time.