It has been a while since I posted on here. Summer visitors have been a pleasurable distraction. But some kind man lent me a couple of dog skulls which inspired me. A few sketches and an early morning walk looking at a post in a field of wheat, covered in snails and I thought, I could paint the skull on top of the post….so I did.
I am now continuing with my art course so won’t be posting on here much for a while. But thanks for dropping by and catch you soon!
Wendy x
The cork oaks have recently been harvested, or stripped of their cork. This always, to my eye, leaves them looking rather naked and vulnerable…. I imagined dressing them again. What would they wear? This cheeky cork oak tree has managed to get laced into a rather lovely red basque. The knickers wouldn’t go on and have been discarded on the woodland floor in disgust.
If you are interested in the whole (real!) process of the cork harvesting in Andalucia, my good friend and eloquent writer, Grandolfo, wrote about it here: https://grandoldfarts.com/2015/01/29/how-did-that-cork-get-in-your-bottle/
A2 canvas board. Acrylic and ink pen.
After a wonderful early evening concert held in the cloisters at the convento in Los Angeles, just down the hill from Jimena, I imagined a dead goat (I know, I am strange like that :-)) attracting down the griffin vultures we have here, looking for a tasty meal. I wanted to juxtapose the beauty of the church with the image of death, but showing the wonderful recycling that the vultures do here! I have no idea if they have ever in reality landed on the church roof…..This is an A1 canvas (a bit puckered in the corner – I must try and fix that!) with mixed media – mostly acrylics and felt pens for the detailed bits.
Acrylic on almost A2 canvas block. Study of a very tiny flower that is currently blooming down by the riverside here in Jimena de la Frontera. A bit like a ‘forget-me-not’ but don’t know what they are called. I wanted to try doing a huge version of something really tiny! I had to use a magnifying glass some of the time… I did an abstract background based on some seedpods that I had found before. I was thinking of Georgia O’Keeffe’s wonderful, huge flower studies (however I am not in any way comparing this to her amazing work! 🙂 )
Real flower to show size
Acrylic and ink on long canvas block. This is my last stork study for now 🙂 I had managed to get some great photos of the storks in flight and wanted to use them against the background of Jimena. I am not sure if they do indeed fly in the early morning with stars; this is art, not ornithology, after all….
Acrylic on A2 canvas block. Early morning red sky and mist pockets between the hills out to Gibraltar. Yes, I am fascinated by the storks 🙂 – just one more stork painting to finish…
Acrylic on A2 canvas block. I have completed the first module of my course and am now free to paint whatever I like! I have decided I like using acrylics and have been working on some storks using this area as a background. The storks are here at the moment having baby storks, and I have taken masses of photos to use as reference.
To those of you reading this, thanks for not un following me and I hope to catch up with your blogs very soon!
Wendy x
I am still here but a bit busy to be blogging and reading lots of blogs. But thanks to those of you who are still stopping by! This is an old cork oak tree that lives down by the river. It is a line drawing of the bark detail that I did for an exercise the other day. Happy summertime to you all!
When we bought our house we inherited a lemon tree with an orange branch grafted onto it. It is very strange, and many people do not believe such a thing is possible 🙂 It is a magnificent tree, providing us with nearly a year round supply of lemons and Seville oranges. Well, we think they are Seville, they are quite tart but very nice added to juices. They are full of pips though! The leaves and blossom are quite different too; the orange blossom smells glorious when it is out. The ones I picked today for this picture found the lemon leaves quite pale and yellow in comparison to the orange leaves. Having arranged them nicely to sketch and paint, I found the leaves seem to move on their own! Most strange…..Watercolour and ink.
Our tree, just outside the back door.
At the north end of the village, past the campsite, is the start of a walk that can take you way up into the hills, with amazing views back of the village. It starts off as a cobble path, then the cobbles are just sort of dumped and then it’s just a rough track. I plan to get up there with my paints and do some painting ‘plein air’ soon. It’s not really called ‘Vulture Rock’ but I call it that after a close encounter with a large eagle vulture I once had up there! (pencil sketch from my own photos)
Two days ago I got notification that I had been blogging for a year! A whole year! I now have over 240 followers (including e mail followers) which is amazing. Thank you all for your encouragement over the year. My news is that I am now officially a student and studying online to work towards getting an art degree. I may not have so much time for blogging and may not always be drawing Jimena but we’ll see how it all works out! 🙂
Spanish scribbles 