Wanderlust 2024 - Weeks nine to sixteen - Texture

The art journaling course is going along well so far this year and here are the pages from the theme 'Texture'.  Above we were drawing a portrait using watersoluble graphite and adding gesso mixed with plaster of paris as well as texture paste.  My portraits are improving but I do find them tricky.

I loved week ten where we used a book as inspiration - mine was 'The Secret Garden' (with a bit of Alice in Wonderland thrown in - both with gardens, and finding keys to unlock doors.) 

Week eleven was adding texture to an image by sticking tissue paper over it.  I didn't really find this lesson very inspiring, but like the bird image I chose to use.

For week twelve were encouraged to think back to our childhood and my thoughts went back to a lovely house we used to live in which had stone walls and a climbing rose 'Albertine' in the back garden.  I then thought of the blue and white flowery material which my granny used to make me a puffed sleeve dress.  I loved that dress! Under the rose is a pocket which houses...

...some tags - here is Granny with me in the dress.  The image to the right is from the pattern she used, which I found in a bag of patterns.  The plan at the back is how I got to the different elements I used in the final page.

I enjoyed week thirteen as it involved inks and texture paste and a stamp for the focal image. This woman stamp is a Jane Davenport one and I love the movement in the image.  

Week fourteen was really fun.  We had to make pen nibs out of drink cans and stick them to a wooden skewer. These pens were then used to write and make marks.  I thoroughly enjoyed making all the papers which were used in the big circle.

Being grounded was the theme for the next week, so I chose a photo of the lilac and magnolia trees in the garden.  We were shown how to mix used dried tea leaves and sand into white gesso or clear gesso to create a textured paint.  

Week sixteen was the 'Artful Musings' week and it was about using an art journal to process emotions, in this case, grief.  The writing is quoted from the end of this blessing, which struck a chord with me and I knew I needed to include it:

"May the sun bring you energy every day, bringing light into the darkness of your soul.
May the moon softly restore you by light bathing you in the glow of restful sleep and peaceful dreams.
May the rain wash away your worries and cleanse the hurt that sits in your heart.
May the breeze blow new strength into your being, and may you believe in the courage of yourself.
May you walk gently through the world, keeping your loved one with you always, knowing that you are never parted in the beating of your heart."
                                                               Apache grief blessing, by unknown author(s)

On to our next theme, which is writing.

Wanderlust 2023 - Weeks One to Eight

This is my third year taking part in the year long art journaling course that is Wanderlust. This year's  course continues the focus on different media, starting with pastels.  There is always an introduction to the media and then an exploratory page.  We thought about a word (in my case, two words) for the year and then played with soft pastels, pastel crayons, watersoluble crayons, and oil pastels.

Week two was my absolute favourite and I really loved creating this abstract landscape, using soft pastels, white gesso and clear gesso. I hadn't really used pastels much, partly because they are a bit on the messy side and also because they have to be fixed.   However, as this technique used gesso to fix the pastel as I went along, I began to really enjoy the way the pastel worked and the effects that could be created.  

We then used baby oil with soft pastel to create a paint.  Soft pastel is a stick of pigment with very little binder, so adding a binder changed the pigment to 'paint'.  Using pastels like this gave a thick, bold line.  We also used pastel to paint in flowers which gave a delicate effect and dripped gesso over the pastel/oil mix, which resisted the gesso and again gave a different effect.

Using watersoluble crayons to create flowers was the following week's page. We cut out a window and then on the other side... 

...we created a night sky in acrylics with lots of splatters.

Colouring photographs was the next lesson, then setting the pastel with a mix of glue and water.  The photos did have that hand coloured look, although using a sponge to add the pastel meant I couldn't be that detailed.  These are all photos of my Granny's family.  The words I added were from The Secret Garden and seemed really appropriate for the different family members.

I enjoyed the process for this page, layering up over pastels and adding gesso.  

Abstract flowers over a pastel layered background was the focus for the final lesson using pastels.  My abstract flowers didn't look how I wanted them so I added collage over the top, which I was happier with.  Working with pastels has been a really good learning experience and I will use the techniques again.  I am sure I will revisit the abstract landscape from week two. 

Week eight was the start of a series called Artful Musings, where an artist discussed their inspiration. This artist talked about how they look to nature and so I created a page which said Winter into Spring to me and added in a quote about courage.  Snowdrops always have resilience so that created the focus.

On to the next seven weeks - all about pencils.   
 

Index Card a Day 2020 (ICAD) - Week Two

Here are the cards from the second week of ICAD.

The prompts were: Suzani patterns (I had to look this up - traditional embroidery from Uzbeckistan and Tajikistan); Bookshelf; David Bowie.

Tiramisu (featuring a photo of my Granny and her sisters when they were girls);  Brocade; Kite or Rhombus; Chamomile.  Just in case the Chamomile one doesn't make any sense, I used camomile tea leaves, which I added to texture paste and applied through a stencil and the tea bags were glued in strips.  I then added drips of acrylic paint and watercolour pencils for the colours, finishing with gold speckles and a bit of glitter. (I had this brainwave having watched a Youtube video where teabags were made into a mini journal.)
On to week three...

Finished!

 Prepare to be surprised - in fact, are you sitting down?  I have finally finished the rabbit I was making! It feels like I have been working on her for years, even though it is about two months or so.  At last, her face has been added and she is done.  Hoorah!
As you know, I found the 'Tilda' pattern quite fiddly and I also needed to do some judicious amending to the dress pattern.  The hat finally fits her and took me five attempts to get right, but I am pleased with the end result.

 I added some vintage lace around the bottom of her dress and it does lift the whole outfit I think.

 I hope she has a serene and pleasant expression - that was the plan when I was sewing!  Now she needs a friend who is going to be wearing a dress made from the left over pink silk from my wedding dress bodice.  I am going to use the 'Sugar Bunny' pattern by Helen Philipps, which is a little larger and see how I get on with that.  What do you think - will I be any quicker with the next one?  (Somehow, I doubt it.)

I was looking through Mum's photo albums and found the only colour picture (from 1972) of me in my puffed sleeve dress - the material of which started this rabbit construction project in the first place.  Granny is behind me and my eldest sister is sitting on the grass with Tina, the Yorkshire Terrier.  It was a bright and sunny day which is why the details are a little washed out, but I do look incredibly pleased with myself, don't I?  (I may have a go with Photoshop and see whether adjusting the brightness/contrast/colours will help.  If so, I'll post the updated version too.)

Latest books

I have been a little remiss recently, as I haven't shared my latest reading with you in quite some time.  I have been reading lots, just haven't mentioned it!  I am going through a Jane Austen stage at the moment, watching films, series and reading the novels again too.  As you can see, there is a bit of a theme with three of the books, but it is the 200th anniversary of Pride and Prejudice, so why not?  I recently re-read Sense and Sensibility again as I wanted to know whether Colonel Brandon had a first name (the answer is no), but I discovered there are other characters who aren't given a first name either - this and many other interesting points are raised in What matters in Jane Austen? which is a lovely book to dip in and out of (although the author does use  quotations which include some rather unexpected language, so be warned if you wanted to give this book to an impressionable young person!)  The Real Jane Austen has been a Radio 4 book of the week and is a biography based around items in the Austen household, so should be fascinating.  The other Jane Austen inspired book is all about the worlds that the writer created and I borrowed this from the library first, before deciding I needed a copy.
The last book, Three Houses, by Angela Thirkell, was also a Radio 4 book of the week over Christmas and is the childhood memoirs of the grandchild of Edward Burne-Jones.  It really is from another age and reminded me very strongly of my granny's memoirs which appeared on my blog a year or so ago.  I am a huge fan of the Pre-Raphaelites and their followers and we have a print of The Golden Stairs by Burne-Jones which belonged to granny and which I love.  The original is in Tate Britain.

The Golden Stairs by Sir Edward Burne-Jones (1880)

 

(picture from Tate Britain http://www.tate.org.uk/visit/tate-britain)

Granny's Christmas part 3

Interior of Crayke Church

The third and final instalment of Granny's memoirs follows below.

Mother and Father went to church at 8.00 am and we children got up then and were dressed and ready for breakfast at a quarter to 9.00 am. There was church once again at 10.30 am and Christmas Dinner at a quarter to 1.00 pm. The dinner table always looked very gay. We had a brown basket with holly and a robin on it in the middle filled with fruit. There were silver dishes with almonds and raisins and crystallised fruits and sweets. At a party we went to we had each been given a little figure with a nodding head, a man with a wire pigtail, a fluffy dog and a black cat, a plaster puppy with a blue shoe in his mouth and a little fellow called “Billiken”. We liked to see whose figure would keep its head nodding the longest. I think “Billiken” usually won. The same kind friends had also given us a set of huntsmen complete with jumps and hounds and a fox. We used to take care that the fox was well hidden from the hounds. Father carved the turkey and Mother served the plum pudding which was always brought in alight with the brandy. Mother put the little silver charms in at the table. She liked to give Foss the sixpence, Mary often had the thimble and Brooke the bachelor’s button. Margie and I perhaps a 3d piece or a little donkey. Father usually had to go without. 
At 2.00 pm we had a carol service and then home for an early tea. Mrs M and E from the Hall always came to tea. We waited for Foss to ring the bells when everything was ready in the drawing room and then we all rushed in for the great event of the day. There was always a bright fire of logs, the standard lamp stood by the piano, the tree with its shining tinsel and coloured glass ornaments was lit up with its little candles and round the room stood the tables with our presents on them. First we had to sing a carol. We always sang, “Come to the manger in Bethlehem”, which was Mother’s favourite. One year, Father told me to be the page in “Good King Wenceslas” and he was the King. I managed to sing my part quite creditably because I knew it so well. Sometimes the choir boys came round singing carols and were invited in to see the tree. They were given an orange each and pennies. Father kept a bag of pennies to give to the carol singers. Some came on Christmas Eve and some very early on Christmas morning. “A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and please will you give us a Christmas Box”, was a familiar cry on Christmas morning.
The celebrations do sound lovely, don't they? Wouldn't it have been nice to have been there?

Granny's Christmas part 2

Granny looking very smart

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas Day.   Here is a little more from Granny about her Christmas celebrations.

Foss and Mary decorated the Christmas Tree and we little ones were not allowed into the drawing room till after tea on Christmas Day when we had our presents. We went to bed early on Christmas Eve with our empty stockings at the foot of the bed. We each had one of Father’s golf stockings which could hold a lot. We often woke during the night and felt at the bottom of the bed to know if our stockings were filled. Yes, there it was bulging with odd shaped parcels. It was too early too look at it yet so we got under the clothes again and went back to sleep. When Mother heard us talking in the morning she came in with a lamp and then the joyous excitement began. There was always a cracker at the top, an orange in the toe and an apple in the heel with nuts in between. We generally had a small book, perhaps a Beatrix Potter for the young ones, something for our dolls’ house, a fireplace, a little piano or a bird cage. Often we had a game or a pack of cards, crayons and always some sweets or chocolate. Our stocking presents kept us happy till the evening when we had our big presents.
Mother always chose our presents for us. The Aunts and Uncles must have sent money. We girls usually had something for our dolls, a high chair, a cot or a tea set. We were always surprised and delighted with our presents. Mother seemed to know just what would please us most and we never wanted anything that the others had. As a rule, we each had a book, Fairy Tales or an E. Nesbit, or a children’s classic like “The Water Babies”, “Peter Pan” or “Treasure Island” and usually, there was a box of chocolates for each of us. Then perhaps we had hoops or skipping ropes. The boys had trains and soldiers, tools and puzzles. Brooke generally had a wooden box of tangerines. We took our pile of gifts up to bed with us so that we could gloat over them again in the morning.

Some things don't seem to change that much.

Granny's Memoirs - Christmas

Granny and Margie

Granny wrote a lovely description of a typical Christmas for her and the family, so, over the next few blog posts, I'll add her Christmas celebrations to my blog.

The few days before Christmas were a very exciting time for us. We children never sent cards or presents to friends and relations as children do now, but we were very busy decorating the house, fetching the Christmas tree and making chains of holly leaves for the church. We threaded the separate holly leaves on to a fine string which was threaded through a needle with a very big eye. It was painful work and damaging to the fingers but there was a great satisfaction in seeing the prickly snake grow and it looked very handsome twined round one of the pillars in church.
The morning of Christmas Eve was taken up with decorating the church, some of the children from the village used to come and help. We collected baskets of moss and trails of ivy, fetched cans of water, handed up scissors and wire and put little bunches of red flowers amongst the holly and blobs of cotton wool to look like snow. There were two big placards hung on the wall at Christmas and Easter. The Christmas one, “Christ is born” on a red ground and the Easter one, “Christ is risen” on a blue ground. We made a good deal of mess with the moss and the evergreens and tried to tidy up when all was finished, but the Church cleaner must still have spent a busy afternoon in the church. All the decorators came over to the Rectory for a cup of coffee and a mince pie. The children had cocoa and biscuits. We were always very tired and dirty and were glad to get clean and tidy for dinner.
I am sure that everyone is busy with all the things that need to be done and that in some ways, things haven't changed very much since Granny wrote this. However, the over-dependence on materialism that we seem to suffer from these days has left its mark on current Christmas preparations.

Granny's garden at Crayke (part two)

"At the top of the hill outside the greenhouse was a small rose garden.  The roses were mostly pink and dark red.  Father liked a dark red rose best.  He pruned them himself and I used to enjoy watching him.

The square was the sunniest and most sheltered part.  Nurse used sometimes to send us to walk round the square on a winter's morning if there was no time for a walk.  The centre of the square was occupied by an asparagus bed with peas, beans and carrots in season and a border of flowers round, sweet peas, gypsophila, shirley poppies and love-in-a-mist.  There were also some frames for early lettuces and seedlings.  Below the square was a bed for spring greens and radishes and parsley and a large blackcurrant bush.  Then came the main potato patch.  All down beside the potatoes were steps with logs of wood for treads.  Below the potatoes were cabbages, onions, leeks, celery and marrows.  A small gate led from here into the field.  The field ran steeply downhill but at the bottom was a level lawn where we played bowls, croquet or tennis.
Two fine oak trees grew near the lawn.  One was easy to climb and provided good seats.  The other oak was very old and had a stout trunk.  The roller stood up against it and by climbing onto the handle, Margie and I could be hoisted up to the first intersection where the branches spread out.  Room could be made for all five of us to sit at the top of the trunk.

We each had a garden of our own near the house, where we grew pansies, mignonette, forget-me-nots, candytuft and such easy growing flowers.  Father had a special place for primroses and was very fond of his blue primroses.  Every year he would arrange his plants to form the initials of one of the family.  How proud I was when it came to my turn and I saw E.M.W in primroses!
We had a swing and a see-saw under the chestnut trees.  I was afraid of the see-saw as I once got my leg pinched when I sat in the middle.  Sometimes all five of us climbed on the swing together and pretended we were Huguenots escaping from our enemies, or Cavaliers being chased by Roundheads.  The swing went up and up and faster and faster until at last we reached safety."

The garden and field were sold off some time around the 1960s and I believe houses were built there.  The garden obviously had a huge impact on Granny as she could remember it all so vividly.  She was extremely knowledgeable about plants and flowers, particularly wild flowers, and sometimes would collect us from the bus stop after school and point out all the different flowers we walked past on the way home.  I am sure she would be very pleased that I love gardening so much.

Granny's garden at Crayke

I haven't posted any of Granny's memoirs for quite some time, so, to fit in with the garden theme of my blog at the moment, here is an exerpt about the garden at Crayke.
 " The garden at Crayke was a perpetual delight to us. We had a good gardener called Taylor, who, with the help of his son Tom, kept the lawns, the greenhouse, the vegetable garden, the flowers and the fruit trees all in good order. We grew enough vegetables and potatoes to keep us all the year round, and usually had plenty of apples and pears. Taylor must have worked very hard. He pumped all the water for the house as well. We had a WC but no bathroom. There was an earth closet in the garden and another for the maids, in the yard.
There were window boxes at the front windows filled with double pink creeping geraniums and lobelias. By the drawing room steps there was a jasmine plant and the scent of white jasmine always takes me back to Crayke. Lilacs and laburnums grew round the side lawn where we often played croquet. There were plenty of trees in the garden which we could climb and others, like the big elm trees, which had no low branches.

The garden was laid out in terraces down the hillside.  The top terrace was wide enough to skip along and bowl our hoops.  There were hyacinths growing in the border and one year Mother hid my Easter egg amongst the hyacinths.  Berberis grew on the bank above... Along the lower terrace were the gooseberry bushes and on the bottom one, the strawberries, but they never did very well.  Beyond the strawberries were rhubarb and horseradish, and two lovely lilac bushes." 

It does sound an idyllic garden to grow up with and there will be more about this garden in my next post.

More from Granny

After Granny made her debut on my blog, I asked Mum for a photo of her when she was little. This was not an easy task as there don't seem to have been many taken. Mum did find this one, with Granny at the bottom left frowning, her sister Margaret (known as Margie, with a hard 'g' sound) and Hilda Mary at the top wearing a very posh hat. The back shows it is from Hilda Mary and I'll try to decipher it:

My darling Mother,

We had 4 of these Post Cards done for 1,50, when we went to town yesterday. Monica (Granny) has already told you in her letter that the J/Tour du Monde (?) did not have a Matinee on Thursday so as we had got into Bruxelles we did not want to go back having done nothing, so we went to 'The Merry Widow'. We all enjoyed it immensely, it was very well done and it was only 50. We must tell you all about when you come back, but to tell you how much I enjoyed it I will say I was not disappointed. The singing and dancing was sweet, but we were rather too high up to hear the words but I don't think that mattered we heard the music and saw the glorious dresses, it reminded us of those fashions at the ?: which are burnt(?)I hope you like this of us, it was an instant(?) and ready for us when we came from the theatre. With much love to Father and Brooke ? Hilda.

Mum said Hilda Mary was always very well dressed and took a great interest in clothes, as can be seen from her card. I remember visiting Auntie Mary and I do remember her wearing a suit and being very smart. Apparently, they went to school in Brussels for a while and Granny was about eight at this time which might explain her less than happy expression. I have tried to decipher the card as well as I can, but there remain some words I am not sure of, so have replaced them with question marks. It does give a fascinating glimpse into a different time.