30 12 2019

 Finished rabbit - Jess - and re-finished Famine. Been tweeking War.

Ark on mt Arak keeps nearly getting there...

28 12 2018

Been happily pottering on - but just seen pix of the painting below and think it was rather better then. Have of course over-thought the whole damn thing. Hey ho. Clear day, apart from some shots necessary to get me into India; leaving in 10 days.

27 12 2018

Getting a surprising amount done - I'm not cooking or caring, merely have to stop and change and go out. Christmas as it should be.
Today is another matter, alas. Have to clean behind bookcases after the recent soaking. Damp and mould not good. But that'll give the pic time to dry and bit and tomorrow is fairly clear. Its all too pasty.

24 12 2018

Been poddling doggedly on, between times... currently on the landing of Noahs Ark. Using drawings from various models to fix the corpses bestrewn on mount Ararat. At the end of a session a model will invariably lie down and go to sleep so I have many drawings of collapsed people.
Trouble started when I abandoned the drawings. After the thing was laid out, as it were, I started into the painting. Its a strange one, moving from definitive designs (ie copies) to free attack. Many animals emerged, drowned. Its all rather sad, I mean  really sad; touches me far more than it did ought.

21 12 2018

...roofer fixed roof, allegedly - it has stopped raining so cant verify. Moss in gutter apparently the problem. Still cleaning out moldy papers.
Or I was. Took some days off to go to Aix-en-Province and see the Chagall expo. Bloody wonderful!!

14 12 2018

All nearly finished but now of course finding the chief problem; cohesion...
I've attacked each pic  individually yet the four riders must stand together.

Going to clean brushes, studio, palette and have a rest.


* Server rejected the cropped version of Famine. Is there an algorithm that spots symbols?

Studio roof continues to leak, roofer continues to not come to fix it - its raining, after all. Mould on more drawings and papers. Fearful that the water has come on down into the study and frightened to check the bookcases.

The light is dreadful, its raining and grey. Cheerful enough, for all these moans.

12 12 2018

Not quite the possibly-finished version but near as dammit... need to see it in daylight as was painting in the dark. Under lights, obviously. Jubilant though.
Setting up a problem and resolving it seems to be my raison d'etre.
Now for famine which so far is a disaster. Decided that to exclude humans was to dis the real horror of starvation that faces a load of the people on planet - to use a lion eating a badly drawn horse was not a decent response. On the other hand, the little scull-like faces, skinny arms, dead babies is too trite by far. (ooh just remembered - the second art prize of my life was a poster competition for Oxfam, and that's exactly what I did. Won a box of watercolours.)
Worked up some symbols, which I regard as self-eating.
One maze-like thing with no way out, one ouraborous, one erm other. Which I cant describe. Will insert when the painting is nearer that point.
Hard... where does illustration end and painting begin? When you are not in charge. When the dynamic of the system has overridden all other concerns. Haas to be done, in short.

11 12 2018

   












nearly finished....

finished -

and finished

Hurrah. Flogging a dead horse with Famine, its hhard - and I think death may be done. Wonderful having all this time :)

05 12 2018

They are all coming along, indeed Death might be nearly finished. Took the trouble, finally, to check the Biblical references and Ive got the symbolism all mixed up, wrong colour horses, crown on the wrong rider, no scales, no swords etc etc. Fortunately I'm not a pedant.

Famine is a right mess.

Today is complicated; library day, plus locksmith calling for no 11 whose lock is non-functional plus have  to do some xmas shopping so the packages can be taken to and posted in England. Bit of distance probably a Good Thing.