Thursday 30 July 2020

Beautiful Birds


photo: Troy Snow
 I have seen Egrets now and then down with other birds near the water’s edge at low tide ... 
but never seen them so beautiful as in these photos !  

photo found on Pinterest 


Wednesday 22 July 2020

Wednesday 22nd July

APOLOGIES ....   after several attempts to re - write & put a few paintings onto this blog in celebration of Mary Magdalene  / 22nd July...   I have once more lost the threads and paintings too...

I will try again in a few days time.... 


Tuesday 21 July 2020

Mary Magdalene

22 July is the day of celebrating the life of Mary Magdalene...
... many years ago I began to realise she had become much maligned and misunderstood throughout the centuries, and this is reflected in paintings by well-known artists, who were presumably being true to the thinking of their times... ( eg Georges de la Tours & Titian )

But then I discovered an earlier painting : from the St Alban’s Psalter 1120 - 45, and what really interested me were the expressions of the disciples receiving Mary’s news that she had seen the Risen Christ... 

apologies.... this blog - post has flipped around / lost some pictures & writing....

hoping to re - write later today
St Alban’s Psalter : 1120 - 45 AD








Friday 17 July 2020

Jurassic Cliffs, Dorset

Jurassic Cliffs : oil on canvas, c.Janet Driver

All my oil paintings are painted layer upon layer, gradually, over time, sometimes taking several weeks from the initial underpainting to the final strokes of colour...

but painting these cliffs seemed to make me even more at one with the vast centuries during which these cliffs have been slowly changed and eroded by rain, wind, waves, baking hot sun, ice & snow...

I decided to paint the rocky texture of these ancient cliffs using palette knives, so that I could drag one colour over another ...but what about the sea and sky ?
I had to experiment on practice oil-painting paper to try various techniques... then worked outwards from the cave into the waves, then up towards the horizon ... then I working on the clouds and down towards the sea...
it was very different from painting with a brush
and quite exhilarating...

Don’t forget... I am now changing from ‘a picture a day’ during lockdown
into a few paintings on a theme 
once a week or fortnight

...I will be back again next Tuesday or Wednesday...

NB please add your email
if you would like an automatic email notification 
whenever I post something new...

Thursday 16 July 2020

Thursday

On the day we went into ‘lockdown’ in the UK 
way back in March
I promised to put something on this blog every day
...a picture or two
...a painting
...some of my own paintings & my stained & etched glass...

and now that we are beginning to come out again
I realise its been well over 100 days
...and each day there has been something to share...

but now I would like to move on... :)

I still have some of my paintings and glass to share with you...
but many are part of a theme rather than individual one-offs

so... this week I will continue every day until Friday

...then one day next week I will put up some of my Mary Magdalene paintings 

 then something else about a week later...

if you wish to receive an email notification, please add your email at the top right hand corner, 
click ‘submit’...   *
then you will automatically receive an email whenever I put some pictures on this blog

Gustave Caillebotte: Regatta at Argenteuil
 
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enlarge top right and add email there

Wednesday 15 July 2020

Wednesday


On the day we went into ‘lockdown’ in the UK 
way back in March
I promised to put something on this blog every day
...a picture or two
...a painting
...some of my own paintings & my stained & etched glass...

and now that we are beginning to come out again
I realise its been well over 100 days
...and each day there has been something to share...

but now I would like to move on... :)

I still have some of my paintings and glass to share with you...
but many are part of a theme rather than individual one-offs

so... this week I will continue every day until Friday

...then one day next week I will put up some of my Mary Magdalene paintings 

 then something else about a week later...

if you wish to receive an email notification, please add your email at the top right hand corner, 
click ‘submit’...   *
then you will automatically receive an email whenever I put some pictures on this blog

Becalmed, awaiting more wind : c Janet Driver

*
using a phone ?   ...then click ‘go to web page’ & enlarge the top right hand corner to enter your email

Tuesday 14 July 2020

Tuesday 14th July


On the day we went into ‘lockdown’ in the UK 
way back in March
I promised to put something on this blog every day
...a picture or two
...a painting
...some of my own paintings & my stained & etched glass...

and now that we are beginning to come out again
I realise its been well over 100 days
...and each day there has been something to share...

but now I would like to move on... :)

I still have some of my paintings and glass to share with you...
but many are part of a theme rather than individual one-offs

so it would be easier to take a little time...
...space these out ...
...take maybe a theme each week...
or fortnight

with a few blank days between 

as space to breathe


If you would like to know when I have posted a new theme,
please put your email in the box at the top right hand corner...
and don't forget to click ‘submit’   :)

then you will automatically receive an email
each time I put new pictures on this blog



Saturday 11 July 2020

Sunday 12th July : The Sower : St Matthew 13 v 1-9

Van Gogh : Wheatfield with Cypresses

Van Gogh clearly enjoyed painting the colours of the wheat at harvest time...& even went so far as to paint both sower & harvest in one painting ! (see below & Friday)
Jesus’ parable ends with an amazing harvest...100fold return would be almost impossible even today with all our technological improvements... but a really bumper harvest is the story’s punchline.

The Reaper: Van Gogh (after Millet )


detail from The Sower, showing the wheat already golden for harvest behind the sower !

Saturday: The Sower

Van Gogh : the Sower (after Millet )


 I came across this painting of a sower  by Van Gogh, which shows much more clearly the traditional method of broadcasting the seed...  I have never seen a farmer doing this, and so at first I was puzzled by his slightly odd gait... but of course he is not just walking across the field, but with each step his arm will swing round to scatter the seeds, swinging his whole whole body around as well...

Eventually I managed to find this painting by Millet which must have been the one Van Gogh used as his reference... but painted in a very different style and range of colour & tone...


Millet : The Sower


maybe these paintings can help us imagine the sower in the parable Jesus told & which will be read tomorrow...  but then the ending of the story = the real punchline...& Van Gogh must have known that well... but more tomorrow...   :)

Thursday 9 July 2020

Friday : The Sower

The Sower : Van Gogh

The Sower : Van Gogh  

which of these paintings do you prefer ?

one of them seems to be a cold early morning sunrise...

I have heard the other described as a sunset...

but I am surprised how one painting has wheat all ready for harvesting at the same time that the sower is only just sowing 

Thursday





I remember the excitement of watching gloworms as a child...
but have not seen any recently...
have I just missed seeing them,
or are they falling prey to insecticides like bees & butterflies ?

Monday 6 July 2020

Tuesday


photo found on the internet: Penguin Watch led by Oxford University scientists

Sunday 5 July 2020

Monday...continued from yesterday...

Michelangelo : Rondanini Pieta, detail

“you are God’s work of art...”  Ephesians 2 v 10

... an unfinished masterpiece...

do look back at yesterday’s blog 
& its meditative poem




Saturday 4 July 2020

“you are Gods work of art...” Ephesians 2 v 10



Michelangelo : Slave


God’s work of art.
That’s me ?
Then Beauty must lie
In the eye of the
Beholder.

I feel more like
One of those statues
Michelangelo left
Half emerging
From the marble block;
Full of potential,
On the verge of life,
but prisoned still
By circumstance and
Fear.

Michelangelo : Slaves

yet part of me is free -
And you are still creating,
Bringing to life
The promise that is there.

Michelangelo : Slave

Sometimes by 
Hammer blows
Which jar my being,
Sometimes by
Tender strokes half felt
Which waken me to
Life.

Go on, Lord.
Love me into wholeness.
Set me free 
To share with you
In your creative joy;
To laugh with you
At your delight
In me,
Your work of art.

poem by Ann Lewin, ‘Revelation’  found in ‘Invitations’ by Francis Dewar p 98

Friday 3 July 2020

Saturday






From the ‘sublime’ to the ‘ridiculous’ !


...even so, I enjoyed this stunted little plant which I nearly tripped over :)
how did it survive in this crack in the pavement ?

Wednesday 1 July 2020