Day 7 of the 64 Million Artists January challenge. I’m lucky that I have been collecting and pressing leaves in shades of Autumn for a different project. I wanted to create a natural palette for Procreate sampling the colours from nature.
Today is a real experiment sticking leaves into a collage with Acrylic medium to see if they will adhere to the paper surface. Also, I want to test to see if the colours stay or fade away.
I have painted over the image on the left with acrylic matt medium to see if that helps to stop any fading.
Probably not the most inspiring image but collage and natural materials has been on my list of things to try for quite some time.
I love today’s challenge – ‘Add a face to an everyday object, what is the story?’
I’m reminded of my nan who worked as a Nanny in a stately home. To entertain the children, she made up stories of coins who only wanted to get back to the bank. They would go out and have adventures. My favourite was of a 50 pence piece who got stuck in a tramp’s pocket. He couldn’t wait to get back to the bank and have a bath!
I’ve put eyes on my trainers. They are dirty and muddy. I can imagine them wanting a bath to get clean!
Today’s 64 Million Artist prompt is quite a challenge!
‘Find someone you have something in common with and connect with that person’
How do you turn a prompt into a piece of art? When out walking look at your neighbours front door, or front garden. What sort of person are they, tidy, come as you find me or something in between! Draw thier front door and share the picture with them. Did it start a conversation?
The best thing about being an artist for me is seeing the look on a persons face when they like the work that has been produced.
I like to keep a variety of sketchbooks on the go in sizes from A6 to A3. My favourite manufacturer is Windsor and Newton whose wiro-bound sketchbooks come in various sizes and textures. The only way to improve their sketchbooks is with a piece of elastic to keep the pages closed while out sketching in the field…and voilà – Artway available from Amazon have the perfect sketchbook!
My studio sketchbooks differ in content where the page is used to expand on ideas and to experiment with colour and composition.
In my research of ways to use a sketchbook I always find myself coming back to the work of Neil Meacher RI. His use of sketchbooks is documented across the internet and shows how he developed his ideas from sketch to finished piece. The Batsford book – Mastering watercolour, learn from five masters of the medium is a well-thumbed book in my library.
Aside from sketching I also use my sketchbooks to record family holidays. For this I use a normal lined notebook and the page will be littered with notes from the day.
Finding enough inspiration to fill a sketchbook is daunting at first but there are various websites with monthly prompts to help you. A few of my favourites are Doodlewash.com, dedicated to watercolour and Inktober dedicated to the use of ink.
Filling your first sketchbook is really rewarding and it helps to build confidence in your skill as an artist. Make 2023 the year of your first sketchbook!
No-one has an excuse not to produce an image today! Just walking in mud counts – take a photo and you’re done.
Our puppy had her first taste of snow in November. Literally just sat licking the thin layer of cold snow! What would dogs do if they knew about snow angels? Luna is never happier than when she is on her back, swishing her tail back and forth.
Day 2 of the 64MillionArtist prompts. A real challenge today set by Emma Major – removing the thought of doubt.
I decided to use my left hand while drawing to music. I covered my paper in sugar paper collage and then taking a line for a walk a let myself have free expression to the music I was listening too.
To bring some order back to proceedings I finished the piece with gouache.
This is my left-handed stick drawing with collage and gouache. Using some old mount board I searched the image for some alternative images.
Welcome to a whole month of the 64MillionArtists January Prompts!
Today’s challenge is to choose an object that has a story you can tell, imagining that the object is displayed in a museum setting. I have chosen the stick that I use to produce my line and wash art works.
The stick was picked up years ago from a footpath. It probably has it’s own story to tell. But this is mine…
Magnificent mark making from simple tools. Martin used sticks and ink to produce images of beauty and imagination. He recorded daily his life in sketchbooks using as few lines as possible. Thick and thin black line wondering across the page. Truly magnificent mark making.
For ideas of how I cut sticks and make marks with them see my youtube video.
Christmas is a really good time to reset and relax.
I am about to start creating my responses for the 64Millionartist daily challenges for January. Last year it was my first experience of the prompts and it’s to them I thank for changing my approach to art and to reassessing my creative process. This year I signed up to being a community leader…
The 64million artists are a group started by founder Jo Hunter who asked her facebook followers to join her in a daily art challenge during January. The group is made up of people like you and me who want to create plus a daily dose of encouragement
There is no pressure to fulfil all the challenges and you can just sit at the edges and see what everyone else produces.
How you respond to the prompts is up to you. You can choose to create written pieces, drawn, painted or sketched…anything goes! Just be free in what you create, only share what you want and above all have fun with it.
Last year the prompts led me to reassess my processes and think about what was important to me when making my art. It completely changed my process. I still use line work, but I have added collage elements and emotional response.
If you’d like to follow me then head over to my Instagram page @martinrolfeartist or look at my youtube channel @martinRolfe to see how I respond this year.
I have been inspired by a James Chapman course to create some collage Christmas Movie scenes. I love Christmas films and generally Elf is watched at least 6 times from October!
My process for creating collage is to start with a sketch of an idea. In this case it was simply about identifying a few of my favourite scenes from movies. I wanted to use scenes that would be easy to draw!
My collage elements tend to be torn from children’s sugar paper. To get some accuracy to the image I cut up my sketch so I can draw around the shapes. I apply water to the edges of the sugar paper and gently pull it apart.
The shapes are laid out on a support, generally mount board. And then glued down with Acrylic Matt medium, it dries waterproof and unlike PVA glue leaves a matt surface I can draw on.
A layer of ink is added next with some highlights and corrections painted on with Gouache.
