Easter Break!

I’m back from an Easter break and I’m full of ideas!

I had to take some time out as I have been framing up my latest works in time for the local Art Exhibition in Woodley this Friday (21 and 22 April). I have entered a few competitions and I have been editing content for my youtube channel (@martinrolfe).

Easter was also a time of rest and regrouping. I have reevaluated my Social media presence and started some planning for the next 3 months. It’s actually harder than you think creating ideas and where I used to dismiss social media as an easy job, I now salute people who turn this craziness into a business. 

Sam eating Easter Eggs Sketch

The Disappearing Easter Egg

Sam went to his grandma’s on Friday before Easter. He was lucky enough to find he had 2 Easter eggs. While enjoying a selection of youtube shorts…One of the Easter eggs mysteriously got eaten.

This is a sneaky preview of a set of three cards I have been creating. Following the success of a grant from the CF Trust. I haven’t spoken much about this, but I submitted a business plan and received a grant to help start my art business. I have had some designs made up into canvas prints, plus an assortment of cards.

Card designs image

And Finally

Ambarrow Hill Sketch

Ambarrow Hill

We took the puppy to Ambarrow Hill. She is really fast and not surprising for a Collie cross. While Debs dad and Sam walked tot he top of Ambarrow Hill we meandered our route around the bottom.

Sam was concerned about the dog being off lead. But apart from one time when she ran for 2oo yards the dog remained in a comfortable walking distance.

Rodney Kingston Workshop – Portraits in Oils

Rodney Kingston was on Portrait and landscape artist of the year, and I went to a workshop with him at the Woodley and Early Arts Group to have him teach his method for painting portraits in oils. I first met him at the Woodley and Early arts group demo evening using Nitram liquid charcoal.

Finished portrair

I have always been a water based medium artist so it will be of no surprise I chose water based oils for my portrait. Rodney uses, yellow ochre, cadmium red, ultramarine Blue, raw umber, and titanium white, so I followed suit using Cobra water soluble oils.

Our morning was spent mapping out our portraits using Rodney’s reference materials. Mapping out the face with straight lines and big shapes. Moving quickly into the lunch break by adding shadows and our lightest tone.

Construction lines of portrait

Following lunch, we move onto develop mid-tones and because of the work we had done in the morning the afternoon sailed by. My first efforts were very yellow, and I adjusted the colour with some white and cad red.

I have to say that Rodney’s method was both enjoyable and also in my case, very profitable and I produced a very good likeness of the reference material.

I’m hoping the Woodley and Earley Arts Group will invite Rodney back to do landscape, possibly with liquid charcoal!

New Product!

I work near Daler-Rowney in Bracknell and I have been lucky enough to see a new product.

It doesn’t look like much, but this paint tube is very special. It has a left-handed thread screw cap. Lids that turn in the opposite direction has now been scientifically proven to move paint and stop it drying and sticking the lids shut.

I didn’t believe it either. But it’s true. Why has nobody thought about this before?

Check it out on the Daler-Rowney website.

Sea swimming pool

I like to experiment with ideas, mediums and genres.

abstract image

When I painted this image I was reading a lot of books about abstract art. I’m trying to decide if it’s successful. What I wanted to produce was an image that cut out details with the brush, and then finding details within the white space.

I had been experimenting with unreal colour and that bit probably was a success! But the colours did go a bit muddy.

This is the sketchbook image.

sketchbook image

Balancing Stones

Another of my favourite artists is Sasha Harding.

Stone balancing image

We prefer a beach with sand, but as Sam found stones also have an entertainment value. In the picture are some clothes that I assume were drying on rocks. We never saw the owners!

Sasha Harding is Cornwall based and paints mainly seaside views. Her technique is to draw out her designs on cartridge paper and then she will cut out the pieces and arrange on the canvas. She paints in Oils with an acrylic under painting.

Sasha’s style is very similar to an art lesson I had at school. Where we drew different poses and then created an image of a crowd.

Pencil sketch

Splashing Stones

One of my early influences as an artist was a water-colourist called Neil Meacher.

Final watercolour Splashing Stones

Neil painted mainly seascapes with a cubist style. But more importantly he used sketch books to develop his ideas. Neils work is always primary colours and is developed in layer much like the printing processes he studied in his early career.The Royal institute of Watercolour award an artist each year with the Neil Meacher award.

Neil’s sketchbooks are truly pieces of art in their own right, and something that I aspire to achieving. My work always starts as a sketch and is developed with colour swatches and simplified drawing.

Even my collage work will start with an idea in a sketchbook.

Splashing Stones is Sam enjoying the beach and throwing rocks into a rock pool on Widemouth beach.

Sketchbook image of Splashing Stones

Seafood on the sea shore

I’m going back in time to 2018.

Final Image of eating on the seashore

We eat out a lot on holiday. We are willing to risk the attacks of seagulls to enjoy a roll on sand, maybe I should rephrase!

This is Widemouth Beach where we found a hut selling baguettes. I’ve included the original sketchbook image. I can see ways to create these images as collages.

Sketchbook image of sketching on the seashore.

You can see in the sketch the construction lines that I have used to replicate the image on Watercolour paper.

Upper Decks

Another phobia.

open top bus sketch

I’ve previously said I don’t like boats, or being at sea. Probably why I’m also not keen on Open top busses.

We took an open top bus from Bournemouth to Poole after we walked from Poole to Bournemouth! The bus lurched from side to side, and I had to look down at my feet to keep my bus legs and to stop the desire to run screaming to the safety of the lower deck.

I have a fear about falling over the side when the bus is moving. Luckily for me we rode all the way to the bus station, so I didn’t have to wobble my way down the stairs to the exit.

Fisherman’s Cafe, Poole

Just round the corner from our Poole accommodation was the Fisherman’s Cafe. A down to earth breakfast hang-out.

cafe image

From the outside you would probably walk past the Fisherman’s Cafe. It was small and crowded. But the breakfasts were amazing. Traditional full English, sausages in big baps, eggs and black pudding. And a jolly menu that followed the fishing theme – sailors breakfast, Captains breakfast, matey’s breakfast. for small folk.

This image has been finished in pencil as the pen I used was not waterproof! I’ve also added a character in the back table who is looking in to the picture.

Almost Yoda

We never has much success on the crane machines in the arcades.

crane machine in the arcades image

Almost Yoda, almost came home to us several times. It’s sod’s law that when we move away from a crane that the next person will win the items.

If you want an idea of how bad our luck is…when we went to Great Yarmouth and tried to win something by knocking down tins…The owner felt so sorry for Sam that he set up the tins in such a way that he couldn’t miss. The heavier tins were on the top…

You guessed it. Sam missed and we came away with nothing.