Yesterday was the last day of the Chichester Open Studios art trail. We had many interested visitors and several of you who read this blog. Thank you for coming so far. It was lovely seeing all of you, and an honour.
After finishing yesterday we obviously had to clear everything up. Take the pictures and screens down and pack everything away for the next show. This will be at the Stansted Garden Show in June; more about that another time.
But, today I have been hastily finishing off the picture of Irises in Watercolour, so that I can trace off a similar image to use for the coloured pencil demo tomorrow. I have made some adjustments to the tracing I used and I will tell you why at the demonstration – if you are interested.
A hint might be in the following pictures. Yesterday you saw the start of the picture with only two Irises of the three intended. I was waiting for the third flower to open properly before I drew it.
The Chichester open studios art trail started its second and last weekend, today. The weather as hoped for, was very good although it has blown quite hard. The wind has not kept people at bay and we had a lot of very interested visitors.
We got a few visitors who chanced on our set-up and as always I took this as an opportunity to get them interested in botanical art. However, it seems that most of our visitors had highlighted coming to see my work.
For the first weekend I decided to paint irises in watercolour as I had spent so long using colour pencils on the crab apples. Our visitors were very interested in the progression through drawing and first layers of colour. I continued with the painting during the week as the irises rapidly died. How to finish the painting without the flowers?
I bought some new irises, but they were redder than the original ones. Today I have continued the painting using the new irises for their form and size, but I had to bear in mind the colour palette I needed to use.
I will be continuing my demonstration on the irises for whoever is interested on the last day of open studios tomorrow.
First the RHS exhibition, then Chichester Open Studios – which is on again this coming weekend, and the SBA exhibition at Westminster Central Hall. Next week I will be talking about the Society of Floral Painters (SFP) annual exhibition being held in Chichester.
Normally the SBA exhibition is in April and it is a little easier for a Botanical artists to plan things. But this year, the SBA were only able to book their normal annual exhibition space in Westminster from tomorrow onwards. The private preview and opening of the exhibition is to be tomorrow between 11:00 and 19:00.
The official opening and prize-giving will be by Dr Nigel Dunnett, Professor of Planting Design at the University of Sheffield at 15:30. Although this is a little late, if you would like a formal digital invitation, please contact me this evening through this blog and I will send one immediately.
The annual exhibition in Westminster is an open exhibition and is also to encourage those who paint botanical art to take part with a view to becoming members. Membership is dependent upon having a full quota of pictures being accepted for the exhibition, three years running. But, far from being a mountain to climb, seeing the pictures at the exhibition motivates many artists and helps to concentrate their minds on this particular challenge.
The exhibition usually has a lot of very beautiful botanical art. I remember the first time I went to the exhibition, I was enthralled! I don’t know how better to express what I felt. It is worth a visit if you are in London or want to take a trip up to the capital. I am going to the opening tomorrow.
I have four pictures that will be exhibited this year. Two are in pen ink and two in coloured pencil. I will be interested to see how the pen & ink pictures will be accepted as I have not exhibited anything similar previously. Additionally I will be demonstrating coloured pencil all day on Tuesday 13th May next week. Do come and see and hopefully get a feel for how I use the medium. Maybe I can tempt you to want to try using coloured pencil in your botanical art.
Tomorrow my husband and I will be driving up to London with the Crab apple botanical art pictures due to be exhibited at the RHS, Lindley Hall from Thursday 10 April until Saturday 12 April. We will set up the exhibition tomorrow afternoon and evening and then my husband will disappear until the next evening. I will be all on my own (sniff), but with other exhibitors of course, when we get the results of the judging on Thursday lunchtime.
We have found a hotel not too distant from the RHS halls so I might even get a slight lie-in on Thursday morning. The exhibition will be open for the preview between 18:00 – 21:00 on Thursday evening. I think that this is meant to be for RHS members. By this time I hope that my husband has returned to either commiserate or enjoy. Either way, I think we will have a nice – but late meal in the evening. Everything is planned so far, but you know what happens to plans!
The RHS Botanical Art Exhibition and Orchid show will be open to the public on Friday 11 and Saturday 12 between 10:00 – 17:00. I understand that they are doing something new this year in that several well-known botanical artists (previous Gold medal winners) will be demonstrating their techniques. I will be very interested in that.
So what am I doing now? Have you noticed that I am now looking ahead? This means that I think I have done as much as I can before we set off tomorrow morning – except to pack. Someone is going to look after the cats, so they will probably get spoiled to death.
Malus x zumi ‘Golden Hornet’ crab apples in coloured pencilMalus x zumi ‘Golden Hornet’ blossom in coloured pencilMalus x zumi ‘Golden Hornet’ sections in coloured pencil
I have got everything together – I think. Pictures painted, framed and labelled. Some prints made – in case. Picture hooks, rope to hang the pictures….., a level to make sure they hang straight. Scissors. Oh I must take something to clean the glass! Visiting cards. Have I forgotten anything?
I am trying to make the house habitable again – but that doesn’t extend to the shed – I will do that on Sunday. Imagine, I can start painting again on Sunday – if I am allowed.
There is one picture remaining. I am attaching the elements from it as I have done with the other five. Bear in mind, I have grouped things to make it easier for the blog, but the whole picture does not have the same arrangement. Once I get back, I will put the pictures on my website: http://www.gaynorsflora.com. That means I might not get to paint on Sunday! We will see.
This is Malus x zumi ‘Golden Hornet’ in coloured pencil.
I tried to prepare for today’s demonstration yesterday evening! I had some interesting assistance.
I decided to show how to do a couple of Magnolia x soulangeana blooms and prepared the outline drawing for today.
Today I had a lovely relaxing day with my husband as we drove to a little village just outside Salisbury where the Society of Floral Painters meeting was being held. A lot of people had turned up both to get advice about their own botanical art work and to watch the demos.
Coloured pencil work is fairly time consuming, so I didn’t get too far with painting the Magnolia, but I enjoyed the time showing the various techniques and answering all the questions fired at me. People there were obviously very interested and it was a very useful exercise – also for me. It is amazing how much one learns oneself when teaching!
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After the demo my husband treated me to a delicious lunch. What a lovely break for a few hours from the crab apple series. I did return to it when we eventually got home again.
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GAYNOR'S FLORA 