Bantam Rooster

Gouache on Clairefontaine Papier Kraft 90gms

Pentel Brush Pen on watercolour spatter

Pentel Pocket Brush Pen

This is the little bantam rooster who lived a short but happy life at my favourite olive farm.

My darling daughter bought me the brush pen for Christmas and of course, since Roz Stendahl inspired my passion for a brush pen, it's not surprising that my first inspiration was to draw fowl, which is something Roz does so brilliantly.

Tuscan Landscape Gouache

Tuscan snow 13 x 12 cm
Gouache on Terraskin

For this gouache landscape I was drawn back to the samples of Terraskin paper Jeanette Jobson of Illustrated Life gave me to test. I really love this ground because while the gouache goes on looking very patchy it dries velvety smooth.

The inspiration for the painting was a photo I took on my morning walk after our first snow just before Christmas. Having joined Katherine Tyrrell's new project The Art of the Landscape I figured I had better get cracking and paint some landscapes, even if I'm finding the weather too miserable to get out and paint.

Happy New Year everybody. I've been very lazy over the festive season. I didn't even make any resolutions for 2010 except a promise to myself to FOCUS. It a challenge for me to stop dashing in all directions; trying every new craze; following every Pied Piper of the Palette and instead, to focus on a couple of main areas of artistic expression. Painting in gouache from a combination of life, photos and imagination is one area of focus, my printmaking is the other. Let's see if I can stay on track.