Back To Beauty Exhibition etc etc etc.

Above is a reverse drawing I finished in my drawing session last evening. and looking at it again I am very pleased with this pattern, it is clean and straight forward.

Also I then did this drawing keeping it simple, it seems quite fresh to me.

Above, I also managed to finish this one. The reverse 'bleeding narrative' of the previous one. I am very pleased with 3 drawings in one night and they fit in with my 'whole sketchbook' which is now getting close to being filled up. Once it is in that almost completed state with a drawing on every page I then tend to go back through the whole things to see if I want to do any extra work on it, sometimes I do quite a bit and sometimes almost nothing or even nothing.

Today myself and my wife Zoe Eaton, have  been fully immersed in getting our exhibition ready to hang and then transforming Barnoon Workshop from it's normal workshop state into a place you can have a pop-up exhibition and by about ten to five we had just about managed it to our satisfaction, although not perfect I think it shows our work off pretty well. so below I share a few pics from the evening, including some of the good folk who came out to have mulled cider and share our opening.

Above and below are a view of some of Zoe's work in our show, including the newly finished and when I say newly finished I mean this morning, such is.

A few mulled cider drinkers from this evening.

A table full of my stone drawings at the exhibition above and a view of part of the main room.

We will be manning this exhibition for the next three days and will be drawing and painting in that time too, so if you are near why not pop up and see us 11:00 - 16:00

Up above is our statement for our exhibition which is mainly of work we have both done over the last year or so, however we both have a little bit of work from quite a few years ago which seem to still fit with what we do now. So above is close up of a painting when I still considered myself an abstract painter 'until somebody pointed it out that I was drawing with paint' and I do think this pic sums it up really. It does make me think that I might try and draw with paint again sometime in the future. I already have ideas after just writing this, sometimes I just love the way my mind works when I am in a creative mood. More on all of this later. I better get on with some drawing and get ready for more drawing at our exhibition.

A last aside before I go, saw a picture on social media of one of my old bands New Mutants in an exhibition and book launch called 'We Built This City On Rock N Roll' in Milton Keynes Central Library. All put together by Milton Keynes' cultural secretary Lee 'Scribbo' Scrivens. A great chap who I have played many many gigs with and whose label Back Beat he put out a few of our records in the late 80's and early 90's. Well done Lee and thanks for everything.
Cheers!

Thinking Stuff

Above is a detail of what I did last night o my new piece of slate, I don't know quite where it will end but I have to carry on with the blue metallic pen for a bit and see if I dot between dot again, I probably will do that but there is a small doubt in my mind depending on how it looks when the blue is more. That is what I will continue with after I have finished my blog.

I had a little sleep-in this morning, only til just gone 10 but it doesn't feel like I have had the luxury for a while. This week has been a bit tiring, I am not exactly sure why, some weeks just go like that. I did have a dream last night that I would win an art prize.

Other thoughts of the day were as such:

A. Introduce myself to a few pen companies showing them my art and explaining I could test their     product to destruction and look at the results. Hoping they might sponsor me with pens.

B. Send an email with images to such companies as Liberty's and other fabric companies, I have thought it myself but also other people who have seen into my sketchbooks and know my work have consistently suggested I should do such.

C. Enter some art prizes again I tried it once but didn't present the work to well although I did subsequently sold one of them. I should enter the field of this properly I do seem to have some need to share what I am doing and get it to a greater audience. Why do I have this need, it does now seem to be a need but it has grown from the reactions from of friends, strangers and those inbetween. It is those kind of honest reactions that have given me heart to what I have created in this bulk of work that I have been involved with so far.

I am also feeling that it is becoming more than the some of its parts from those who view it and a sense of anticipation to what I will do next. I still feel that I am gaining traction on a new level. I have played with all manner of the ideas within dots and lines and as I have said before I have probably worlds of ideas soon to be heading to universes as every night whilst drawing I have tangental ideas off ideas, the repetition allows me very free thinking as I work.

Hanging on to those as I work is harder but I am now sure the better ones gather again and come out in what I am doing all these hours. Some of the myriad of ideas just float off but essences continue and evolve into what I am doing.

Dilemma of decision and 150 thousand dots.

Here is one I have been working on for a few days now on some card I marbled a while ago then started to draw on. I am a few sessions in and don't know whether I should stop at this point or add more dots, hmmmmmmm.

Here is me with my recently finished drawing, delivering it to The Uys Gallery St Ives. `looking quite proud of myself.

Here is a high def image of said drawing on a rough calculation there are about 150 thousand dots on this one. I do hope people like it. I love it and it is now up for sale at £450 at the gallery. The two above photos were done by the lovely Jordan Jackson.
www.flickr.com/jordanlaurencejackson
www.uysgallery.co.uk