What I call Contemporary Abstract Drawing.

Tuesday:

I must first report that I have finished another drawing in my latest 'whole sketchboook' work and I am very happy with the way the idea has turned out. I do try to visualise what a drawing will look like when I set out the rules at the start and this one has turned out better than initial thoughts had led me to believe.

I was hoping that the weather would be good enough that I would get people on my art tour and draw but I have to admit it was too cold and windy so after staying about 30 minutes at Barnoon Workshop I went off to distribute leaflets and posters for our future events. Above is the view from above Porthmeor about 11:15 this morning.

Above is a sign that brings sadness to the folk of St Ives and to visitors alike our best grocers have finally closed it will be greatly missed good luck to Mr Trim and co.

Earlier this year my friend and 'the artists friend' Jordan Laurence Jackson came and took some photos of some of my art and here are three pics of one drawing I did about a year ago and I hope his pics give you and idea of the work and the industry it took to get it finished.

It was executed with a uni-pin fine liner .01 pen and took many many days of work.

Another pic that Jordan took on that day is this drawing above that was also a bit of an epic task to complete, they both give you an idea of some of the work I do that I call 'Contemporary Abstract Drawing'.

Today I have started a twitter account to see if that helps me get my art out into the world a bit more. https://twitter.com/BobbyWotnotArt
We will see what happens.

I am soon to be off to draw, cheers.

New work in progress and some other drawings to show some of what I do.

Sunday:

 Above is a drawing I started yesterday and got quite far with in last nights drawing session so I would think about 4 hours work so far and I will continue it when I get to draw later.

Today I have not done 'art' so far because I had a client for my guitar course and it was a good starter session with a good student who worked very hard.

Above is a larger scale drawing and now it is heading into winter I will hopefully have a bit of time to get a few more larger scale works and below are some examples of drawings from various points in the last two years. I have spent some time being more colourful but I always like to be rooted in monochrome. Although the new drawing I am working on is monochrome at the moment I will be adding colour in the second phase.

The above drawing is from my whole sketchbook work 'The Monochrome Set'

Above another drawing from a whole sketchbook work but using my obliterarty style.

Above is a large A1 size drawing that took rather a lot of time it seemed like a huge task but day after day and in spare moments I added dots into each grid. I did it in non evening drawing session time and it must have taken 6 to 8 weeks of fitting drawing in with life and that can be a logistic problem but I have to fir it in.

Above is a post Monochrome Set drawing using the same initial ideas but then adding colour, it seemed a logical extension of what I had been doing earlier this year.

Above and below are two drawings from another whole sketchbook that I did to accompany the Hand Held View Exhibition we had at Barnoon a short while ago,

Above is a much older drawing from my first whole sketchbook work which was my first serious journey into what I do now, which is mostly about mark making, dots and lines and over recent years adding colour too.

I am off to draw now so I have something to show the world tomorrow. It is important to me that I keep creating and work hard to explore my ideas.

Cheers.

The St Ives Society of Artists, new work and work in.

Wednesday:

Above is the drawing I have been dipping in and out for days and last night I had a long enough session to get it nearly finished so with a quick twenty minutes today I managed to get that done. I am pleased with it and will embark on a new drawing later.

Today has been a day of getting art work ready to go in the Christmas Open at The Society of St Ives Artists, It opens this weekend with a private view 4pm - 5pm this Saturday.
I think these two selections show two different sides of my latest drawing styles that have been part of the evolution over the last year or so.

After we had dropped off work, my wife had delivered a sculpture, we then headed down to the harbour. The weather was starting to get rougher but such beautiful light and colours.

I have got to go back up to the workshop in a while as I have a guitar lesson to deliver, I always enjoy teaching guitar and it used to be something I did nearly every day as in one of my passed lives I was a full time music tutor and musician. I must admit though the weather is getting a bit lousy and with a weather warning too, still I normally enjoy the wildness of being on the coast, on a peninsula sticking into the elemental Atlantic Ocean.

Well I am off soon and then when I get back maybe I can get some drawing in.....

Jacob El Hanani, Todd Camplin and a new drawing.

Saturday:

Above is the drawing I was working on last night and another pen ran out and with a change of blue pen with a very slightly different hue has made the drawing even better for me.

The first part of my day was manning the exhibition up at Barnoon and then back home and then go with my son to the railway station so he could return home from his holiday with us and jolly nice it has been to have him around. I joined him on the first part of the journey to St Erth and below are a few pics taken from that.

After returning to town I went back up to join my wife at the workshop until we closed.

Since then I have discovered a new artist that is quite close to some of what I do and probably the nearest in spirit and his name is Jacob El Hanani. I must look up more of this man's work. I found two strands to his work so far, one being close to two phases of my work and why wouldn't I be drawn to them monochrome, dots and lines.

Not exactly the way I approach a drawing but very very close and I like it. Thanks to Todd Camplin and his blog. http://camplinart.blogspot.co.uk/ 
A blog I often read.

Below are two of my drawings that I kind find easily to show why I might think there is a bit of affinity.

I am off to draw. Cheers!

New drawing on the go, Storm Brian etc.

Saturday:

Above is the drawing I started in last evenings drawing session and I continued to draw whilst manning the exhibition today. We had quite a few visitors considering how foul the weather is the picture below does not really give you a big idea of just how windy it has been out the but you can see the sea covering Clodgy, even at low tide.

I was on my way up to the 'top' Co-op and spotted these growing on a dead silver birch tree.

Many other things have been going on today, I have had a meeting about bringing 'scale' drawings to our workshop, my son has been traveling down on the train for half term, and listened to 2 hours of the new Phillip Pullman book on Radio 4. It is called The Book Of Dust and is the prequel to Northern Lights and I must say I was really enjoying it to. I must try and find time to read it in the future.

Anyway I am off to meet my son at the railway station and to bring fish and chips home.

Cheers all.

New drawing on the go, Tony Eastman and Chris Packham.

Wednesday:

Above is a drawing that I started working on in last evenings drawing session, I was also watching a program on Chris Packham and his autism. Very touching it was too and also revealing some traits that I possess, not surprising really when I look at the kind of work I produce. I wouldn't be shocked if I appeared on the spectrum somewhere.
I have found Chris Packham always informative and always worth a watch ever since his early days but I had never realised what a struggle life had been for him and his family and in many ways continues to be. I admire his complete honesty in this documentary, I have continued to think about this hour of viewing all day on and off.

Below is a close up of the work I started last night and have continued to work on for a couple of hours today.

This day has been a good day it started by me manning the exhibition at Barnoon and we had quite a few visitors including exhibitor Tony Eastman it was a pleasure to meet him and I highly recommend you take a look at his work on his website http://www.tonyeastmanartist.com/ 
It is also a pleasure to have him in the show, I will get better pics of his work in our show that my wife curated for tomorrow's blog.
This afternoon was part workshop and part gallery as we had a wire drawing workshop that my wife led, I joined in but helped with visitors to the Hand Held View show. We closed the workshop later than we were intending to as we had a few visitors from the show.
Since then all the ordinary things have happened and I received a communication to say someone had found one of my 'art drops'. It is always a nice moment for me when someone finds one of my free art pieces and even better when they let me know, a little happiness has been spread.

I am off to draw.

Cheers

Helen Birch - Freehand, Starting the week

Monday:

I have probably started most Monday blogs with something like this, and this is no real exception. Monday starts as Monday does with my wife's drawing class at Barnoon Workshop, I have taken the class a few times myself but it is really Zoe's domain. Today we we working from the Helen Birch book 'Freehand'. An excellent book that we picked up at the Tate St Ives bookshop yesterday. We had a lively group this morning, one newcomer and a German lady on holiday four regulars and me.

The two hour session shot past with us all taking something from the book and going with it under Zoe's gentle guidance. I think we were all pleased with what we had done, some serious work was done and a few flippant fun drawings too. I am going to delve a lot deeper into this Freehand book, it features many many different artists, the narrative is straightforward, simple and direct. As a small reasonably priced art book it is a bit of a gem.

We had lunch at the workshop and then in the afternoon I went home to do some Barnoon admin whilst Zoe delivered a watercolour session.

I have not managed any new pics of my new drawings, two done last night and a few sea pottery shards that have been put out for art drops.

So I am going to show some recent works.

 Above is 'Red Hollow Dots' on found sea washed plywood and is one of my enteries in the Hand Held View Exhibition.

 Above is an A2 drawing also themed up with hollow dots.

Above is an A2 on a stained glass window grid.

 Above is another A2 from a series I did in the summer.

Above and below are two more from the same series.

Above is the final one for this blog and was also from this series.

I must also mark that this daily blog well I have missed 1 day in nearly 600 has reached 30,000 plus views, so thank you for reading.

Your Face My Art, new works in a progress, The Rum & Crab Shack.

Friday:

Above is the drawing I started in last evenings session an I am probably going to add to it tonight.

Today started at Barnoon Workshop with a Shibori Tie Dye session our final workshop of The St Ives September Festival although we still have a portraits session 11:00 - 16:00 tomorrow.

After the morning session we had a light lunch treat at The Rum & Crab Shack, see above. Whilst there I bumped into Chris the twin from the shack that has now opened the Exeter R&CS only a brief chat but lovely to see him again.

We then had a bit of time to mooch around town which we don't get very often and prepare ourselves for this evenings portrait studio. I also dropped off a couple of my whole sketchbook works to Trim's for Andrew to show his Sister and later Zoe and I were joined by Gazelle ready for Your Face My Art.

Considering the weather this evening we had quite a few visitors and I also got chosen to do a portrait in my 'ostraca' style and above is the drawing I produced on a pottery shard beach find in a wotnot box. Zoe and Gazelle also did portraits and friends Audrey and Nick came up to say goodbye until next time the head down here. So a lovely little evening event with a nice vibe too. 

In the gaps today I have also started this drawing and it is my new work in progress 'up at the workshop' and we will see if I have anytime to add to it in tomorrows Barnoon event. We will see.

Above is a drawing I did in The Penwith Gallery a couple of days ago and I had a look at it again today and I really like it now. It represents a nice little drawing session with Sandy who had first come to the drawing group on Monday and joined me on a art/drawing tour on Tuesday and then turned up for 'buildings and architecture' on Wednesday. So today as the Shibori class her and husband John turned up and to give us a present, a carrier bag of home grown veg and to say goodbye and when they make it down to St Ives again she has vowed to come to drawing again.

New drawing, work in progress and a bit of my day.

Friday:

Above is a drawing I started and finished today, well unless I decide to add colour, then it is not completed. Time will tell.

Below is a drawing I got this far with in the last evenings session and I will continue with tonight when I have posted this blog and stopped watching Only Connect.

Today has been a very windy and inclement day so again I had no outdoor drawing tour this afternoon I have been helping in my friends shop which was a jolly shift with regulars and September festival goers and I saw my first new ten pound note. It was busy I then met Zoe and Gazelle up at Barnoon Workshop and have since returned home.

My thoughts are starting to come around to the sketchbook I have had for a few weeks and not started, I think I have been ignoring it so not coming up with an idea to set the book off. That is a plan for the future but I also have to get some much larger drawings done through the autumn and also nail some small drawings for the Hand Held View exhibition.

Tomorrow if the weather gets better you never know I might have a drawing tour and I am also one of the portrait artists for Your Face My Art at The Barnoon Workshop. Last weekends YFMA was rammed and hopefully tomorrow will be the same but who knows, we will see.

Drawing, Thinking, KLF etc.

Tuesday:

Well here I am again as I have done for nearly a year and a half now, I have built it into my daily routine to write this blog for many reasons but mainly to show my world of drawing to those who find it. I hope it illustrates my work practices and some of the thinking that goes on while I am drawing. I seldom do this in silence as I enjoy listening the radio mainly BBC 6 Music with a bit of radio 4 thrown in and of course television too. This way I get a flavour of the world through the music, art programs, dramas, documentaries and the stuff you cannot get away from like the news and current affairs. This washes around as I concentrate on drawing and exploring my small corner of art.

 Above is a small postcard drawing I first worked on last year sometime but I am now remixing each of twelve postcards I did in that time, I think it is finished but I don't really know at the moment.

Above is a new postcard drawing with the 'work further in' ethic I have with small works at the moment.

 Above is another postcard drawing I have started to remix, I am quite happy to dip in and out of these small drawings.

Dipping in and out of these small works also enables me to get on with a larger drawing so above is an A4 piece that I started in last evenings drawing session, looks like it is another grid drawing and playing with some of my themes and hopefully fully exploring with a new twist. This is how it seems to me anyway!

The other side of my drawing activities these days are the drawing tours of St Ives I do weather pending five mornings a week and also by attending the open drawing class my wife leads every Monday Morning. I have learned so much from starting my week in this manner nearly every week of the year.

Above and below are two warm up drawings I did in yesterdays class, taking on some free lines. The bottom one is more worked into with charcoal and compressed charcoal.

We all then drew with pens on the end of sticks in a kind of Bryce Marden kind of way.Above is one I did and then couldn't resist adding to because it didn't look finished. I ran out of time with it but I may well add more.

One last drawing for this blog is one I did on a drawing tour last week, I really enjoy doing them and I also like the results and people seem to like them which is always nice.

I am now turning my thoughts to evening and drawing as well as having my head full of the KLF after catching up on iplayer from a couple of Sundays ago put together by Tom Robinson. Their activities are always fascinating and they are back doing something......

Cheers!