Thursday, December 18, 2008

Hay bales, coloured pencil and ink

Hay Bales, 10" x 4.5"
Coloured Pencil and Ink on Stonehenge
Copyright Teresa Mallen

First, let me say that this looks much better in real life! Taking pictures with late afternoon winter light just doesn't work well. The paper is white not blue! Goodness, it sure looks goofy in this photo. Of course you can't see all the lovely subtle colours either. Oh well, use your imagination - hopefully you get the idea. Adding colour to the ink drawing was a bit like the debate that goes on about whether or not black and white movies should be colourized. Part of me wanted to leave it alone and part of me wanted to go ahead and add the colour. Obviously the colour side won. The good news is that pen and ink is quite a fast way to work so I can always do another ink one if I wish.

I stumbled onto a blog today that I would like to share with you. I saw a comment that Maureen Mitchell made on Steven Chipman's blog. I followed it to her blog. Maureen is a new blogger and I think she is off to a great start. She has a beautiful collograph posted and I especially liked her December 7th post featuring her work entitled "Connundrum", Coloured Pencil with Brulage. Maureen does a great job describing how she created the piece (brulage is a burning technique). Imagine being inspired by the burning Bonanza map! How cool is that? Have you ever wanted to burn some of your cp work?! :-) Click here to hop on over to her blog. From here you can visit her Etsy shop. She has some lovely block prints for sale. Maureen's 'Long Journey Home' was juried into the CPSA exhibition this year. She has it for sale and you can see it at her shop.

Up next in the studio will be a coloured pencil piece of red chard. Hay bales to Swiss chard...

4 comments:

Jeanette Jobson said...

These are very effective and I know look different in real life. Seems we are all struggling with the problems of photographing pieces in winter light.

Have I ever felt like burning one of my cp pieces? heheheh Oh yeah... But seriously I have't considered this version of burning. Perhaps I'll experiment one day.

Swiss chard comes in amazing colours, I'll look forward to seeing it develop.

Teresa Mallen said...

I found the brulage technique quite effective in her piece. I think the subject and how it is rendered is part of the success. I am inspired to give this a try. I can see it now, my insurance agent (who is a family friend) has a heart attack over me setting fire to things in my studio! :-)

Maureen Mitchell said...

Teresa,
Thanks so much for this nice mention on your blog.
Just wanted to let you know that the cp piece you mentioned (Long Journey Home) from my Etsy shop was juried into the 2000 CPSA Int. I did submit a piece this year but it did not get in (will try again for 2009).
Have checked out your wesite...gorgeous florals!
Thanks again!

Teresa Mallen said...

Hi Maureen,
Your welcome!
Sorry for the mix up regarding the CPSA exhibition. I read that you lived in Seattle and I guess my brain made the leap that your piece was in this year's show - which of course was in Seattle. So 2000, at the Washington State Convention Center...got it.
I hope you enjoy being a blogger!