ArtCtrl

So this is the first page. Welcome. Kia Ora. Currently I have no net and I'’m just sitting in my room thinking about going out. It’s getting late so don’t see that happening.

Today has been positive. My brother on the other hand has been negative. Wont go into that though.

Spent the day in town drawing the world around me. I said to myself this morning - No bus! Managed to keep to my promise too, even though I was close to getting a bus home since it was so damn cold.

Town was really busy today, maybe because I’ve been in Levin for the last month and Wellington is giant compared. New Zealand arts show was on this weekend so that would help the numbers. First stop was French Art Shop. I was on the hunt for some oil paints and a new journal. I got two oil paints, Burnt Umber and Raw Sienna. Both of them in 38ml tubes - better to go for high quality and smaller tubes then cheap and large tubes. I haven’t used them yet but looking forward to seeing what they can do :)

Gorden Harris was my next stop. I never enjoy it as much as French Art but sometimes their sales are very nice. They had a green in oils on sale so I grabbed that. It’s Pebeo brand so not expecting much from it. Didn’t have a green so might come in handy. It’s a English Deep Green. Fancy. Tube of gouache was on sale also, the colour Rubine. Which is basically pink. Helpful to have around for using in my journal. Finally Permanent Green in watercolour. Had a go with that tonight but not too sure, i think I rather use acyclic in my book. The watercolour looked good when I mixed some white arcylic into it.

When I was in Levin I spent some time practicing perspective. No ruler was used today of course. Loose and focused on the angle and size. I wasn’t worried about getting things ‘wrong’. On most of my drawings I mixed the elements up - Added a beam where there wasn’t to make the drawing more interesting.

Three girls were busking on Cuba st, violins. I did a sketch of them in this book and gave them it along with two dollars. Also did a sketch of the Nirvana guy. He’s always doing Nirvana covers, not that there is anything wrong with that. Quick sketch of him and 50 cents :D Really inspired me to go out and draw people

Popped into the Wellington library too but was close to closing time. Read a few books on street art. One had good interviews with the artists. One artist made a good point about being labeled a street artist when really they are Artists. What label would people give me? Going to  UCOL was the first time I really remember drawing. Before then it was just design at high school (and high school design is basically - get font, turn pretty colours, win). My work then was mainly in charcoal. Portraits were a focus - celebs, music, actors. Expressive marks. I would use charcoal and work very black. Mums are great at analyzing art. Recently Mum said to me that some children were scared of my portrait of my sister Holley. Does my art have a sense of fear or evil? It must be the emotion created with the marks. Colour must affect this also as colour is linked to making a person feel calm or fearful. Since I’ve really started to use colour (Thanks Gary) my colours have become bright and colourful. This likely reduces the er… fear.

I’ve recently been exploring yellow - mixing it with bronze and reds to create some interesting effects. Haven’t been very happy with blue lately. The yellows are bright and transparent (very helpful for the book since I use pen before and want my pen work to show. I did have a good blue I enjoyed using in my journal - Persian blue. sadly I’ve left that in Levin with my sister. I hope shes putting those colours to use that I left by mistake!

Is my art getting better?