Amy Shackleton

What a great way to line draw.

Exhibition at Cafe Wander

Exhibition at Cafe Wander, originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
Yes, ten of my (mostly continuous) line drawings showing at Cafe Wander in Glasgow. All of November and 'til the end of December.
If you're in the area, do please feel free to pop along for a look. :)

Blue Hair, Blue Thoughts.

This one was a submission to a doodling challenge on the Doodlers Doing Doodles team on etsy. You can vote for mine (or someone else's, of course) on this web site...

http://www.acepolls.com/polls/1233759-which-is-your-favorite-interpretation-of-the-theme-hair

A Little Conversation...

A Little Conversation..., originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
...this one's with Jim at the Old Mearns Gallery,
2a Howie Buildings,
Mearns Road,
Clarkston,
Glasgow,
G76 7ET

:)

handful of skies

handful of skies, originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
Made for the Team We Draw October Challenge, The City.
The city is different from the suburbs in a number of ways, but the thing I notice most nowadays is the shape of the sky; it's a narrow irregular wedge in the city, and it's different on every street.
(I think this project might grow some more...)

I'd taken some shots of these drawings on friday, to post them on etsy. But it was late, and I used the anglepoise for light, and didn't think they worked. So the next day I took these in the daylight.
(Coinciding with flickr's downtime.)

I've been toying with user settings on the camera, to try and cut down some of the pp time. I shifted the colour balance a little further towards green, and dropped the saturation. (Then I forgot I'd had the white balance set for fluorescent light the night before, and that's given it the lovely lilacyblue hue, which I left because I quite liked it.)

Featured in another coffee themed treasury!

Fallen

Fallen, originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
Props in use at atyn last week; I thought the model really worked those wings, channelling fallen angel in every pose.

He Wears Motley, actually wearing motley.

He Wears Motley, actually wearing motley., originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
I added some motley. It was about time actually, and it really sings in the low light. :)

Some date

Some date, originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
Drawn for the We Draw august team challenge on etsy.com.
I can honestly say I would not have made this one without the challenge. Really, I'm not even remotely sure where this came from in my head.
But there she is, sad little mule-clown. Waiting. Waiting; waiting for that long-overdue Harlequin. I hope he doesn't become irrecoverable...

Alison and Hugh.

Alison and Hugh., originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
This is the final piece for the commission I mentioned before. I made some sketches at the wedding, and worked them into this composition back at the drawing board. I also had a version with Alison and Hugh facing each other, but it looked a bit too fussy and overworked. I like them side by side. Shoulder to shoulder, and all that.

Clare, who was giving the drawing as a gift to the couple, seemed very happy indeed with the final work, which is just magic. :)

(This is one continuous line.)

ox eye daisies

ox eye daisies, originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
A deviation from my usual people obsessed monochrome work. Made for the We Draw July team challenge, the topic of which was 'In the Garden'. I love ox eye daisies, and there's a big blousy patch of them in the back drying green area where I live. I love how long they're around for in summertime, I love the way they look in late summer rain. I love their scaled up unashamed daisiness.

I used fw inks, and coloured pencils on canford card.

Featured in a coffee related treasury on etsy!

shy anglepoise

shy anglepoise, originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

My submission to the somewhat abortive June Challenge for Team We Draw on etsy.com. Hey ho.

Theme was gestus. I didn't want to use people, I draw people all the time.

Not a great drawing, and obviously inspired by the anlgepoise animation.

Lurid Reclining Man

Lurid Reclining Man, originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
I'm working on a kind of fiddly precise commission at the moment (I'll share it with you when it's done), and it was nice to throw some ink around on tuesday. Scratchy with the white and orange pencils too. :)

yellow hair

yellow hair, originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
Toying with a watermark for the shop. Don't really like it.

It's funny, I find myself aiming for something different from before when drawing. I need to think about what I'm doing.

Gertie Schiele's hands.

Gertie Schiele's hands., originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Via Flickr:
Egon Schiele is my hero.
There was an exhibition of drawings from private collections in the Richard Nagy Gallery in London between the 19th May and 30th June, I took the opportunity to pop along and see them in the real - oh heavens, standing in a roomful of Schiele drawings, swoon*

I love the drawing of Gertie Schiele in the big hat with her top folded down. Yes she has a great look in her eye, yes her breasts are bared, yes it's a superb contorted pose; but I think it's really a drawing about her hands.

The first 'we draw' team treasury!

Made by 'we draw' member Coramantic.
My little non-dancing bear is in there too, thanks Yvonne!

Just found a treasury widget on CraftCult...

A Line is a Line...

I popped down to Middlesbrough to catch the tail end of the Drawing in Progress exhibition at the Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art. The exhibition displayed MIMA's recent acquisitions of American post-war drawings. G's and my favourite was Fred Sandback's Untitled from c.1987, in which we pondered whether the black and yellow described the edges of the gap between the vellum sheets; or were the lines themselves the gap, separating the vellum sheets.

I also enjoyed drawing the front of the MIMA building, and particularly Lawrence Weiner's A Line is a Line for All That. Struck me a sentence about line would look nice in continuous line writing. But I would say that, wouldn't I.

I made MIMA a gift of one of my wandering lines on one of their comment cards, above. :)

It's not that I don't like giclee...

(I never intended to start a drawing team on etsy. I went looking for a drawing team to join on etsy. I couldn't find one.

And so,

was born, and I'm now captain of an etsy team about drawing. Here is my first rant, it is about giclee, which I actually like very much indeed.)

" Of course I like giclee, and yes it absolutely has a place in broadening the price bracket of a piece of art; you have the original for sale at 100%, you have a giclee for 25%, and some notelets or postcards for 5%. For example. So, your customer can be anyone, not just the ones with more disposable income.

And then, you might have already sold the original, so all anyone else can have is a reproduction, and giclee is a darn fine reproduction. I'm just a bit tired of looking at some of the etsy shops full of prints, and as a buyer, if I have a spare £40 one month, I'd rather blow the lot on one small original from a favourite shop. As a seller, I want to be one in a brave set of sellers, who have he guts to part with the originals, because (in my humble op) that's really what being a practising artist is about. Surely nobody wants only a collection of digital prints? I'll get off the soapbox now. Thanks for reading. :) "

See the team on etsy...

Tony Orrico: Penwald: 2: 8 circles (2009)

One of my clown images was featured on www.patiodebutacas.es, thank you, Loredana; but the other stuff on the blog is also interesting...

Including this artist, Tony Orrico. Here using his own body's proportions to construct a work. Reminiscent of hypotrochoid drawings. But on a much larger scale.

an exhibition

an exhibition, originally uploaded by Donna Nicholson-Arnott.

Yes, eight original line drawings by me, including that little blue horse above, in

Cafe Wander
110a West George Street
Glasgow

On for the whole of March, and probably April too. If you find yourself in the area, do please feel free to pop along and have look. :)

............................

This little poster was featured in one my favourite artist's blogs,

cathy cullis: mosaic monday

Thank you Cathy!

Crazed rabbit can opener, in a book!

It isn't quite released here in the uk yet, but I just got my comp copy and I'm very excited!

There are three others of mine, and a wealth of superbly located faces from other more talented photographers.

Focus: Found Faces, May 2011, Lark Books, 9781600597923.

my heart's witnesses hide

I slowly continue to make these. I should probably get a move on and make more, but there's something so meditative about the process. It's tense making the initial drawing onto the prepared balsa; balsa is soft so there's an impression of the drawing on the wood as well as the graphite drawing, and errors are not really correctable in situ. I have sanded back one awful drawing when I got home once, and re-inked it for next time. But I'd rather just get it right and move on to new bit most of the time. I add all the colour and details when I'm back in the studio. This one ended up with some words because there was space at the top compositionally, and I had some bits of Browning on my desk from fiddling with the clownery, and they were catching my eye. I inked it's edges black, because I was short of white, and wondered what it would look like darker.

This one is for sale in the new Far Dot Shop.