Art Is Everywhere

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This weekend Maryanne Hobbs hosted her wonderful annual Art Is Everywhere show dedicated to creativity. Listeners are encouraged to make art while they listen to the music and interviews with inspiring artists. This year’s show included conversations with Blondey McCoy, Will Gompertz and Martin Parr. I was particularly swept away by a piece with Kate Tempest talking about how she became inspired by William Blake. In her words, “I was meant to discover this person’s poetry…”

Below is one of the pieces I submitted on Twitter during the show.

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BBC Radio 6 Music - Mary Anne Hobbs, Art Is Everywhere, Live from the Turner Prize Exhibition

Mary Anne presents Art Is Everywhere from the Turner Prize exhibition at Tate Britain.

National Portrait Gallery

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I can’t walk past the National Portrait Gallery without popping in.  How wonderful to see such masterpieces so easily. These two particularly caught my eye today.

Experiments In Watercolour

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This is a little corner of one of the mini abstracts in my watercolour sketchbook. I've mentioned before how therapeutic I find drawing or painting and playing with watercolours is a wonderful meditation. I am learning about how the paints behave with more or less water. And letting them seep into each other teaches me to relinquish control and to let the painting be what it wants to be.

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Skating & Creating

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"Everyone is an artist until they stop playing. That’s all it is. Art is just play." - Ed Templeton

I was introduced to Ed Templeton's photography and art by an old friend who taught me a lot about how creative skateboarders can be. I love Ed's spirit and tenacity and the creative connection he has with his wife Deanna. This is why I was intrigued to see him featured in this trailer on the Huck Magazine website this week. A teacher, Kelli Watson, has created a documentary about the connection between skaters and art which is being launched later this month. It should be a good watch.

You only have to spend five minutes watching the skaters on the Southbank to understand their tenacity and singlemindedness. It makes complete sense to me that this partners perfectly with the creative mind.

Life Drawing

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I finally had time to go back to my drop-in life drawing class today. I hadn't realised how much I missed it. Life drawing has really helped me to start drawing figures as they actually are, rather than as I think I see them. You start to see the body as lots of shapes that work together with weight and light and shade in the limbs. I really recommend going along even if you have never drawn before. It's absorbing and meditative and a lovely way to spend a Saturday morning.

Illustration Inspiration - By Bun

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I've been enjoying watching Roxanne Coble's YouTube channel since I saw a couple of her Vlogmas videos over Christmas. Roxanne, also known as By Bun, is a multimedia artist and illustrator based in LA who shares her work and life online in daily vlogs. Her art combines patterns, colour and collage, line art and words. I love how free her style is. Watching her videos and learning more about her style has encouraged me to play with my art a bit more, to try collage and layering and to combine media more. Her videos are friendly and absorbing, click here if you fancy a look (they also feature her two super cute pugs!).