EDiM23 – a souvenir

I used to go to Bali every year and stay in Ubud. I haven’t been for a few years and I’m longing to go again. I have huge numbers of silver earrings that I bought over the years. I used to buy for the girls at work too – many of them would give me $50 to spend for them. You could get a lot for $50. Silver earrings used to be about $5 to $8, from memory. I made a long-term friend of a Balinese woman, Wayan,  in a silver shop, who said to me ‘you dealer?’

So I had quite a collection to choose from. I have brooches also, that I used to wear on the corporate wardrobe. None of them ever get worn now, not the earrings or the brooches.  I hadn’t sketched these ones before. They have some sort of crystal in the middle and they are quite large.  I used a Derwent Dark Wash pencil to get the main lines in. Then I reserved the highlights with a clear Sakura Glaze pen. I continued with the drawing, then got out the waterbrush. An unexpected effect of using the Sakura Glaze pen, is that as you look at the finished sketch on the page, the Glaze areas catch the light and shine, just as the silver does.

Today, as I write this we are having a major storm with strong winds. There are trees  down all over the place and people having difficulty getting home. It was already pretty much dark at 4pm. Being in Bali, strolling down the Monkey Forest Road as it is getting dark, smelling the woodsmoke, looking forward to a bintang besar sounds rather nice tonight. (It’s a large beer).

EDiM7 Spoon

I had a spoon somewhere that came from a P&O ship many many years ago. I was going to sketch that one. However when I went to find it, it was gone. Maybe flown away back on board one of P&O’s more modern ships.

This is part of an everyday set with acrylic handles. I thought the transparent handle would be a nice challenge for me. I used my Sakura Glaze pen to place the highlights & drew the rest with watercolour pencil.  I’m trying to vary my materials throughout May.

EDiM6 Easter Card

EDiM6 ws ‘draw a holiday card’. None of us were quite sure what a holiday card was, because we don’t use that expression here. I guessed, and as I’d received this card for Easter from my friends in Switzerland I decided to sketch that.

I used my Sakura Glaze pens, which create a resist, then finished it with watercolour washes. Unfortunately the Sakura Glaze pens don’t seem to come in earth tones, so I had to work with what I had. They give a slightly raised surface which is shiny seen from some angles. I wasn’t sure how they’d be in a sketchbook – whether they would stick to the opposing page – but they were fine. In fact they dry almost immediately and not really any delay before applying the washes. You can’t ge them in Australia. I bought some from the USA and then Annie gave me some more when she went to Alaska.

Australian Native Flowers

I’ve been too busy to blog. Saturday was the Derivan Open Day and today is my workshop at the Balmain Library. Next week is Leichhardt Library – reserve your place. We’re doing texture with Matisse Dry Mediums.

My friend Annie went to Alaska and Canada and she brought me back a set of Sakura Glaze pens. They’re not available here.  It was when I was drawing the Australian native flowers one by one, so I decided to try out the glaze pens by drawing the whole bouquet.

All I knew was that the clear one acts as a resist, so I put that one first – then I didn’t have a clue where I was.  Another time I’d use at least one coloured pen first so I could see where I was on the page. Given that there is a limited range of colours (getting more, getting more) and I hadn’t so much as tested the colours before, I think it went pretty well. I let it dry for about 10-15 minutes, as recommended on the packet, and then went for it with the watercolours.

These pens give you two ways of looking. One is as you see here on the screen. The other, if you tilt the paper, shows the pen work as slightly raised and a bit shiny. They are really interesting pens to work with.