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.

Gymea Lilies in the Gardens

Last Saturday it was supposed to pour with rain again. Surprise. Though cloudy & a bit hazy if remained fine and warm enough for comfortable outdoor sketching. It was the 2nd of the Spring Sketchabouts in the Royal Botanic Gardens and this time they led us to the native Australian garden just near the Opera House.

The garden is on quite a steep little hill and I went to the top as I’d not been before. The Gymea Lilies were in bloom so for me that was an obvious thing to draw. They are just magnificent. They grow to 5-6 metres tall ( a metre is a yard + 3 inches) and the ones I was drawing were downhill from me, as you can see by the photo that Jennifer took & was kind enough to send me to use on my blog.They are in bloom all over Sydney at the moment and I took this other photo in another part of the Gardens. Next, I moved along the slope to draw some Kangaroo Paw.  Yes they are called that because of their shape. Look at this closeup. They also come in a beautiful rich red. I was looking for some of those to draw as they seem a little more ‘typical’ to me, but they were mostly in the middle of the slope and not accessible to draw. I’ve since found some in another part of the Gardens, so I’ll go back to draw them.

I’ve made a solar plate of the Gymea Lily drawing already and will be printing that in a couple of weeks.