Hag stones - watercolour and collage

Hag stone sketch ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

Hag stones - stones with naturally occuring holes - are plentiful on the local beaches. Traditional folklore states that they are protection from witchcraft, can protect against disease and by looking through the hole you can see the fairy folk. Dorset fishermen used to tie them onto their boats for luck. I'm not so sure about that but I do find the spaces fascinating and when drawing them I am not sure if I am drawing the stone or the spaces inbetween. This little nugget was a sketch from the summer probably made in a couple of minutes and then forgotten about just as quickly. Until now....


 I started by cutting shapes from pre-painted and printed papers looking from patterns, marks and textures similar to the stones that I have collected. Then I began to play with arranging them on a plain white backing. Four little stacks resulted that are giving me lots of ideas for further work.

Four Pebble collages   approx 20x5cm mixed media   ©2018LisaLeQuelenec

Pebbles - watercolour studies

Pebble studies in watercolour   21x15cm approx   ©LisaLeQuelenec2017

There is something very comforting about a pebble warmed by the sun and held in the hand. I seem to collect pockets full of pebbles from all the different places I visit; picked for their colour, texture, pattern or weight. Quite often holding particular pebbles can transport me back to the landscape from where it came. Some of them appear to depict complete little landscapes within their markings. I have a bowl of them on my drawing table along with all the other bits and bobs picked up on my walks. The above watercolour studies are a few favourites recently gathered locally. The one below reminded me of an early O'Keefe watercolour.

Pebble study in watercolour   21x15cm approx   ©LisaLeQuelenec2017

I think I feel a new project coming on.....

Winter

Winter - A/P    blind embossed collagraph 12x20cm   ©2018LisaLeQuelenec  

Winter continues with it's dark, cold and damp here on the south coast. It may not be the best light for painting but work continues with printmaking, sketching and planning for this lovely fresh new year.

In December I had made a collagraph plate of a lone winter tree the first print of which I used for my Christmas card. Well I have made a further three prints from this plate and one blind print (a print with no ink that just shows as an embossed image). It is a technique which I rather like especially mounted and framed completely white on white - very crisp and pure.

All three are available at Seaside Studios Uk on Etsy.

  Winter - 1/3          collagraph print        12x20cm   ©2018LisaLeQuelenec

   

A digitally manipulated version of this image is available as reproduction prints and cards on my RedBubble site

Winter tree moon II  reproduction print   ©2018LisaLeQuelenec

Heavy weather sketchbook pages & Seasons Greetings

Heavy weather sketchbook pages   ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

Well what a storm! We got off lightly in last nights Storm Caroline on the south coast but it was very wet and a bit blowy still this morning. Wild weather is always an inspiration for me. I think some more drypoints perhaps? A few drawings to start from a while back in my sketchbook as a starting point and I will see where this takes me.

Now the rain is passing the temperatures here are set to drop with the possibility of the rain turning to wintery showers....could we really get some snow here down south? It would be nice for Twinkletoes as he hasn't seen any of the white stuff yet. In anticipation I will sign off for the holidays with this ....

Winter   collograph with digital drawing   ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

Wishing you all a happy holidays & my very best wishes for a happy, healthy and successful 2018.

See you next year.

Back to the drawing board...gull sketchbook pages

When in doubt go back to basics.... something that has helped me many times over the years. The act of drawing with no end in mind can help me push a project through, consolidate ideas or suggest new avenues to explore. I think what these sketches are telling me and the recent experiments and prints is that I need to step away for a while and stop thinking about it. Then later, there will be time to re-evaluate and percolate the ideas. I think I will spend some more time re-reading the poem that was the original inspiration as well. For now the gulls can rest as I begin the wind down to the holidays and the exciting job of planning for next years adventures.

Gull sketchbook pages  ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

A medley of work from the last few weeks....

A medley of work from the last few weeks ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

A virus has been keeping me away from work so I haven't progressed as far as I had hoped to with the gulls. I thought I would share a collection of some of the work that has been going on in the background whilst the gull experiments have been going on - all these pieces are available at SeasideStudiosUK

I'm not sure why a ball of string...it just looked like it needed to be drawn and one thing led to another...

String   drypoint 8.5x15cm   ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

Gulls 3 - monoprint & collagraph

Gull   collagraph   15x21cm   ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

A round of collagraph monoprints. I used a cardboard plate with textures made from different acrylic mediums. The aim wasn't to make an edition of prints but rather to see how many different ways of using the plate I could come up with before the plate was destroyed in the process.


To begin with things didn't turn out in the way that I expected in that some of the acrylic mediums had sunk into the cardboard plate as it dried and I probably should have sealed the board to begin with to avoid this...lesson learned for next time. However this added to the need to be inventive with ink application and made it even more flying-by-the-seat-of-your-pants-exciting!




You can see in this first print that I took that the tonal contrasts in the background are a little too similar and more definition was needed. No matter the texture in some areas made them beautiful to work into with mixed media. I added watercolour and coloured pencil.The oil based printing ink resists the watercolour and provides a nice tooth for the pencil so further texture results.

Gull   collagraph and mixed media15x21cm  ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

After a few inkings and taking some more prints in this way I started to add some extra gull shapes using separate pieces of board inked up and also by gouging into the baseplate to trap the ink. The gull shape below was cut from a piece of medium weight paper and then inked up by brushing on the ink. I liked the idea of the bird flying out of the frame.


After a couple of hours of playing with these very simple materials I have more and more ideas to work through and a lot of thinking to do. Just where will I wonder next?

Gulls   collagraph and mixed media15x21cm  ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

Gulls 2 - more printmaking experiments in monoprint and digital manipulations

I continue to play with the lone gull motif. The lower five square images are digital manipulations of the original first image. Tiny steps and alterations that can make a big difference to my line of thought. I may be drifting towards vignettes again... On the right three monoprints. I started to play with multiples and pattern - it could be an interesting avenue to explore later. I think I want to contrast this serenity with a bit more energy and texture...onwards!

Gulls ideas in monoprint and digital manipulations   ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

October Moon

October moon   watercolour on paper 16x16cm   ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

Boo!

It is Halloween after all...

Gulls 1

Gulls have featured in my work for a number of years now. I discovered a poem by Neruda a while back and some of the imagery in the piece has stayed with me. It has sparked ideas to explore which are turning into a series of works in a variety of media.

I feel like a gull circling in the sky getting closer but not quite hitting the mark just yet. I have started with some monoprints with Neruda's words in my mind. Using an inked plate and removing ink, applying masks and also making marks in the ink before running through the press.

Flying Free   monoprint and mixed media   ©2017LisaLeQuelenec

Some I made ghost prints with (running the plate with ink depleted from the first pass through the press for a second time). I likes the subtleties of a couple and so have left those untouched. Other ghost prints weren't strong enough to stand on their own so I have worked into those with other media. Others have been photocopied, scanned and digitally manipulated and exist only as digital prints. We are fortunate to live in an age where so many opportunities and methods of experimentation are open to us and I like to exploit as many as I can on occasion.I'm not sure where I am going with these still.....I'll see where the breeze takes me.

Gulls   ghost monoprint and mixed media   ©2017Lisa Le Quelenec

A translation of the poem that inspired this work can be read here