Exhibitions

This year I decided my plan was to get my artwork into as many exhibitions as possible!

I'd had enough of trying to sell my artwork at craft fairs last year. I was so sick of being stuck in the freezing cold, expensive fair fees and dealing with rude people to make not very much money when I could be selling online at home in the warmth! It hit me when I was doing a Christmas craft fair last year that I had over £85 worth of online painting commissions to work on while at the craft fair and yet I barely scraped the craft fair fee in sales that day. From then on I decided to concentrate on the online sales and exhibitions. I do miss the people you meet at the craft fairs but definitely don't miss the frozen hands and toes!

My first exhibition for the year was through Staffordshire Enjoy Art - a company that promotes local artists and organises three local exhibitions in the year. I wasn't sure if I would be able to exhibit with them as I don't quite live in Staffordshire but they were very welcoming and produced some very well organised exhibitions.

The first exhibition was at Shugborough Hall, Stafford where I had two collagraph prints displayed - "Twisting Upwards" and "East Wing". I also had great fun exploring behind the scenes of Shugborough Hall when picking up my work after the exhibition!

Staffordshire Enjoy Art Spring Exhibition - Shugborough Hall - 30th March to 13th April 2013

 

More Kittens!

Kitten Charm Acrylic Painting

I couldn't resist doing another blog about my new little kitten Morpheus, although he is growing up fast and won't be a kitten for very long!

Helping me pack for my latest exhibition!

 I love taking photos of him and can't stop painting him, he is just too cute! His favourite thing at the moment is playing with the bathroom tap, he loves watching the water. Although every time he gets his paws wet he is still shocked and never seems to learn! He has also fallen down the toilet a couple of times by being too inquisitive!

 

I sometimes wonder if he thinks he is a dog though as he loves fetching his ball for you to throw and can do it for hours without getting bored. Also whenever we play in the garden he always likes to find and bring a stick in to play with him and he loves to grab all the letters when they comes through the letterbox!

He also loves to follow me everywhere and wants to help me with everything. Here he is helping me take photos of my latest paintings, of him of course!

Kitten Grin Acrylic Painting 

 

 

I've just started doing a series of collagraph prints of him. The first is called Dreamy - he does dream a lot usually of either eating or chasing things!

Dreamy Collagraph Print

I've just started doing another today so here is a sneak preview, still lots of work to do!

I'm hoping to exhibit my prints of him at the new Staffordshire Enjoy Art group exhibition at Cannock Chase Museum starting 21st October so I better stop playing with my kitten and get printing him!

Clare xx

Cats!

Well it has been a bit of a mad week and you can see why! This is Morpheus the dream kitten and he was just so cute I couldn't resist him!

I've been inspired to do lots of paintings of him but he does like to help usually by chewing the paintbrush!

Black & White Kitten

He doesn't stay still for very long so getting photos to work from has been a bit difficult!

Here is he is with his favourite toy a rattly ball that he likes to get you to throw and he will fetch it back for more (I'm sure he thinks he is a dog!)

Today I decided to do a few watercolour paintings of him until he pushed a full jar of water into my lap and decided my watercolour paints were a new fun toy!

Sleepy Kitten

Kitten Charm

Kitten & Ball

I've also been doing a bit of linocut printing as he looked so cute in this pose!

Kitten Play

Kitten Cute

  I can see much more kitten themed artwork to come!

How to print a Kitty Cat!

Purple Cat Collagraph Print

Turkish Cats

I've recently got back from a 12 day holiday touring round Turkey. I had an amazing time and ended up with over 1250 photos! I can't wait to start working on my photos and making some really atmospheric prints soon but while I was sorting through my photos I discovered I'd taken a huge amount of cat photos most of them asleep on some ancient monument!

Ephesus Cat

ACEO Snoozy Cat

 I couldn't resist painting a few ACEOs of these cats. ACEOs are very collectable tiny artworks - Art Cards Editions or Originals and are 2.5 x 3.5" in size. They are a great size for painting all the photos that I normally would never use in my larger artwork but just need to be painted somewhere!

ACEO Serene Cat

ACEO Cat Sleep

ACEO Listening Cat

ACEO Cat Doze

Wherever I go I usually pick up a cat or two, heres me making friends at Troy!

 

Also just had to paint the nesting storks that were nesting all the over the columns!

ACEO Nesting Stork

Clare xx

Purple Animals!

I'm getting obsessed again! There seems to be purple animals everywhere I look!

It all started with a purple hippo collagraph print that I printed to sell in the Little Hippo Shop last year. I love purple and when it came time for me to proof print the hippo the only colour that came to mind was purple!

Purple Hippo

Next came an elephant, I did originally print him in black but he just didn't look right so he had to be purple too!

Purple Elephant

Then I had a trip to the zoo with my friend and we spent a lot of time at the penguin enclosure so a purple penguin it had to be!

Purple Penguin

Another trip to the zoo and a purple pig was the result!

Purple Pig

A purple tiger and rhino soon followed.

Purple Tiger

Purple Rhino

 Then I just had to print a purple cat, it took a lot of bribery to get this pose!

Purple Cat

Well it seems I'm not the only one that likes purple animals as I've sold out of the purple hippo print not long after Christmas and the others are proving very popular too. Most of them seem to have gone to Canada, I'm not sure what this says! 

I've even done a couple of animals in pink too just because I needed to see a pink elephant!

I've just been working on a brand new big eyed purple cat design and here he is printed on a bag on display at the new We LoVe crafts shop in Wolverhampton.

I really must stock up on some more purple ink for my next series of purple animal prints!

Clare xx

Elephants!

 
 I've just been looking round my studio (or spare room as its normally known!) and realised I'm getting a bit obsessed with elephants at the moment!

This is just a few of the many elephants taking over the bed!

Elephant

 It probably started with this acrylic painting from last year, I had such fun painting all the textures and colours and it sold in an open exhibition.The cards I have produced featuring him have been very popular!

After a recent visit to the local zoo to get more elephant photos - I then painted a few watercolour ACEOs featuring elephants.

Elephant ACEOs

 This led to a few larger watercolours!

Elephant Watercolours

 And then I started on the prints!
I love making the elephant collagraph prints as it is the perfect medium for getting all those lovely wrinkles and textured skin. I couldn't resist doing a purple elephant too after almost selling out of my purple hippo collagraph prints!

Purple Elephant

Elephant Stroll

I've also been experimenting with my new Gocco printer so of course I had to try an elephant print!

Elephant Stand

 This is my latest large acrylic painting, only just finished and being entered into a local competition.

I've still got lots more photos to work from and I don't think my elephant obsession is quite finished yet so I may need a bigger room to house all my elephants!

Clare xx