Bristol Affordable Artfair - this weekend

my work will be here : Smithson Gallery stand B5 - for the weekend, it's just by Temple Meads station - so very handy

some bears like to dance

what better way to spend the weekend than printing a few grumpy looking bears dancing their socks off? It was a good way to slightly get over my feelings of "ooh, I'm not sure what to do next"...these bears have been on my mind for a while, so I've made a bit of space for more demanding drawings and I had a bit of fun playing with layering transparent colours - and it got me thinking about using black paper and layers of transparent pale ink....hmmmmmmm. 

Anyway, voila  - bears on the sunny rack:

 I was trying to get a photo of the light overlapping layer - in the shadow....you have to squint a bit to see it!

These bears will be featuring in the Bear Flat open studios, the last weekend in may and also at the Smithson Gallery stand at the Bristol Affordable Art Fair next weekend.

I ♥ Berlin

Just back from a quick trip to berlin - where despite the gloomy looking skies over the TV tower, we enjoyed a few days of heatwave. There's something about Berlin I really like, it's not the prettiest city but its an easy place to be and everyone seems really friendly - though it turns out my attempts at german just made me come across as very un-chatty and a bit grumpy - oh dear  - es tut mir leid.

 "say cheese" Mr Hippo

we pretty much walked around the whole city (not easy when it's the first flip flop wearing moment of the year) so this was our uber-healthy start to the day!

bad and good news...

Just a quick catch up, as I'm very guilty of blog neglect after all the hectic-ness of getting everything done for my show...

The bad news is that the show is coming to an end BUT the good news is that the next show at the Rostra is all about prints so my work will be hanging around for that...and then it's the Bristol Affordable Artfair.

Here's a few slightly rubbish photos from my phone:

( ahh the first sunny day in a while)

I've been back in the studio printing a few snowglobe commissions - nice to be back on snowglobes, and they're saving me from worrying too much about a little bit of artists block thats creeping in (HEEEEEEEEEEELLLLLP ME)

get ready for show time

It's been a hectic week getting the last few bits finished in time for my show at the Rostra which opened today with bucks fizz and pink wafer biscuits...

 glassine bags for my fake tattoos

one last print featuring an owl and a pussy cat (of sorts)

 fancy gold printed bags (which I forgot to take along today)

 

on wednesday I assisted Emma from the gallery in a paper bunting making session 

 and here it is in the window, with my name up in lights (sort of)

pretty and gritty

I thought I'd take a few photos of the vital bits of the Spike Print studio, as its always a bit tricky to explain how screen printing works ( but check out Sandi's great tutorial on http://deadweightisgreat.blogspot.com/2011/11/printing-at-home.html )

...I like how well used the fridge for the light sensitive emulsion looks. The UV light isn't the most photogenic thing ever but without it nothing would happen...

this is my screen after it's been coated in emulsion, exposed and washed out with a pressure washer in the wash out room...now for the pretty...

 Layer 3 seems to be the way forward, I LOVE this little colour combination

  the finished print looking glamorous on the sunlit drying rack...and it only took about 10 hours!

tattoo time

I got some of my new drawings turned into temporary tattoos - very exciting, in fact I was so over excited that I didn't read the instructions properly and forgot to remove the transparent film...I might sell little packs of these in my shop if anyones interested. What could be more rock n roll than a poodle tattoo?!


The toucan tattoo lasted 3 days - would've been longer but I printed on saturday and all the washing finished him off...


thanks to Harriet Gray for the tattoo tips http://harrietgray.blogspot.co.uk