Latest off the easel

As it has been a while since I have posted regularly I thought I should post a few images of work I have done recently. All these paintings are done with oils and are as a result of my Botswana field trip in 2011.

The idea for this piece was after watching three bulls cross the flood plain on a dull drizzly day in the Okavango Delta. I toyed with painting the scene as I saw it with the  muted light conditions; but the bulls had crossed singly so I chose to group them in the composition but still give them that space between them. After some thought I decided to change the light level and backdrop. I went through all my reference photo's  to find a setting that had an 'interesting' tree line and broken reed beds. This has been painted on a deep canvas with the scenery painted round the sides.

I started this painting back last summer it is one of the bigger canvases I have painted so far for my Botswana Collection, it's approx 2' x 3' and I am painting this slightly differently to my normal approach. I am playing with a looser approach for some of my work, these two bulls are my first serious attempt to try and paint less intensely. It has been a challenge to hold off going in with too much detail but it has also been fun 'playing'. These two bulls were seen striding closely side by side one evening near sundown one was very pale probably covered in the pale dust and sandy soil of the surrounding area and the other may have recently washed himself clean of dust as he was much darker. I have had a spell of doing other work, so it has been some months since I last worked on it but this weekend I was able to get back to it. One advantage of the 'time out' has been that I can look at the painting again with fresh objective eyes and can see I have a few adjustments to make to the paler elephant. Over the weekend, though, I concentrated on the darker bull adding in a 'foundation' layer on the ears head and trunk. Once this is dry I shall go over this foundation adding texture which will also lighten him up and better define the highlights.

These three pieces are more examples of some more 'playing' with this looser approach. 

Clover... for Send A Cow

Yesterday I spent the day at the offices of the Send A Cow Charity, donating my time, to paint Clover. 

Clover is the cow sculpture made by the wonderful company Wild Art who did the gorilla sculptures seen in Bristol in 2011 and the Grommit sculptures to be seen in Bristol this Summer. They have made some wonderful shapes of animals, really pleasing to the eye with surprisingly tactile and perfect forms. The sculpture was the prize in a recent competition, run by the charity, to name her. The winning name is "Clover" and as one of the artists who submitted designs to decorate her, I got the honour to paint her... not in the design I put in but one suggested by the lady who won her. She was donating the sculpture to her local school and wanted the colours to reflect the school colours and be patches with the 6 'R' words that make up the school motto. These words will be put on by a signwriter, but first I had to paint the patches. 

After a brief chat with Joanna at the charity to discuss ideas the plan formed of several patches showing the countries of Great Britain and Africa. Great Britain for where the Charity is based and Africa for where they do their work. Then I thought of adding the Send A Cow charity logo and the shape of a clover leaf to represent her name. My prep work consisted of finding suitable map images of both countries, both of which I played with in Photoshop on the computer to 'clean up' of place names etc and turn into plain black shapes. A quick search on the internet for Fresian cow images (to get some basic patch patterns as reference), the charity logo and an image of a four-leafed clover all of which I printed out on A4 sheets.

I took a collection of brushes, a small tray to hold some paint, a water jar, my iPod and speaker and a Cadbury's creme egg along with a few other nourishment supplies to keep me going. 

The day started off badly with my car battery deciding to go on strike and refusing to allow my car engine to turn over and fire up! I got it started eventually by using a set of industrial sized jump leads and my brother's van. Should have been an easy affair to sort, but all manner of things conspired to throw proverbial spanners into works. I got there eventually, with the help of my neighbour Joe, but let's just say it all could have gone a lot more smoothly and simply than it did.

Got to the offices of Send A Cow just after 10am and after being shown around quickly I was then left to sort myself out. As planned my attack of the project as I looked over Clover and took a few 'before' photo's. Then there was nothing to it but to wade in and get cracking...

I had only one colour to apply and for the most part it was make it up as I went along. I used the Fresian cow photo's to get some sense of how I might place certain patches but apart from the emblems. logo and country patches, everything was just playing with shapes. This was great fun and I did enjoy 'finding my way' on her markings.

I decided to do the country shapes freehand.. I had no printouts big enough to trace so it was just a case of start drawing with a pencil and hope my proportions and size looked pretty good. I wasn't happy with Africa.. it looked stunted and fat, so I had some alterations to do to slim it down and elongate the sub Saharan part of the continent. But GB went quite well, I thought.

The school had sent Joanna an image of a school shirt so she could get the right colour blue paint, it also had the school emblem on, so I decided to add that to the design as well. Another on the spot addition was a little heart shape under the chin. It can only be seen by an adult if you bend down really low.. but the small children should see it with no trouble.

Here are some pictures of before, during and after the 'make over'. From start to finish of painting (with no breaks) took about 5- 6 hours.

During the day I had a few of the charity staff pop in to see what I was doing and at the end of the day, as I was painting the last hoof, practically all the staff came in en mass to see the finished product. I was pleased with their reactions and felt relieved that hopefully meant I had done a good job  and that they were happy with what I had done. Now I just hope the signwriter can work with what I have given her and that the lady who won the cow and the school to whom it is being donated like the look of Clover too.  

I was pleased too that, even though it gave a little protest, the car started reasonably well and I got home without further mishap.

Artists For Conservation

I became a Signature Member of this prestigious society at the end of last year. Recently I had my profile on their website go live for the first time. I hope you will visit and take a look. I will add more in the future. http://www.natureartists.com/susan_jane_lees.asp

Part of my initial profile presence was to add to my newspage a little bit about Maximus, the gorilla sculpture I painted in December. Today I noticed that this has been selected to appear under the Nature Art News section on the Home Page for the site. http://www.natureartists.com/news_events/news.asp?NewsID=3977 This is something I had not expected, but I'm so proud and pleased to see it was deemed newsworthy for all to see.
I will also soon add a official link for the Artists For Conservation website to this blog.

Update... I have now added the Artists For Conservation banner logo which is a link to their home page. Please visit and browse through the wonderful artists they have as members.


Artists for Conservation Foundation - Supporting Nature Through Art - [Nature Artists | Wildlife Art | Conservation]

Happy New Year

I hope 2012 was good for you and that you had a great Christmas and New Year no matter what your religious denomination may be. After all the sentiments expressed at that time should be for all.

For all my readers who pop by regularly or now and again, thank you for your support and I hope you will continue to drop in to read my mutterings during the next year. I have a few workshops already lined up and I am back at Nature in Art as an artist in residence later in the year.. I will soon update the list of events of what has been confirmed so far.

I am still working on my Artists For Conservation profile, (it won't be live on their website until I have finished) unfortunately my progress there has been hampered by major redecorating works in the house, the usual Christmas Frenzy and the last minute commission to paint another gorilla in December. The decorating work is still ongoing, but hopefully not too far away from completion and then my artwork can get back to normal. Painting has been on hold due to excessive amounts of dust around the house due to demolition and sanding of plaster, paint and polyfilla. I will be glad when the last of the work has been done, the dust settled and eventually swept and wiped away for the last time!

In the meantime I wish you a very Happy New Year and hope that it is kind to you.

Artists For Conservation

I am very happy to post that I was recently invited to become a signature member of the prestigious Canadian wildlife art society, Artists For Conservation.

"The Artists for Conservation Foundation (AFC) is a non-profit, international organization dedicated to the celebration and preservation of the natural world. Based in Vancouver, Canada, the Foundation represents the world's leading collective of artists focused on nature and wildlife, with a membership spanning five continents and twenty-seven countries. The organization's mission is to support wildlife and habitat conservation, biodiversity, sustainability and environmental education through art that celebrates our natural heritage."

This society is limited to 500 artists of high quality work and standing, and as the membership stood at just over 490, I wondered how many others were being considered and what my chances were.

To join this society I sent examples of my work and my CV showing past and current support for wildlife conservation, I also had two artists who are already members support my submission with their own recommendation. Of course by applying I was hoping I would be accepted but there is always that nagging doubt that maybe you aren't good enough yet, or as the membership is limited that they haven't a place to offer yet. But the encouragement and support of the two wonderful artists who offered their recommendations spurred me on, it was time to broaden my horizons and begin to aim higher. This society was the one I wanted to aim for because the ethics of conservation is integral in the operation of their work. They support and encourage activity with artists in wildlife conservation and this aspect was important to me.

To have been accepted and invited is a great honour that I am truly overwhelmed by. I have yet to work on and 'go live' with my webpage on their site, as I am in the thick of working on George the gorilla. But once that is done I hope to get a visual presence on their webpage soon.

I hope you will visit their website through the link above. I will shortly put a proper link under my LINKS tab on the right of this page.

Little gorilla commission

I have just been commissioned to paint a small gorilla sculpture. I cannot say who or what it is for at this stage,what it will look like or any progress reports with photos. I will at some point in the future, when he is finished, post some photos and a piece about him.

But for the moment... here is George.....

Thanks go to Sarah, in the offices at the zoo for parting with him, he has sat in her window ledge for a long time and I believe she got very attached to him.

Artist in Residence Week

 As always I had a marvellous week at Nature In Art Museum and Art Gallery as their artist in Residence. Although it was an unexpectedly quiet week, considering they had a new exhibition just open, I had enough folks coming in the studio to see what I was up to to stop me getting lonely and I got a good amount of painting done into the bargain.

I started the week working on the two bulls painting. I got the trunk of the right hand bull blocked in and then moved onto putting the texture and detailing in on the head and altered the front leading leg a bit. To get the feel of the skin being dust covered and caked in mud I use a dry brush over the blocked in sections. Once that was done I then moved onto the left hand bull putting in the lower sections. Then in my enthusiasm to keep going, as I was about to start the ear, I remembered I had to stop there to allow the lower sections and trunk of the other ellie, I had painted over the last two days, to dry before continuing.

As this painting is to be of specific individuals, I took care to suggest the creases and folds on the forehead and trunk from the photo reference I had. These lines form a pattern unique to the individual, so I am trying to get them right. The other telltale markers are the ears and tusks. I would not be so fussy if my painting was not to depict named individuals and was more generic. I'm hoping Dr Kate Evans of The Elephants For Africa Trust can identify the two bulls so that I can name them in the title of this piece. 

So I then started the next painting of the three bulls crossing the flood plain, as I described in my last post. I roughly sketched in the tree line with pale green paint thinned with liquin and then with a similar thinned mix of burnt sienna I drew in the elephants and was pleased that my feel for them was improving as I needed few alterations to my freehand drawings to sketch them in. Obviously when I come to paint them there will be refinements, for example enlarging the head on the bull to the far left.

Once that had dried over night I went over the whole canvas with a thin burnt sienna wash (thinned again with liquin to speed the drying time up) I then pushed the easel into the line of the heater airflow and fiddled about with other things and had long chats with folks whilst it dried for an hour or so.

I then did a mix of white, ultramarine and alizarin crimson with liquin for the sky and applied it to the canvas, including the deep edge sides and top. Once it was on, I felt it was a little too dark, so I paled it down a little with white, working wet into wet. 

Again I waited for it to dry for an hour or so before starting to add in the tree line, working as I always do from the horizon coming forwards as I progress through the scene. The photo I printed from my computer  of the background did not show up the lovely warmth of red tones in the reeds and vegetation so I am adjusting my painting to compensate for that. 

This is as far as I got before I had to stop and pack up to come home. I hope to continue this at home over the coming weeks as and when I can inbetween finishing off the larger two bulls painting.

Thank you to all those who popped in to see me, whether planned or by accident, it was lovely to see and meet you. I hope to be back there next year again.