This weeks Kick About over on Red’s kingdom is the mystical creations of Hilma Af Klint. I have been yearning to do some traditional art lately, probably due to the fact that, during the Christmas break, my nieces and nephew received some arty presents. Here are some oil pastel drawings similar to some Irish sigils.
A recent wintry, cozy illustration given the current weather conditions many are experiencing, hopefully we will be greeted to a fluttering of snow soon enough!
This weeks Kick About over on Red’s Kingdom is the folk art of Harriet Powers. Originally I planned to rely solely on the images childhood blankets and pillow cases but sadly they are long gone. However much like patchwork I decided to chop up up various elements into a sort of hodgepodge – some from other sewn blankets found in my home in Ireland and I added little drawn elements over the top.
Something I have been working on behind the scenes is a print shop and I am excited to announce the shop is finally live! The Gentle Giant shop has prints available in both illustrations and photography. The shop will be updated when I see fit with new illustration and photography series available including some of my recent projects. The prints look gorgeous if I do say so myself and ship worldwide as well as being printed from a carbon neutral printing service here in London with 100% recycled packaging. If you would like to have a gawk at the shop you can do so by following the link below or in the “Shop” Tab on the Navigation menu and if you would like to buy a print it would be greatly appreciated.
A random assortment of environment art that I had yet to share on Gentle Giant – created for the spooky season or just the exploration of colour in space, fun as always.
This weeks Kick About on Red’s Kingdom is the Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. Lately I have been looking to a lot of German expressionism in my own work, the monochromatic shapely designs of the set dressings are unparalleled and always leave me wanting more. With that it mind I wanted to do some black and white eerie angular paintings inspired by German expressionism.
This weeks kick about over on Red’s Kingdom is Henry Matisse – The Dessert: Harmony in Red (1908)
All I really want to do right now is draw. I latched onto the royal reds of Matisse painting and the quirky perspective. At first I was a bit intimated by the brightness and saturation of the red, I didn’t want to burn anyones eyeballs with these illustrations and with the first illustration of the bunch I had the back walls a much darker maroon but then with the second illustration I jumped in with the same Matisse Red determined to make its high saturation work.
After adding in the details such as the swirly designs, the gold rimmed edges and vaulted high ceilings I was able to make the vibrant red work and decided to switch the first illustration to match! I am glad I did as I usually don’t do a lot of interior illustrations but this bunch quickly become one of my favourite paintings thus far.
This weeks kick about over on Red’s Kingdom is the drawings of Mervyn Peake. I decided to do some really rough 2 minute scribbles of some landscapes. I forgot how nice it is to feel a pencil in your hand and hear the scribbles as they form.
A second bunch of outpourings for this weeks Basquiat Kick About. The motive for these pieces was to turn my brain off, listen to Kate Bush and Goldfrapp all the while paint vigorously and furiously.
This weeks Kick About prompt over on Red’s Kingdom is the neo-expressionistic delights of Basquiat. I found it a very cathartic experience to let the lines, colour and texture lay where they want in a rambling automatic experience. I think if someone was to practice some freudian techniques they could figure out tidbits from these free flowing apparitions and symbols.
Gentle Giant 