Magic Mosaic!

A mini mosaic of some of my Etsy items!

Christmas Watercolour - Help!!?

I've recently been aiming for a loose, expressive style along the lines of Shirley Trevena's work. In this painting I was trying to do a Christmas themed still life, playing with pattern, paint and perspective a bit. But I didn't plan the composition very well! I'm pretty happy with the teddy bear, but I added the teacup quite late on and now it looks as though it's sprouting from the bear's foot. The kettle's spout isn't placed very well either....

Overall I'm quite pleased with the bear and kettle, but the foreground composition has really made a mess of the whole thing. I'd be very interested to hear any feedback or comments you have? I've posted the painting on Flickr and added it to a number of critique groups, and I've already been getting some really helpful feedback!

My current thoughts are that I could cut the elements out of the painting (bear, kettle, angel, cup) and start again as a collage. I could also bring in some Christmas ephemera and other bits and pieces that might add something to the composition and textures...

If anyone has any suggestions on what I could do to fix or improve this painting I would be very grateful to hear them!

Latest Paintings

Sunflowers

This started out as a quick 'Shirley Trevena' style practice painting. It went a bit wrong in the middle so I thought I'd try adding some collage bits to it. I tried to keep it simple by only using some sheet music strips, some blue Japanese patterned paper and the central sunflower which is a piece of paper I painted yellow and then used pen and watercolour to add detail.

I'm not sure if it's finished yet.


Water Lily

This is another attempt to get the lose and expressive 'Shirley Trevena' style. It was a very late entry for the Lotus watercolour challenge from Lorus Maver's great photo: Lotus Challenge Photo. There were so many beautiful paintings from this photo, by the talented Flickr group, that I had to give it a try. All of the versions can be seen in the group's pool here: Lotus Challenge entries

The 'Watercolourist, Painting with Light' group has been running challenges like this for a year now but this is the first one I've taken part in. Hopefully I can start catching up with the others from now on!

This painting is predominantly watercolour, but I've also used a bit of salt and some coloured pencil in places. And quite a bit of wax candle for the sparkly highlights on the water and lily pads.

Little blue jug

Again, I'm trying to work on still lives in a Trevena style. I bought this great little jug and bowl in a charity shop recently and I'll probably be using them in many more still lives to come. I've used water-soluble pencils in the background and for some of the details of the bottle. I used a wax candle for the pattern on the bowl - not ideal, but I've run out of masking fluid. I've also used a bit of the pencil sanding technique in places - i.e rubbing watersoluble pencils on sand paper over wet paint, it gives a great speckly texture.

Hantsweb Award Nominated!

Hurrah! My art gallery & shop website, http://www.francescawhetnall.co.uk/ has been nominated for a Hantsweb Award!

The Hantsweb Awards celebrate excellence in website design, accessibility and service, so it's a real honour to be nominated. So far 1000s of sites have been whittled down to a hundred or so and the next step will knock the list down to a shortlist of just 10 sites in each category. The judges will then nominate a winner and 2 runners up in each category.

I've been nominated in three categories:

• Small Business


• Special Interest


• Business Innovation

The Business Innovation category is new this year and has been added to recognise the effective ways companies have used the web to drive business during the recession.

Leader of Hampshire County Council, Councillor Ken Thornber, said: “Good quality design is vital to ensuring websites remain easily accessible and simple to navigate for everyone. The Hantsweb Awards are a great way of encouraging best practice examples and celebrating those websites that are leading the way in their field and delivering the goods."

It's really great to get such encouraging feedback from this nomination, and to know that the clear design of my website makes it both accessible as well as enjoyable to view!

Fingers crossed for the next stage! :-)