Approx. 6″ in diameter. Sakura glaze pen, Rotring rapidograph pens with black ink, Derwent Inktense pencils with water wash, metallic gold pens and several hours of attention.
Autumn blackberries
5″ x 3″, pen and ink.
Plucking blackberries from hedgerows bursting with the deep purple-black fruits of the bramble are memories of childhood.
Taking care not to prick fingers on the thorns, or get clothing snagged and torn upon them either. There were also the sticky burrs of goose-grass to avoid too.
It was all worth the hours of effort, however. Blackberry and apple pie, blackberry crumble, bramble jelly, and the blackberry wine my father brewed (if he could steal any away).
Blackberries were frozen by the plastic gallon re-used ice-cream tub to be used for Sunday desserts through the winter months too.
All of these things created once the blackberries had been washed in salted water to bring out any maggots that had burrowed their way into the fruits. If I caught sight of one single maggoty thing, I couldn’t eat any more of them, and eating them straight from the bramble was not an option for me. It’s no wonder I’m a vegetarian!
A free harvest that I no longer take advantage of, but may manage to do so this year if I can pluck up the courage to go by myself in to the countryside to do this.
Yes, I do mean courage, as I’ve become a bit of a recluse once again, not going out into the world where there are other human beings to encounter me. A long, personal story that is, but one I hope to change with time. The gist is I’ve allowed myself to be hurt by other people over the past few years. Things I was once involved with have gone by the by and I’ve not managed to replace these social activities with others. Oh, I do go out. I am involved in things, but the people I encounter are, generally, more acquaintances than anything else. I still seek and search for a sense of belonging in this world.
Even as I think back to childhood blackberrying, I remember that I was often alone even though the rest of the family were there, all chatting and laughing and playing amongst themselves while I was generally excluded, unless it was to be the butt of someone’s joke. Always funny for them…
Funny, the memories of blackberrying, and collecting bilberries, or whinberries as they are also called, are still ones of pleasure – the pleasure of the food produced as a result. Bilberries are small, blueberries, native to Britain.
Folklore
There’s plenty of folklore surrounding the humble bramble and it’s fruits.
“Throughout much of Britain there was a widespread belief that blackberries should not be eaten after a certain date.” [Vickery]
This date may have be that of the first frost, as then they become the Devil’s fruit and are not fit for humans to eat .
Michaelmas (29 September) or Old Michaelmas (11 October) relate to the biblical tale of Lucifer being thrown out of heaven for his proud, covetous ways by Archangel Michael (Isaiah 14:12). It is said that Lucifer landed in a bramble bush and cursed it, which is why people won’t eat blackberries after Michaelmas, saying variously that:
- they have the Devil in them
- the Devil peeps over the hedgerow and blasts them
- so the Devil may have his share
- the Devil spits on them
Hallowe’en (31 October) or All Saints’ Day (1st November) are also dates given as the cut off for blackberry consumption. As well as the reasons given above, this date also relates to the following:
- they have the witch in them
- the witches have peed on them
- on Hallowe’en the puca has crawled on the blackberries.
“From a scientific point of view, blackberries contain a high concentration of bitter tasting tannins which over time accumulate in the fruit. Old Michaelmas day falls late in the blackberry season making berries picked around this time very bitter. To make matters worse, as autumn arrives the weather becomes wetter meaning the fruit will contain more fungus spores. This will not improve the taste either.” [BBC Nature UK]
Brambles were sometimes planted, or placed, on graves, one belief being that they stopped the dead from walking. Another reason is that they kept the sheep off the grave.
A superstition in Wales was “When thorns or brambles catch or cling to a girl’s dress, they say a lover is coming.” [Roud]
References:
BBC Nature UK, Nature folklore uncovered
Roud, Steve “The Penguin Guide to the Superstitions of Britain and Ireland”, Penguin Reference, 2003
Vickery, Roy “Oxford Dictionary of Plant-lore”, Oxford Paperbacks, Oxford University Press, 1995
Share this post
Floramania and another dragonfly…
Floramania
Approx. 13cm x13cm (5″ x 5″)
Rotring Rapidograph pens with black ink on white cartridge paper and several hours of time…
Little dragonfly
Approx. 9cm x 14cm (3.5″ x 5.25″)
Rotring Rapidograph pens with black in on white cartridge paper.
Faffy times…
The last several days have been ‘faffy’ days where I’ve just been faffing around with art and reading and not much else.
The weather has mostly been very wet – torrential rain, high winds at time. Perfect weather for battening down the hatches and losing oneself in art and craft and reading.
For some reason the drawing pens have come out again, and I find myself lost in the fiddly fussy work that I do, enjoying it too. It also has shown me how I struggle with colour, unless the colour is purely abstract in itself.
It also allows me an escape from the sting of rejection, the loss of a dream that never ever was, and a chance to let my unconscious mind, my soul, my spirit to start the process of healing and working the way to the person I am meant to be, choose to be, want to be, with a life I’d like. A life that includes people in it – friends, a found family, and love too.
Share this post
Flutter By…
Flutter By Butterfly
Approx. 15cm x 15cm. Rotring Rapidograph pens with black ink on white cartridge paper.
Dragonfly Away
Approx. 14cm x 21cm. Rotring Rapidograph pens with black ink on white cartridge paper.
Share this post
Dragonfly and Bee – Pen and ink drawings.
Fly Away
Approx. 8.25″ x 5.25″ (13cm x 21cm). Drawn using Rotring Rapidograph pens with black ink on white cartridge paper.
Bee Natural
Approx 5″ x8″ (12.5cm x 20.5cm). Drawn using Rotring Rapidograph pens with black ink on white cartridge paper.
Share this post
Dragonfly and Bee
Dragonfly.
6.25″ x 9″ (16.5cm x 23cm).
Drawing pen and watercolours.
Bee
6″ x 6″ (15cm x 15cm)
Sakura Glaze pen with watercolours.
Share this post
Dragonfly
Well, I’ve just finished this dragonfly. Drawing pen and watercolours. 8″ x 5″, approx. (20.5cm x 13cm approx.)
Not happy with background, gave up on it really, but then I was more focused on the dragonfly, other things can happen with backgrounds later on I’m sure …
Share this post
Geometric arty goings on …
Both worked in the last 24 hours or so. Same media for both – Sakura Glaze pens, watercolours and Cosmic Shimmer iridescent/metallic watercolour paints.
Each ‘dot’ on the mandala has a metallic centre or ring around it.
Fun to do! Engaging to create and colour … very meditative.
Share this post
Arty goings on…
Non-dotty flowers – a reworking of the dotty flowers below. 3″ x 5″ approx.
Busy, busy, busy…
I’ve been kind of busy, but not busy-busy, since my last entry, busy with art. Being engrossed in arty pursuits has kept me up until the wee-small hours as the dark outside has given me no idea about the passage of time. Good thing I’m still on the long summer break from teaching.
I must admit that I’m not looking forward to going back to work. I think I’ve said before I need a different environment to flourish in. My only problems in changing career are that I need a certain income and I have no particular idea what I’d like to do instead of. I’d love to do more things that are creative – arty/crafty would be good. I’d also like to work in an environment where people actually get along, without the constant rumble of poor attitudes, disrespect for self and others and an unwillingness by the majority to want to learn or to see the point of having a good education and doing their best.
Anyway, before I drag myself down into a gloom, I still have two and a half weeks or so away (apart from a need to go in for a few days towards the end of the break to mark work, prepare work, and sort out displays for the walls) and so will be making the most of the time to be creative and explore my artsy-craftsy nature.
Torc – statement necklace – bib necklace – collar necklace.
I managed to complete this torc. It took over 30 hours of work. It is available for purchase at Etsy at the time of this blog entry.
As always, spirals, circles and curves feathre in my work, along with some of my ‘custom made’ sequins. I enjoyed the work in this, and realised how many of the ‘tricks’ I had forgotten from previous endeavours like this. My earlier torcs can still be seen on Artwyrd at deviantART.
Experimental landscape number two.
I’ve also managed to complete another experimental landscape – this one from a photograph of a ‘real’ landscape in North Wales.
A dear friend of mine has made some interesting suggestions about how I can approach the ‘patterns’ for different land-uses. When I’m ready to do another landscape I will take his suggestions to heart.
There are glimmering, metallic, glittery highlights on the drawing/painting that don’t come out well when photographed/scanned. I do think I’m beginning to find my ‘style’ when it comes to landscapes – and that style involves simplifying the shapes/lines of the land, trees and so on, and then working out how to fill those shapes in. Spirals are, as always, a favourite motif of mine, along with circles and curves, influenced as I am by prehistoric rock art, early Celtic art, and anything with curves and curls in! If I try to work with perfectly straight lines and sharp corners in my work, well it just doesn’t seem to work or scream out ‘Angela’ at me.
Abstract Floral.
This was an experiment in something a little different for me – pastel colours on a grey paper, with an open kind of design. The usual spirals and swirls are there, but there’s a lot of ’empty space’ which also works. The pastel colours are a definite change from me!
Flowers…
This started as a good idea and ended up a right ‘mare of an experience. A dear friend of mine reckons it is lovely and very William Morris…
I realised the rising flowers were on the wrong side if I wanted to add words to it as I was inking it all in.
Then, as I blended the coloured pencils, the ink rubbed off to mix with the coloured pencils, so it all had to be inked in again, which is often the case with my kind of work, but the ink subdued the colours somewhat.
I then started to fill in the blank space to the left with tendrils, without putting pencil lines down first as a guide, and ended up making a right hash of it. So, the shading under the leaves and so on was meant to disguise some of that, and cutting it all out and sticking it on blue paper … well it was a good idea, but not the blue! I also rediscovered how useless I am with a pair of scissors or craft knife too.
However, some of the most important lessons we learn are when things go wrong…
Geometricity 1
So, after the pastel colours and the disaster, a return to bright colours, and flashes of metallic gold.
A small piece of work – 7cm x 10.5cm, but jewel-bright watercolours used to fill in the pattern. I’m pleased with the work (though not with the scanned image – photographing/scanning my work is a major problem with the shiny Sakura Glaze pens that I use and the highlights of metallic/iridescent/glitter paints/inks that I so love. However, you get the idea.
I think that I’m going to play with geometric patterns and colour for a while, on a small scale, to see where it leads me. Of course, I may just change my mind as time goes along!
More flowers…
I completed this one with Geometricity1, and there are too many ‘dots’ on the flowers – another lesson to learn! I’ll be reworking this one in a little while. It will keep me occupied during the torrential rain that is falling here in waves. I love the sound of the rain…
Share this post
Landscape experiment
I have spent the day working on this. I have used Rotring pens, watercolour paints and metallic watercolours on watercolour paper to create this imaginary landscape.
I thought I’d use colours that represent the different seasons, as well as autumnal and spring/summer trees. Spirals and curls are a feature of my artworks, as well as the highly detailed pen lines/textures.
I find it easy to do this kind of work, yet if I was to try to express a real landscape, I would end up bogged down in trying to make it real, to get it perfect, to use realistic colours …
I’ve had a ponder about such things in my journal today…but I’ve enjoyed working on this and am pleased, mostly, with it. It’s certainly something to continue experimenting with.
Oh, it’s 4″ x 6″ in size, if you were wondering!
Art is the Adventure 