Arts and Crafts Movement

Colouring page for 11 Nov 2022

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Usually, I gift a colouring page to Angela Porter’s Coloring Book Fans Facebook Group on a Thursday. This week, it’s been delayed by a day, but I do hope it’s been worth the wait.

This week, it’s a flowy, swirly, abstract mandala. There is a lot of potential for playing with contrast to bring out depth, dimension, volume, layers … There’s no right or wrong way to add colour, the only essential is to enjoy! Oh, and find calm and relaxation as you do so too.

I used a limited colour palette for mine. Though I’d started off thinking I wanted to keep the colours pretty much flat, like in Arts and Crafts or Art Nouveau, but it didn’t end up that way. The colours are, however, inspired by some work in these movements, just given a slightly more modern and ‘Angela’ feel to them.

“Thistle” – An Art Nouveau Inspired Drawing

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I’ve spent some time over the last day or two looking at Art Nouveau flower designs. I was particularly fascinated by a thistle design.

This is my interpretation of the design drawn with Copic Multiliner SP pens (0.1, 0.25 and 0.5) on paper. Then, after scanning the drawing, I added colour digitally using Clip Studio Paint. So, this counts as ‘tradigital’ art!

I chose a simple colour palette; I was inspired by William Morris, the Arts and Crafts Movement and Art Nouveau. And, the colours are more mellow than is, perhaps, characteristic of my work.

The version on the left has just flat colours, no shade or highlight; I let the contour lines suggest volume. This is more true, I think, to the Arts and Crafts Movement and Art Nouveau.

To the version on the right, I added some shadows and highlights, but subtly for me. And even though they are subtle, they have a distinct effect, which surprised me.

These show just two of the many coloured backgrounds I tried out. This is why I love adding colour digitally! It’s so easy to try out different colour combinations, methods of adding colour, and so on.

Which version do you prefer?

I like them both, but I think the one on the right is my favourite; I like the stronger background colour which allows the flower to ‘pop’. I also think the subtle shadows and highlights do add a little something to it too.

William Morris Inspired Botanica

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Click on this link to view the accompanying Draw With Me tutorial video on YouTube.

William Morris, one of the primary founders of the Arts and Crafts Movement, is one of my favourite artists. I love the ornate botanical and nature-inspired designs of quite stylised motifs. I also love the way that colour is used simply in them. That is definitely something I can learn from!

It can take a while for pennies to drop with me, and I don’t know how it has taken so long before I took a look at Morris’s work.

Like myself, Morris was inspired and influenced by Medieval manuscripts. That explains a lot!

I use some motifs from Morris’s designs in this drawing. I applied colour with chalk pastels to the pen drawings, with subtle white highlights from white charcoal. I’m quite happy with the result; I’ve not decided what to do about the background.

Where is this study going to take me? I don’t really know! But I know it’s going to be an interesting one. I’m particularly interested in how Morris used colour, and I hope that will make me comfortable with my own simple way of adding colour to my art.

April Dangle Design

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April Dangle Design by Angela Porter 2019
April Dangle Design by Angela Porter 2019

I had a lovely time this morning looking at Arts and Crafts Movement, Rennie Mackintosh and Art Nouveau designs. I’ve always love these styles of art with their organic lines and stylised motifs and it’s certainly influenced my style of art in some little way.

I got inspired as I looked at these styles and decided to use them as a start for my April BuJo page design, which you can see above.

The had lettering is a little heavy handed where the squares are concerned, but over all I’m fairly happy with it.

There’s definitely a touch of the Rennie Mackintosh’s there with the organic motifs and lines contrasted with the graphic squares and diamonds.

I chose warm and sunny yellows with light, fresh greens as they are so dominant in nature this early on in Spring.

A quick sketch on Rhodia Dot Grid paper followed by a scan and I inked it using some of my brushes in Autodesk Sketchbook Pro. Of course I wielded my Microsoft Surface Pen with some happiness on the screen of my Microsoft Surface Studio.

A simple but, I think, and elegant design. One which would look fab for any month in a BuJo (bullet journal), planner, diary, journal or even in a scrapbook. Of course it would make a lovely greetings or note card too. I’m sure there are many more instances of where this design would work beautifully.

Want to know more about creating your own dangle designs? My tutorial book ‘A Dangle A Day’ is now published.

Inspired by Charles Rennie Mackintosh

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Angela_8Sept2017

I do enjoy exploring different genres of art, and the Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau styles of art are ones that resonate with me.

I’ve loved the work of Charles Rennie Mackintosh for a very long time, but never really took time to explore the work and to use it as an inspiration for my own work.

I sketched the outline design on paper, then edited and tidied it up in Autodesk Sketchbook Pro.  I have used a mixture of gradient fills and colouring as if I was using a pencil or marker in other areas.  I’m now adding some typically ‘Angela’ intricate patterns to various areas, so this isn’t finished.

I really do tend to gravitate towards creating digitally these days, and loving it too I am, though I still like to sketch the bones of my idea out on paper, scan it in and then use that as a guide; I’ve still not got my head around the size on the page and the real size of the art that will result.