January 2019

/ Tracey Ross

It’s January and I’ve been thinking over the Christmas break just what do I want from this year? Here are some of the questions I’ve been asking myself : 1, How to keep my faith and prayer life fresh? 2, How to keep my studio in order? 3, Where to exhibit and find new opportunities? 4, Mentoring – who and how do I find them? These are things I aim to address during this year…. I don’t ‘blog’ as such but this year I aim to keep more of a written journal/diary about what it is I love doing and to be more ‘open’ to sharing these things with you.

For my workshops please see under workshops

Looking around my studio I can see it’s holding far too much stuff so I’m using the inspirational Marie Kondo method of tidying up and having a good declutter. Starting with my brushes! as you can see many have been well used and seen better days. This insightful method is all about sparking JOY and as my work is about creating uplifting and joyful artworks then I aim to have this feeling all around me as I continue painting. Well that’s definitely one goal to master this year. https://konmari.com/

In need of buying more of these Inktense blocks by Derwent

Art tools – keep trying new things

Tools I love to use for creating new marks
Colours of Norfolk – much of my art is about Creation and capturing the beauty of the North Norfolk coastline

Artworks in Progress

New works in progress – creating lots of marks and textures in the
under painting

Sanding back paintings that are not really working all helps to create something new!

Tip – if you are not sure about where a piece of artwork is going then try sanding it back a little with sandpaper

Try mixing Triadic colours – very interesting and you can learn so much from this exercise

Tip! Try mixing your own colours from the three primaries: Cadmium Red, Prussian Blue, Cadmium Yellow . Try adding a bit of white to half of the mixed colour to lighten – then in the other half add a touch of Paynes Grey to darken. Remember to mix enough of the original mixed colour to do this. Keep a note of the colours used in your sketchbook for future reference.
New work in progress – here I’m using oil paints to mix the light soft Norfolk colours as seen along the coast.
Oil paints
View from the studio

Sketching at Holkham beach North Norfolk

Beautiful Holkham beach – always a great source for inspiration – just caught this slip of light on the horizon before the heavens opened
Fast and expressive sketch on Holkham beach – I forgot to bring my clips so luckily I found an elastic band in my sketching bag to hold down one page of the sketchbook!

Thank you for visiting my website, to sign up for occasional information about exhibitions and new artworks for please click link below or use my contacts page. More inspirations to follow next month…

Great ways to keep in touch