Photos of Skylines Exhibition

Cromarty collagraphs - as seen in recent Skylines Exhibition, Marchmont Gallery, Edinburgh.

Skylines Exhibition

Oops!  Forgot to blog about this earlier with Christmas and all that - but you can still catch it for a week or two more.  Marchmont Gallery kindly invited me to include my Cromarty collagraph prints in their most recent exhibition entitled Skylines.  Other artists featured in this group exhibition include Gill Tyson and John V Gardner, so I was very pleased to be invited as well!  Thank you Marchmont Gallery!

Autumnal Illustration

Finally got around to posting the illustration I made after our outing to The Meadows in Edinburgh, as detailed in my previous post Autumnal Inspiration.  I've really enjoyed getting back into ink and watercolour drawing, which I used lots in my book Behind the Scenes: Creating Theatre for the Very Young.  The drawing is for one of several designs for a small commission I'm working on: the client wanted an image that would communicate a sense of freedom, and was keen on the childlike urge to keep up fallen leaves .

Autumnal Inspiration

Sorry to the leaf-hooverers!  They'd tidied them all up!

Ola tries out a new leaf-kicking move...

Can't believe it's over a month since I posted on here!  Here are some photos of Giorgos and Ola who kindly agreed to help me get some inspiration for an illustration by running about kicking up leaves on a very autumnal Saturday in The Meadows, Edinburgh!  It was a chilly day, so we retreated to Peter's Yard afterwards to warm up with cakes, scones, coffee and peppermint tea!  Thanks very much Ola & Giorgos.  I'll post the resulting drawing next!

More Scots Fiddle Festival drawings

I haven't blogged for ages where does the time go?  Been spending quite a lot of time going through location drawings to develop some prints/publications from them, and here are few more from my 'mini-drawing residency' at Scots Fiddle Festival last year.  I'm hoping to make a series of prints or a small book of prints developed from these.  More info about the drawings are did and the musicians are to be found at http://hannahryeillustration.blogspot.com/2011/03/fiddle-festival-drawings.html.

Illustration Friday: Gesture

My offering for this week's Illustration Friday theme, gesture, features a stage actress rehearsing a performance for very young children.  This week's theme made me think about the movement and immediacy of live theatre performers, and how best to capture that spontaneity in a single image.  I made the drawing in situ, sitting on the floor with my 'mobile' drawing kit spread out in front of me.  By the time I drew this, I was completely absorbed in the process that the performers were going through, and had watched the actress repeating this routine several times over.  I used ink, watercolour and a very small amount of Photoshop afterwards, just to clean up the image once I had scanned it.

Here are some photos of the actresses at work in their humble rehearsal room at Leith Community Centre, Edinburgh, Scotland:

Turquoise Bay

Marchmont Gallery are now stocking a screen-print of mine: Turquoise Bay.  The print is a section taken from this concertina book, which illustrates a traditional sea shanty & folk song Fiddler's Green.  Here's a wee excerpt:

As I went a walking one evening so rare

To view the still waters and taste the salt air

I heard an old fisherman singing this song

Sayin', "Take me away boys, my time is not long.

Chorus:

Wrap me up in me oil skins and blankets

No more on the docks I'll be seen

Just tell me old shipmates, I'm takin' a trip mates

And I'll see you someday on fiddler's green."

...I don't need a harp nor a halo not me

Just give me a breeze and a good rollin' sea

I'll play me old squeeze box as we sail along

And the wind in the riggin' will sing me this song.