Planet Ruby Starrs

Another lovely weekend spent with stargazing enthusiasts at Ninebanks Youth Hostel, eating cake, cooked breakfasts, 3 course dinners - all to fuel Dr Freds lectures on the cosmos and as the weather permitted some serious stargazing late into the night. It was cold though - astronomy is not for the fainthearted, under dressed, or a  cosy fire comfort lover, so if I'm honest I didn't do a lot of actual stargazing.... I did step outside for a look at the milky way as it was pretty spectacular but then I put myself in charge of keeping the wood burner burning and the kettle on!!! Nine banks Youth Hostel is a very nice place to stay, it has some private en-suite rooms and a couple of  'chalets' which are self catering if you want total privacy.  It sits in the  Mohope valley of West Allendale  and has spectacular views out the front while being snuggled into the side of the hill.  the owners are helpful and friendly and the communal bits of the building are ...

More life drawing - this time a class at eh Hartlepool Art Gallery - great experience and practice. ; lots of 5 min poses and a few 15 minute ones - 10 drawings in 2 hours after a full day at college my back ached from leaning over drawing!!!

I hope the new look blog is behaving itself ... please let me know if its not!  I think you can now subscribe to get email reminders again - I seemed to have lost that button before and hopefully it doesn't jump about as you read it! I've been colouring in.  This beetle is from a photograph I took in the Natural history Museum.  I used the photograph, cropped it, enlarged it and then using Photoshop I digitized it until it was just the bare 'bones' leaving me a lovely image to play with. . Its been a quieter week at college - I have been consolidating my work and reflecting on what I have got and where to go next.   I have complied a large file of resource inspiration, some of it primary photographs, collated artists that inspire me and some market research about my potential target audience.  this file is a work in progress as I add to it all the time as inspiration hits me but a lot of it is made up of photographs from my travels and gallery visits...

This return to college is catching up with me, my initial enthusiasm remains but the getting out of bed and facing rush hour traffic is starting to pall slightly - I've never been a morning person and at 7.00 in the morning as the mornings grow chillier and darker I can find more and more excuses to stay warm and cosy under the duvet!! So today was a late start but eventually quite productive as I struggle on with the ever on going dissertation scenario.  No one will be as pleased as me to see it reaching its conclusion and almost final word count of words that have some semblance of usefulness and  the feeling I have something worth handing in.  Its not going to be a nobel prize winner and its not making any amazing discoveries but it will do the job and allow me freedom to place my energies into the rest of my creative work. Don't get me wrong I have mostly enjoyed some of the dissertation experience, mainly the reading.  I am a voracious reader but its mainly ...

Second life drawing class was slightly daunting - tasked with drawing figure, getting some semblance of lighting and skin effects and including detail of the room!!! I didn't think I would be able to do it if I'm honest but it came together in the end - not bad for a beginner.  Charcoal on A1 paper.

Back to reality and art works.... At college today I had the chance to take part in a life drawing class.  This came about because I had been chatting to my tutor about how I would like to try life drawing but would prefer a 'guided'lesson type thing as I have never done if before.  Sometimes life drawing is part of our curriculum but not this year, so, star that she is she negotiated for me to be allowed to join a couple of sessions with fine art students. Big paper, easels, charcoal.... all very different to surface design experiences but great fun and very informative - the lesson was based on finding skeletal structure and weight bearing limbs so final figure would be in proportion and grounded - looking stable and hopefully like a figure!!! I really enjoyed it and look forward to the next session later this week and I was very pleased with my efforts given I'm a beginner!

Regular readers and those of you that know me will know this blog is supposed to be about my art work and what inspires me - which in fact, is most things.... beauty and inspiration can be found everywhere  so this blog often digresses allover the place - life gets in the way - throws opportunities, lemons, beautiful sunsets and occasionally really dramatic events - yes we've had a few of those lately but this week we realised that is was 20 years to the day when Dr Fred my trusty sidekick - who puts up daily with my 'inspirational' life - had his most dramatic event and how he survived.... it makes grueling reading and its why I need to know what time to call mountain rescue when he goes off on some of his jaunts!! He wrote this account 4 weeks after the event and hasn't looked at for a long time it until yesterday when we both read it and felt ill, relieved and thankful he is still here to read it!!! This was an event that happened before I met Dr Fred but that does...

Back in school and the getting out of bed is killing me... its not helped by the fact that the traffic has been terrible and also I was involved in a small incident when another car didn't see my (normal sized bright red) car and drove into the side of me!!! No one was hurt and the damage was made good within the week.  That was on day one - then day 2  another accident slowed traffic.  This week a huge oil spill on the only link roundabout into town caused complete standstill and I was sat twiddling my thumbs for nearly 3 hours while it was cleared... But once in college it feels good to be back - I've claimed my wee space to work in and started to put stuff up. I've collated my work from the summer and it adds up to a fair bit. This module is all about collecting and composing drawings, mixed media paintings, any imagery really, and getting it ready to be developed in the next module which is the major part of this years work. Most of my current work is line work an...