Month: December 2010

My studio showing work in progress



This is a place that is becoming a distant memory…my studio! Too much going on over the holiday period. Too warm indoors by the fire!

Thought I would get into the mood by posting some pics of last summer when I was looking at cosmos. I made several paintings using the same palette of colours and because there were poppy seed heads and scabious in the background, this was blue/green based.
I have examples of the flowers in vases and my own photos printed off for reference plus the computer there to provide more reference material. In front of the window I’ve displayed one of the paintings I’d done earlier to help things along.
I notice my coffee cup is there, dangerously close to my painting water!

Keeping track with a 2011 Flower Calendar


It’s the day after Boxing Day and the world, well my little bit of it anyway, is still in Christmas holiday mode. It’s a case of suspended animation with the days being so short still that there’s hardly time to do anything before dusk falls and then there’s family and friends to catch up with.

But 2011 is just around the corner, a brand new year and brand new exciting challenges. I thought I’d tell you about the 2011 calendars I’ve created on the redbubble site from a collection of my paintings.
If you’d like a collection of 12 good quality prints of my paintings on excellent quality thick card, then one of the calendars might be an idea. It’ll keep you up to date as well!
Click on the link below to have a look. You can scroll through to see a different print for each month of the year.
Or if you’re into landscape, there is the “Out and About with Ann Mortimer” calendar. Click on this link to view.

The North wind doth blow…


Hi all,

Sorry I have not posted for a while. It’s the time of year! I expect everyone is in the same boat, or should I say Department store, desperately looking for present ideas.
I’m posting this little robin who should cheer us all up. Medici cards used this image for a Christmas card this year. He came out of nowhere really, I didn’t even draw an outline, though I took some care to try and get the spade handle and snow and water droplets right. I did the robin wet in wet and left the feathers on the breast just to sort themselves out, adding the red wet in wet with thick paint to spread on its own.
I don’t often paint wildlife, but this robin seemed to emerge from the brush with a life of its own.

Snow,snow…quick,quick…snow


Hi all! Sorry not to have posted for a while. I have become all discombobulated with the snow and freezing weather. My studio is not such a welcoming place somehow in these freezing temperatures. The other day it stayed at about minus 5c all day. Just the few yards up the path to the studio in the open air is enough to put you off.

Also Christmas duties call…shopping and organising.
The title of this post is a reference to another thing that is taking my attention at the moment…the BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing. Now this is no purely British phenomenon…I know it has travelled in its many form all over the world. I also know that this blog is visited by people the world over, so everyone knows what I’m talking about! Have been blogging and making friends on the Strictly blogs, especially the one supporting Matt Baker, who is the main man as far as I’m concerned and with his partner Aliona should be this year’s winners.
But back to painting. I’m uploading a painting I did recently with a workshop in mind. Reference photo kindly lent to me by Alan from the Orston art group.
Have lent it a seasonal touch by adding the holly in the foreground.
Enjoy!