I brought back the lurgy from Venice and other stories

Featuring tales of holidays, kind people, museums, and deadlines.... why are there are always deadlines?

It's been almost a month since I posted here which is kinda weird considering how often I used to write but also to be expected considering the chaos that was last month. To give a very brief summary, and as you may be able to guess from the title, I managed to get ill quite literally the evening I got back from Venice and am only just about recovered. Did I mention that it's the last week of semester this week? Finals with flu. Yeah, that's been fun. So, as opposed to multiple detailed posts we're doing another of my favourite style smush posts but, this time, with pictures (yay!) and subheadings because I recon it's going to be a long 'un!

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So, we should probably start with Venice. It was an amazing trip. Truly.

Compulsory tourist shot.

I actually traded the week long Dutch summer for an overcast Italy so this was a major sacrifice, although it did warm up for the last couple of days, and still that city is quite magnificent. There are mazes of streets, so many bridges, beautiful churches. The other thing is - and it reminded me of Amsterdam in this sense - it's painfully busy in the touristy areas but you can go just a couple of streets along and be alone. It's a magical, magical place and you can kinda see why, if a film is set in Venice, it's either a romance or a horror.

The majority of my time was spent wondering these streets getting between different churches and the odd museum which is why I actually didn't take as many photos as one might have expected. Seriously, the museums I wasn't too impressed by,  generally, but the churches... we all know I'm a religious art nerd and I was so very much in my element. We, naturally, went into the St. Mark's Basilica and, when we went in, the doors to the basilica proper were closed so, instead of opening them, we, like sheep, followed each other up this uneven mountain of stairs. Anywho, this led up into the basilica's museum, something I hadn't really been too bothered with going round. After climbing those hellish stairs we were going round that museum whether we wanted to or not!! And, frankly, I would recommend it heartily, if only because you get to see the amazing mosaics up close. The song books were also a highlight for me. The other church that made a huge impression was Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari. It's a bit more out of the way but it's worth making an effort to see. I wanted to go because the altarpiece is one of Titian's and, to be honest, I was unaware of just how much art is in this building. It's exquisite. There are also some rather impressive monuments that are quite striking, the most well known being a monument to the sculptor Canova.

Came out the church to be greeted by this - sat and watched for a while.
Couldn't have planned it but what a perfect moment.

Other than churches, it's got to be said, I ate quite a lot and also spent quite a lot of time sat outside restaurants having a drink and people watching. Both my mother and I really enjoy sitting down and watching the world go by. You learn so much that way.

I also ended up meeting up with quite a few people out there. Seriously, I had more of a social life in Venice than I do back home - what is this madness? It seems that half of my university had taken a trip to the city at the same time and also, against the odds, we bumped into each other on Murano one day. I was also lucky enough to meet up with the lovely Fietje for dinner which was delightful... although the food wasn't the best and the waiter was, quite seriously, the most miserable soul I've ever come across. I tried so hard to make him smile but I failed in my attempts!

And the other person I met up with was Jacopo who quite literally turned up in the city on the first evening I arrived even though he couldn't be sure I'd know he was there because I didn't have internet. Luckily, I did pick up his message and, unluckily for him, he had to socialise with an extremely tired from traveling me! He was also so kind and saw us off at the airport. Highlight of meeting up with him, other than the fact he's a lovely chap for sure, has to be that moment where he led us over a bridge that led to a block end accidentally and, in his annoyance/embarrassment/I don't know, threw sat himself down on said bridge. And this is where the stereotypes about those southern Europeans come from, you know! Yep, I know he'll read this and I am actively teasing him right now... should probably stop! But it's so much fun!! Anyway, you can read his version of events over on his blog here, scroll down for English.... he's probably been mean about me in the Italian part knowing I can't read that ;-)

With Jacopo on the first evening in the city, featuring tourists walking in sync

I am certainly going back to Venice in the not so distant future as there is so much I want to see there. I also want to go to a few of the other cities in the vicinity so it would be nice to book out a longer trip. Trying to talk Dania and Leonoor into going with me next year and, frankly, I don't think they need much convincing. If only it wasn't so expensive!

As a bit of an aside, I ended up having a paper on Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice due just after my return so I did bits on it while I was out in Venice. I was writing, mainly, about the significance of rings in the text. I left my own ring in my hotel room. You have no idea how much struggle it was to get that ring back but seriously, I had to laugh about it!

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So, as you may recall, upon my return, I was supposed to go to see the Bosch exhibition. Well, I got struck down with the flu and that was not going to happen so I missed out. I am seriously disappointed. However, there was some bright side in that the hotel I had booked for the night before due to having such an early slot at the museum cancelled the room without charging me despite my only being able to let them know on the day of arrival and them having a 'no free cancellation policy'. And, actually, kindness was the theme of this fluey time. Thijs went and got me food and juice because I had literally nothing. Fatiya dropped me round readings I'd missed and was a complete gem as we were supposed to be preparing to lead a class together and I was messing her around so much. Other people sent me through notes without my asking them. People sent me messages asking how I was. I felt so loved. And physically a wreck but, y'know, like a loved wreck. So thank you people for looking after me <3

I also had exams and papers due during that time and somehow managed to get them all in before the deadline. More surprisingly, those that have been graded actually have high marks - higher than usual despite the fact I was writing with a candyfloss brain. I genuinely would have expected to get lower grades considering I couldn't study or think straight. What is this backwardness? Anyway, I now only have three roundtables (one of which is a paper defense - eep!) and then this semester is done and onto German. The less said about that the better. I'm so nervous I cannot put it into words.

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However, the lightening of the work load has meant that I can socialise a bit more and that means my favourite thing: Museum exploration with Dania!

Sunday, we went to the Rijksmuseum to see their Catwalk exhibition which was closing that day. As the name may suggest, this was a fashion exhibition and we'd wanted to go for some time. I have to say, it was well worth getting up early for. There was a really nice range of pieces on display and, importantly, the curation was exceptional. My particular favourite was a room with a conveyor belt (think airport baggage collection just prettier) on which manikins wearing different costumes slowly rotated in a catwalk type fashion. There were chairs where you could sit and watch the 'show' and a book attached to each chair explaining the significance of each piece. There was a seriously snazzy pair of pyjamas made to look like an evening dress too... I might have got some ideas! The highlight of the exhibition was the widest mantua in the Netherlands (over two metres wide) and there was a cardboard cut out in the lobby so, you know.... Dania forced me ;-)

I seem to be missing a neck....

And then today we caught the Spanish Master's exhibition at The Hermitage. Again, we'd planned to see this one since before it opened and, again, we caught it just as it was closing (although it's there until Sunday so if you get a moment then it's worth popping to). I wasn't so interested in this one because I've never really go that into a lot of the Spanish artists. That said, I'm really pleased I went. I actually saw a few paintings, and a few styles, that really did catch my eye and my imagination. Perhaps I need to do a bit more research into the area's art history. The other thing that I really liked about this exhibition is the fact that it was set to music. As opposed to having information given over the audioguide you had a different song/tune play that was supposed to evoke the feelings of the pieces in that area. It made it a very special experience and I kinda want the CD (while I don't think there is a CD you can listen to the music here)

Post exhibition selfie, as always!

While I've had a great time at both museums, I don't think I'm going to go to any more for a while. I fell down stairs in the Rijksmuseum and broke the exit gate at the Hermitage. Am I clumsy, cursed, or is someone trying to tell me something? ;-)

Okay, okay, procrastination over. I will get back to working on my stuff for the next two days. On the bright side, I'm definitely going to Keltfest - there's a light at the end of the tunnel!

The Post in Which Havanah Gets Completely Overexcited About Visiting an Art Gallery . . .

Wednesday saw my art history class go to the Hermitage museum in the centre of town. This museum is a branch of the Russian museum of the same name. It isn't one of the state owned Dutch museums and it instead operates, I believe, completely privately. It means it's a bit pricier to get in (or free with a Museumkaart) but it is, I believe, completely and utterly worth it. We only visited the "Portrait Gallery of the Golden Age" but there is another exhibition on Napoleon and Josephine running which I would like to return and see. The layout of the exhibition, and the level of interactivity, has been so carefully thought through that it truly was a pleasure.

The museum's 'Selfie Area' allows people to be green screened into a group portrait type setting that includes photos of previous guests. My teacher (right of me) seemed to confuse the green screen somewhat ;-)

The main gallery is a large hall filled with group portraits which are most impressive. Grouped together like this it is quite overwhelming but in a brilliant way. At regular intervals there is a 'light show' which is linked the audio guide and takes you around key portraits in the room giving details about specific figures. In this sense, you experience something of the scale and magnificence of multiple images alongside one another but are assisted to appreciate the details held within single pieces. It's very cleverly done. Seriously, I rated both the collection and organization here well over the Rijksmuseum.

There's another floor of paintings that we rather rushed through although I don't think I'm alone in saying that most of us could have spent a lot longer looking around had time been on our side. This floor was a bit less about portraiture, although that's still the broad theme, and more about the history of the Netherlands, and Amsterdam in particular. In this sense, it was rather interesting for all of us, particularly us foreign students, as the exhibition gave a lot of really interesting information to contextualise the works, and the area in general. It wasn't overly crowded either which meant it was comfortable to wander through at your own pace and actually enjoy.

Yep, I will be going back here, undoubtedly!

A group photo of the class, taken in the gardens of the museum, seemed only fitting!

Lack of routine leads to boring blog posts but to happy Havanahs

Ah, the freedom of the last weeks has allowed me to reacquaint myself with so many old friends... sleep... art... music... Aimee...

I also seem to have made some new friends as my shower gel (or that's what we think it must be) seems to attract moths. Seriously, I spend most evenings covered in moths and my mother has to get them off of me before I sleep so I don't squash them. I don't mind... it's quite flattering really!

You may call me the Moth Queen ;-)

All that aside, I think I've been quite noticeably absent from my normal channels of communication. I've been avoiding facebook (not actively but it's happened), I've not been logging onto Skype because even when I have the computer on the keyboard is generally too far away for me to type, I've let my phone run out of charge rendering that pretty useless. Okay, I've now recharged my phone as I've decided to end my self imposed, and oh so blissful, retreat.

It has been lovely to be free to dictate my own schedule and not to feel the overbearing press of deadlines and "I must get this A grade". In the first few days at home I probably painted etc for all the hours that weren't spent sleeping or eating. It was as though there was a real backlog! 

Sitting under a parasol in the middle of nowhere.
It's a hard old life.

I have also, quite naturally, been spending a fair bit of time with my parents which has been... interesting. I'm really close to my family but, as anyone who has met my father will confirm, he is quite excitable... to say the very least. Well, he's been excited to have me home - which is lovely - but that also means he's extra bouncy. It's like having a human shaped puppy bouncing around most of the time!

Catching up with people has also meant bugging the best friend in Cardiff where she is now working seven days a week. The insane girl. We only got to have one day together - her one day off of the summer - but she's going to come and see me in Amsterdam in September so we'll be together for a week or so then. Read that Aimee? It's in black and white now so there's no backing out now!

More recently, I've been translating again and I have cleared a great deal in that regard. I have to say that, with those couple of weeks of German lessons, I have found my speed of translation much improved. It's not that I couldn't do it before but now, knowing some of the basic grammatical rules, which I may have either fumbled through or completely missed previously, I know what to look for and it is so much easier. 

I'm thinking about focusing on language learning over the next few weeks as I still have a few languages on my 'to learn' list. Also need to get round to seriously brushing up on French, having not spoken it in coming up to three years - oh my!

Getting away

Today is the day that I travel down to the cottage we're renting for Christmas.

I've been packing for a few days now as, due to the time of year, there's so much that needs to go with us. I've also learned that packing after a couple of (large) glasses of whiskey is not a good idea... yes, I did manage to get my head stuck in a suitcase. It took my parents about fifteen minutes to free me, although I'm sure that time could have been cut down dramatically if only they had stopped laughing!

En route to the cottage I am going to stop and visit a couple of siblings and, most excitingly, the diddy nephews! Yes, I am still planning on dressing as an elf!

As for where I'm going, it's a holiday cottage in the middle of no-where down in the south west. I'm close enough to Exeter that I can meet up with a couple of people if they bother to get back to me but far enough from everything that I can just get away from life for a while. I also believe that there is no internet at the cottage so I'm actually really looking forward to that. I'll only be there for a week, and one day of that will be Christmas day, but it will be nice to be stuck in 'real life' for a couple of days.

I'm taking a couple of musical instruments with me. Sadly, my 'cello is back in intensive care so she won't be coming but low whistle certainly is. I'm also taking a bundle of paints with me and will just see what happens over the next week. It'll be lovely to be free to just create with no strings attached and no real pressures.

So, I guess I'm off now. See you all after Christmas!

Christmas Song of the Day

Solstice Evergreen by Spiral Dance

Because today is Yule, or the Winter Solstice, it seemed only fitting to have a song relating to this festival instead of to Christmas per se. I'm still getting over the fact that we're not going to be able to really celebrate the festival this year but I guess the last couple of years have been strange for us as a family and what better time to remember that there's always next year!

As for the song, this is by a Pagan Folk band called Spiral Dance and is a great piece of music that works for Yule, Christmas, or just winter festivities in general. Enjoy.

(because I've been having some issues with blogger and youtube recently, if the video isn't embedded then click here to listen)

A return to essays

Over the past couple of days I have been working towards something, something I'm not going to talk about online until I have something solid to say (although I've mentioned it to a couple of friends). Anyway, this basically means that I have been working on essay writing all the time. Yuk.

Okay, I quite like essay writing, and it's certainly nice to have my brain stretched again, but my goodness my brain is being stretched! The essay question refers to the "abilities" of the arts and then asks you to illustrate them using a piece of literature (or several other art-forms that I'm less comfortable writing about). Can I just say that the question sounds so simple when I put it like that!

lit·er·a·ture 

n.

1. The body of written works of a language, period, or culture.

2. Imaginative or creative writing, especially of recognized artistic value: "Literature must be an analysis of experience and a synthesis of the findings into a unity" (Rebecca West).

3. The art or occupation of a literary writer.

4. The body of written work produced by scholars or researchers in a given field: medical literature.

5. Printed material: collected all the available literature on the subject.

6. Music All the compositions of a certain kind or for a specific instrument or ensemble: the symphonic literature.

-From The Free Dictionary

A problem that this has brought to the forefront is what classifies as literature. I can find a perfect novel to illustrate the points but it was written in 2004... some people would say that 2004 is too recent to be literature. What about a play? Oh, that could be a bit funny too. The problem is, without knowing what the 'examiner' considers literature it's very difficult to choose something to write about and when the essay is for something important I'm not going to push boundries and challenge the status quo... I just wish I knew what their view was!

So yeah, you know when I said I was essay writing? I kinda lied. I haven't even chosen the book yet.

But I will!!

Art, music, life

The title pretty much sums up what's going on pretty now. By day I'm being a noisy pest playing various instruments and by night I'm attacking things with paint.

Art

Art wise, I'm mainly working on scrapbooks in various forms right now. I've actually not finished my Castlefest book yet. In my defence it does take a while to design/paint 100 pages of stuff. I have, however, started a new book for general life and that is actually pretty much up to date. I know. A miracle! I'm thinking about posting photos of my scrapbook pages onto tumblr as well as on facebook from now on. We'll see what happens. I know a few people want to see certain pages and it's hard to work out where to share them.

I'm getting a real itch to paint a portrait again. You may well know that the last ill fated attempt didn't work out so well. I guess painting a picture of a couple is always going to be risky and the pair I was painting happened to get a divorce in the short time between the sketch and first bit of paint being put down and the rest of it going on! Whoops. Although I was painting for my own enjoyment I hadn't the heart to go on and finish such a lovey-dovey painting. I'm not sure exactly who or what I want to paint though, and I'm not practised in portrait work either, so it might not happen. We'll see how I feel!

Music

As for music, did I tell you how much I am in love with my new whistle? He quickly gained a gender, which is as far as I tend to go with musical instruments, but Nené seems pretty sure he should have a name too. She suggested Felix and then Máté (the latter having a rude explanation) but I don't think either of those are quite right. Okay, the latter is just wrong! 

Lack of name aside I've been enjoying playing so much. I feel that I'm progressing in my playing very quickly, much quicker than I expected, and after just two weeks I'm a bit overwhelmed by the progress that's been made. I'm not great, not at all, and speed is something I need to work on greatly but things are going so well. 

Of course, the other major musical adventure for me is my singing. I had a lesson yesterday, the first in two weeks due to illness, and it was probably the best lesson I've ever had. I managed to sing a song through in a relaxed way and, do you know what, after doing that I managed to tell my teacher, honestly, that I thought it sounded good. I'm far from being a confident singer but that's such an improvement. In three months I have sung in front of someone for the first time in years, sung in front of an audience (albeit unintentionally), and finally I have managed to have a moment where I can admit that I enjoyed my own voice. I'm far from being a good singer, and far from getting over my phobia, but, step by step, I'm going in the right direction.

'Cello is still being played but we have some issues with tuning pegs going on. I think she may well need to have a quick trip to a luthier because we have some major slipping that I can't seem to fix. She also needs some new strings as I can actually see the A and D strings fraying. I think I've been neglecting her a bit recently, especially when one considers the abuse she suffered at the hands of my father. She got her own back on me by stabbing my foot. After this many years you think I'd remember to wear shoes when playing, wouldn't you?

Life

Things aren't really going to plan and this is not how I saw my gap-year panning out, for various reasons that I don't want to share randomly on the internet. However, I am actually really happy. I'm doing the things I love and I will be continuing to do these things next year, and more. I can't wait for next year's European adventure, even though it looks like I'm going to have to travel alone which wasn't my plan either, and I can't wait to see what happens next.

Getting into the autumnal mood

Well, if you know me well then you'll probably have noticed that I've been unnaturally down recently (and with good reason!). Today, however, I decided to pull my mood up through whatever means possible so had a morning of 'cello playing, which felt like heaven, and am spending my evening painting.

I felt in the mood for autumnal colours (and really fancy a toffee apple, incidentally) so decided to pull some of them out of my ever growing paint collection and just see what happened.

Didn't use the green in the end. Whoops.

The dangers of gold paint a.k.a. I think a small faerie's
 been taking a bath in my water.

I don't know how I managed to match the canvas colour
to that of my desk but it wasn't my aim!

And let there be trees, a camera flash, and some really
awful orange coloured over-exposure.

See, I can't take a photo of a painting to save my life. I guess I'll have to wait until daylight and try again! Oh well. I'm pleased with the real thing!

Four days to go!!!!

Please, don't expect anything remotely coherent from this post. I'm getting really excited. The problem is, when I'm excited I need some way to channel that excitement and I've done everything. 

For those of you who are a little confused about what I'm going on about: On Tuesday I will be on my way to the Netherlands for my little adventure.

Of course, there's always stuff left to do. I'm going shopping with my mother tomorrow to get her some new clothes and I can't even think about packing until I go up to Birmingham as my rucksack, and camping gear, is all up there. I also could do with buying myself a new hand fan or three as I broke my old one the other day.

That said, none of that can be done until tomorrow, or Sunday, or even, goodness me, Monday. Tuesday I plan to sleep in to make up for the fact that I won't be sleeping on that darned bus Tuesday night but that's another story.

Anyway, the point of this post is that you should not leave me to my own devices when excited. I tend to find things to occupy myself. Yes, writing boring blog posts full of self importance is one of those things. However, I also tend to put this energy into more creative channels like this:

I simply had to decorate the lock because the old one
 just wouldn't go with my banner. Note sarcasm.

I've also started to write emails to Aimee quite often, and she is actually replying, and with excitement. I think we're winding each other up.

So, I'll go now because I can't imagine reading my hyperactive excited rant was high on your plans for the evening.

Making a tent into a home

Okay, my tent has florescent orange guy-lines;
it couldn't be accused of being boring

As I've said previously, I have a new tent to take with me to Castlefest, my old tent being lost in The Flood. I've had a couple of attempts at putting it up and I'm quite pleased with it. It's cosy. That said, it's not me and, as a creative person, I have to turn it into my own!

So, it made perfect sense, for me, to make some bunting, and a flag to make it mine. Of course, I'm not ever content with doing things the easy way, I mean, have you ever hand stitched seven metres of bunting? Yep, I don't own a sewing machine... or an embroidery loop for that matter. Today, I decided, would be the day I finished my sewing, come hell or high water, so here it is!

This photo was taken on the second day of bunting making.
It was chaos by the end!

As I said, we have seven metres of bunting, all hand sewn, with bad hemming and metallic thread. The metallic thread makes up for the shoddy hems in my mind.

The original 'butterfly girl' with a delightful reflection from the camera flash.

It's the flag that I'm really pleased with. This is based on a painting of mine that I did a few years ago as I couldn't really think of what to do. My mother, and her friend, is convinced that it's going to get nicked but I guess I'll have to take that risk. Anyway, I think butterfly girl would curse any thieves hehe (*)

This was harder to get a decent photograph of than it was to make!

This was my first attempt at anything like this so I'm pretty pleased with the outcome. Let me tell you, hemming the material for the girl was pure hell on earth. I'm also really happy to transfer the design from my painting, the painting being one of my complete favourites.

Annoyingly, I can't work out how to decorate the inside of the tent, other than getting my acrylic paints out, and I don't think that'll go down well with my father, so I'll have to work with a dull inside. Oh well!

(*) the original painting was based on my own silhouette, with some tweaks to the nose because I'm not keen on my nose shape, so I think I'm more than qualified to guess what she'd do!

"You need to write a list"

If I had a pound for every time my mother said this to me then I would be a very rich woman.

During exam revision mother would constantly say that I needed to write a list of the things I still needed to revise. The fact that I had made a revision timetable back in January was beside the point. It wasn't in list form.

So you can guess my horror when today I suggested that I needed to write a list. I think I'm turning into my mother who, darling as she is, does have a minor list obsession.

The problem is, I am good enough at procrastinating on my own and I don't need the help of lists. Heck I am procrastinating writing the list by writing this blog about writing the list. On the plus side, since I am a nomad at the moment, I can probably classify the list as necessary for me to be able to get things organised in time for The Festival at the end of the month.

Of course, me being me, packing is the least of my worries. I'm busy thinking about embroidery and scrap-booking and the like. My red and purple bunting is finished now and I just have the same length of green and cream bunting to do. The flag is nearly finished and I just need to sew on one bead because it fell off and finish embroidering about an inch.

As for the scrap-book, I need to make some paper to take with me because I am not taking the scrap-book itself for all the tea in China. Actually, I adore tea so that might be an incentive... 

The long and short of this post being that I am not going to be online much at the moment as I have a tonne to do. Of course, that could mean that I'll be online all the time because we've already ascertained that I'm a major procrastinator!

Oh, and I'm meant to be learning Dtuch. Yeah.

Painting: Stonehenge

Stonehenge in Wiltshire is a tourist hotspot. Commercial and overpriced I hate it. However, spiritually, and generally, it’s a place very close to my heart.

A couple of years ago, I believe it was 2009, I was lucky enough to be there the night of the summer solstice.  Like everything about the monument, this was commercialised (there were burger vans, for goodness sake) and drew a mixed crowd but it was also one of the most amazing nights. Being able to walk by the stones, touch them, and be there with so many other people, there was undoubtedly an energy.  Of course, it’s hard to tell how much of that energy was because of the smog of marijuana smoke sitting over the place!

When I got home, at some time in the early morning the first thing I did was painted a picture of the stones themselves. It’s a sloppy painting, done in an hour or two, carried by the energy I was feeling, and, if you listen to my parents’ views, painted while the marijuana was still having an effect(*)! It’s probably one of the worst technical paintings I have ever done yet it remains my favourite and also was probably the first painting I painted in what has now become my style.

My parents have always tried to talk me into doing more paintings of Stonehenge and I have always shied away from it because I wouldn’t be able to replicate that one painting and nor would I want to try. However, today, I sat down and decided to have a go at painting Stonehenge again.

Usually, when painting I will draw out my sketch onto printer paper because I find it difficult to draw on the slightly more textured paper intended for sketching (and canvas/board is just ick to draw on!) I wanted to do this sketch very quickly to try and capture some kind of energy as opposed to replicating it perfectly. I also used the only source pictures I have, photos taken at sunrise on a camera phone in circa 2009. They aren’t the highest quality in the world but that was not the point, as far as I was concerned.

The original sketch, pre-editing. I actually really like this sketch and might end up keeping
it in my art folder. It's rare I let myself do something with sloppy lines but it works here!

Once I transferred it to my heavy duty paper I had a fiddle with my original sketch, shading it in, to work on the aesthetic of the silhouette and decided that I would work with two tones of black so I could keep some of the depth aspects and also to cut out one of the stones because it made the whole thing look wrong.  A couple of stones also changed shape for aesthetic purposes.

At this point a coke bottle exploded everywhere and I lost my rubber so things got a bit delayed. This is also the point at which I turned off Dickinson’s Real Deal and put on some music to work to instead. Things were getting serious.

I then started to paint the sky of my painting. Although I had planned to work with reds I experimented a bit with some blue hues that I don’t normally use, fell in love with Phthalocyanine Blue. It’s one of those useless shades (in my opinion) and therefore I’ve never really used it. That said, it gave just the otherworldly tone I was looking for here. I can see myself using it more in the future.

The main problems occurred in this stage. Even with the fan turned off, which was agony for me, my paints were drying way too quickly. I guess it’s the heat. Anyway, to get a smooth layer of a single colour was basically impossible and a gradient… lets just say my nerves are in tatters. I guess it developed a lot more organically than I planned and that’s not always a bad thing.

Adding modelling paste onto the stones... and onto my hands, of course!

Ultimately, I made the decision to paint a smaller gradient and to add some modelling paste which was interesting. I’ve only started messing around with this medium recently but this was the first time I applied it with a paintbrush. My least favourite paintbrush. I didn’t rate its survival rate.

Anyway… a long wait for the slow modelling paste to dry (why can’t paint be like that?) a bit more painting and it was done!

A bad photo taken while paint's still wet and with a flash on (silly Havanah)
but I'm not disappointed with the outcome overall.

(*) I have never smoked or taken an illicit drug in my life. Heck, my parents had to fight with me to get me to take painkillers when I had pneumonia! The point being, we always joked that there was so much smoking going on everyone must have been passively high.