Hide Down in My Corner, Because I Like My Corner.

I'm still here. Working away in the background, keeping relatively quiet.

Viking creation comic is underway

Desperate 

 Scruffy but comfortable

You don't look so good Al

Don't be a stranger,

JAB

Sketches From Another Continent

Back from an awesome holiday in Toronto and New York, above are a collection of sketches from museums visited in Brooklyn and Manhattan. Probably a good gauge of what my brain looks like when trying to come up with ideas.

An account of what we got up to can be seen on Jen Collins' blog here.

History Cannot Recall Our Names.

History is going to forget you.

Monday of this week I had a chance to spend a few hours wandering around the National Museum in Edinburgh, here's a collection of sketches from that particular jaunt and a few sketches from last week.

JAB

I've been enjoying scouring museums of late looking for inspiration and I've found a fair bit. I feel I'm on the cusp of a few nice ideas that I want to take further and maybe screen print or just turn into detailed Indian ink drawings.

The pictures in this blog are a selection of some of the sketches from the past few weeks. Visits include Edinburgh City Art Centre, Edinburgh National Museum (for the third time this year), the World Museum and the Walker Art Gallery (the latter two are in Liverpool). Also with trips to finally see the McManus (Dundee) properly planned and a jaunt to London for a concert there's surely to be a few more sketchbook pages scrawled upon before the end of June. I've finally set myself the goal of sorting out and opening my online shop for the end of July at the latest.

Fierce Head o' Hair

Short Arse

Pagan carving on an early christian relic (I added the text though)

Hellhound

'Drink driving 'carving, early attempt at Humour

Collection of drawings from Pictish stones

Greek Lion

Greek Cockerel

Ba, the Egyptian representation of personality and Nut, Goddess of the sky

Elu Mask, Nigerian

More sketches (and hopefully more prints) to come soon.

JAB

A Sketchy Couple of Days

A few sketches I've been playing around with, trying to come up with some screenprinting ideas. Again, still putting off doing more important stuff.

Stumbled across Brook Pridemore recently, give him a listen here.

Cup of tea

More researchy drawings concerning Gods (Odin)

JAB

Chaos Theory.

So there's been a few bits and pieces going on of late. I've been much more productive with drawing and printing which feels swell, but as a result I've been less active on my blog (surprise, surprise). I got myself a new phone last week so I'm finally with the times in that I own a 'smart' phone, meaning that I should be able to be a bit more active on my Twitter and Blog (once I get used to using it, that is).

I have some work for sale at long last, via Two Dolls, who recently opened up their shop in Dundee (proud to say I'm the first gentleman in their collection) so drop in and visit them if you find yourself around the Meadowside area of town. I'm starting to get a few bits and pieces of work together that I feel I can probably sell and so should hopefully open up my Etsy shop over the next few months. Watch this space.

Let's Build a Home

Chaos Theory

Self Portrait

Weathervane

London - A Weekend in 6 Soups

Prescription Sunglasses

As you can probably tell from the drawings I've rediscovered Indian ink and my fountain pen again. I really enjoy drawing with it and love the fact that I don't seem to give a sh*t about making a mess with ink spatters and smudges as I would if I were drawing with a pencil, fineline or brush pen. Marvellous.

In other news, we recently went to London (as mentioned in my previous post) and I was going to write a little more about it but I got a bit sidetracked and can't really remember what I was going to write so - The 'Chaos Theory' picture is based on a super Ice Cream van we saw by the British Museum and ' London - A Weekend in 6 Soups' came about because for some reason I became addicted to eating mostly soup whilst we were away. Damned good soup, mind.

This week I have mostly been drawing with Indian ink.

JAB

New Hair and Screenprinting.

My new years resolution this year was (and still is) 'to be more active creatively' and although it's been somewhat of a slow start toward that goal, I should hopefully get a bit of a move on over the coming weeks as I'm looking to get back to screenprinting for the first time in almost 3 years which I am pretty excited about. I start my induction on Thursday afternoon so I'm hoping that before long I should have some stuff up on my website and maybe a few bits for sale. The image above was inspired to my trip to Edinburgh Museum a few weeks back and could maybe work as a screenprint. However I have all day tomorrow to work on some separations for printing so we'll see.

Also, on the point of my having new hair I did a couple of 10minute portraits a 'before' and 'after'. It should be noted that I got rid of the beard about a month ago but I haven't done a bearded self-portrait for a while and it looked better this way. It has however, been almost a year since my last haircut. Shocking.

Just started reading Jurassic Park which I picked up in the Barras Market in Glasgow for 50p. It reminds me of being about 8 years old and being massively excited by the prospect of a film about dinosaurs coming out. Oh to be young.

Music-wise we went to see Ben Folds a couple of weeks ago and then The Decemberists last week, both gigs were great and I'm glad to say I've finally seen both live. I'm massively excited that The Mountain Goats are coming to Glasgow in May and I already have my tickets. That, and their new album is available to listen to online here on NPR even though it's not out until the end of the month. Ah, another great album.

JAB

And Then it Rained.

Last week after a few lazy days of not being very productive (again), I decided to take a day trip to Edinburgh in order to try and be more inspired to do some more drawing. As you can see from below it was a rather productive trip but as you can also see I'm still afraid of taking any coloured pencils/pens/paints with me anywhere when I'm doing any sketchbook work.

Well, I decided I fancied looking through the City Art Gallery and The National Museum of Scotland followed by a jaunt up Arthur's Seat for some nice views of the city. However, as is to be expected at this time of year, what started as a gloriously sunny morning in Dundee turned into a pretty wet, wild and windy afternoon in Edinburgh so I never made it up Arthur's Seat and instead dedicated my time to the Museums and Galleries and ended up with a little sketching over a pint of Deuchars in Bobby's Bar (just across the road from The National Museum). Below are my sketchbook pages from my day trip.

(it in fact rained before I started most of these drawings not after)

JAB