welcome
Many thanks for taking the time to drop in and check out my latest scratchboard paintings.
I became interested in art during my shooling many years ago. My parents saved for a long time to buy me my first set of 72 Derwent pencils that I have cherished all my life and still have them. As a very young child, I was always trying to create something and bring colour into my world. I recall one day, when I was about 10, raiding the old disused paint tins in the old shed in the back yard and painting a couple of little budgerigars on my white wooden wardrobe. My parents couldn't believe it when they returned home. They were very proud.
Scratchboard art has been doing the rounds of the planet since the cavemen learned to scratch drawings on the cave walls. It was originally developed to serve as a method of adding pictures to those old magazines you may have seen from the early part of the century. The concept has been revitalized and honed quite considerably in the last few years by a handful of creative artists and has now become a worldwide fine art form.
It's a bit like drawing in reverse. You start off with a masonite board that is layered with white clay and then airbrushed finely with black india ink. The more pressure you apply to the blade or the pin, the more of the black ink is removed. Different textures are achieved depending on the length and closeness of the scratches. Sometimes many layers are done on the one piece, gently inking with transparent black or coloured mediums in between and rescratched. The boards come ready made. I can best describe it as scraping a block of butter.
It's an interesting art form and given the right subject, lighting and framing, can really add focus on a wall. having a better look to try and work out the technique.
Most of my subject matter is to do with animals (domestic and wildlife). Like many wildlife artists, I am alarmed and very concerned about the extinction of so many of our beautiful animals due to many man made factors. Native habitats are disappearing at an accelerated rate depriving these creatures of their homes. We must do all we can to stop the carnage. Before long our children and grandchildren will only be able to see some of them in zoos (if they are lucky) or in text books when the zoos are no longer able to help them multiply.
Animals and insects bring me down to earth and keep me in touch with reality. It is for this reason, I find so much solace and peace of mind in rendering animals in my art. I get a deep sense of awe when painting them and it brings me back to basics. Whether they were a creation of the almighty or evolution, depending on your beliefs, their anatomy and beauty never cease to amaze me.
I would like to personally thank all of those wonderful photographers who so generously allow me to use their wonderful photographs as references. Unfortunately, I don't own a decent camera, am getting a bit long in the tooth for traipsing around the bush looking for that elusive black faced cuckoo shrike, and I would have to be the world's worst camerawoman. So I prefer to leave that to the experts who so generously provide photographs to myself and many many other artists to reference. I tips my hat you!!
I am mostly self taught in this medium and find it totally absorbing and very relaxing. i am a member of the Australian Guild of Realist Artists and the International Society of Scratchboard Artists.
Most of my works are for sale. They are all originals and framed unless otherwise stated.
I hope you enjoy my work as much as I enjoy doing it.
Lesley
Please note that all of my works are copyrighted and no works can be copied or reprinted without my permission.
I became interested in art during my shooling many years ago. My parents saved for a long time to buy me my first set of 72 Derwent pencils that I have cherished all my life and still have them. As a very young child, I was always trying to create something and bring colour into my world. I recall one day, when I was about 10, raiding the old disused paint tins in the old shed in the back yard and painting a couple of little budgerigars on my white wooden wardrobe. My parents couldn't believe it when they returned home. They were very proud.
Scratchboard art has been doing the rounds of the planet since the cavemen learned to scratch drawings on the cave walls. It was originally developed to serve as a method of adding pictures to those old magazines you may have seen from the early part of the century. The concept has been revitalized and honed quite considerably in the last few years by a handful of creative artists and has now become a worldwide fine art form.
It's a bit like drawing in reverse. You start off with a masonite board that is layered with white clay and then airbrushed finely with black india ink. The more pressure you apply to the blade or the pin, the more of the black ink is removed. Different textures are achieved depending on the length and closeness of the scratches. Sometimes many layers are done on the one piece, gently inking with transparent black or coloured mediums in between and rescratched. The boards come ready made. I can best describe it as scraping a block of butter.
It's an interesting art form and given the right subject, lighting and framing, can really add focus on a wall. having a better look to try and work out the technique.
Most of my subject matter is to do with animals (domestic and wildlife). Like many wildlife artists, I am alarmed and very concerned about the extinction of so many of our beautiful animals due to many man made factors. Native habitats are disappearing at an accelerated rate depriving these creatures of their homes. We must do all we can to stop the carnage. Before long our children and grandchildren will only be able to see some of them in zoos (if they are lucky) or in text books when the zoos are no longer able to help them multiply.
Animals and insects bring me down to earth and keep me in touch with reality. It is for this reason, I find so much solace and peace of mind in rendering animals in my art. I get a deep sense of awe when painting them and it brings me back to basics. Whether they were a creation of the almighty or evolution, depending on your beliefs, their anatomy and beauty never cease to amaze me.
I would like to personally thank all of those wonderful photographers who so generously allow me to use their wonderful photographs as references. Unfortunately, I don't own a decent camera, am getting a bit long in the tooth for traipsing around the bush looking for that elusive black faced cuckoo shrike, and I would have to be the world's worst camerawoman. So I prefer to leave that to the experts who so generously provide photographs to myself and many many other artists to reference. I tips my hat you!!
I am mostly self taught in this medium and find it totally absorbing and very relaxing. i am a member of the Australian Guild of Realist Artists and the International Society of Scratchboard Artists.
Most of my works are for sale. They are all originals and framed unless otherwise stated.
I hope you enjoy my work as much as I enjoy doing it.
Lesley
Please note that all of my works are copyrighted and no works can be copied or reprinted without my permission.
