Examples of Handmade Christmas Cards

On sale at the Lighthouse Festive Flair Fair, 11th December 2010.

'Hotties' Hot water bottle covers, hand-knitted by my Mother Denise Hopkins.

Modern Houses.

My recent work from a concertina sketchbook.

Diary Date.

An illustrated living.

Living with three Illustrators really drives home how hard I should be working but also how much fun it is to make art. They are constantly thinking of new ways to communicate ideas and makes aestetically beautiful images. Sometimes the aestetics in Fine Art can take a back seat to concepts and meaning.

For the Summer, my lovely Illustrators had to keep a diary every day in the form of a sketchbook. The challenge of finding something every day to interpret as an image seemed interesting.

I'd like to start keeping a similar sketchbook diary as often as I can. I'm excited to get back to drawing and not taking myself too seriously. Hopefully this will be more personal, theraputic and fun!

Incase you were wondering, here are my housemates blogs.

Hannah Lane: http://hannahnomiddlenamelane.tumblr.com/
Marina Brayfield: www.marinaforillustration.blogspot.com
Nadiah Sweilem: http://nadiahsweilemillustrates.blogspot.com/

I'll show you how I get on...

Sketchbook sketchbook sketchbook...

A couple of pages from my sketchbook.

Got lots of new ideas from these and can't wait to get making some work.

Frieze. 15/10/10.

Yesterday I was saturated to the max with British contemporary art after spending a few hours at this years Frieze Art Fair.

I couldn't sleep so stayed up and wrote a page about how Frieze had left me feeling suprisingly positive about the prospect of being apart of the contemporary art scene.

I may share that with you another time, for now here's a few favourites from my notebook.

Damien Ortega

Thomas Locher, 'Frame, framed' 2007
(Example shown)

Erwin Wrum

Lorna Simpson, 'Cloud' 2005
(Image pinned in sections and grain effect of print relevant to my work)

Katja Strunz

Ellen Gallagher
'O.K Corral' Ink, varnish, cut out printed paper
(Different example shown)

Walid Raad 'Sweet Talk- Beruit'
(Different example shown- 'Mappings')

A few other names for future research:

• Sharon Ya'ari, 'Camels' photograph
• Cyprien Gaillard
• Ginny Bishton
• Bernhard Flichs, car photographs
• Daphne Wright, Swan made from resin & marbledust
• Donald Moffett, Oil paint like fur

Shapes from my Window.

Not sure if I like squares...