Posts Tagged ‘painting’

Tuesday Huesday: Stanley Spencer’s Shipbuilding

Tuesday, July 3rd, 2012

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panel from Stanley Spencer's Shipbuilding series of artworks
Stanley Spencer, Riveters, 1941 | © Imperial War Museum

Perhaps it was listening the recent BBC Radio 2 programme about one of my favourite songs – Elvis Costello & Clive Langer’s Shipbuilding that reminded me of one of my favourite artists – Stanley Spencer. He created beautiful works often on an epic scale about war, industry and religion.

Click on the image above to see a larger version… and also click here to get an idea of the size of the work!

If I’ve whetted your appetite for more there’s a great book entitled Men of the Clyde: Stanley Spencer’s Vision at Port Glasgow available on Amazon

Tuesday Huesday: C R W Nevinson

Tuesday, April 17th, 2012

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C R W Nevinson's "Marching Men" painting

This striking painting from 1914, entitled Returning to the Trenches is by C R W Nevinson, considered one of Britain’s greatest war artists. The image conveys the movement and sound of the marching troops so vividly. I prefer his earlier style of work of which this is my favourite example – much influenced by the Futurist and Vorticist Movements.

You can see a larger selection of his work on the Bridgeman Art, Culture, History website. There’s a very rare book entitled, ‘C.R.W.Nevinson: The Twentieth Century‘ by Richard Ingleby. There are currently only two copies available on Amazon – the cheaper being a mere £260.64!

Crafty Compendiums

Monday, March 7th, 2011

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Pile of vintage craft booklets

The Homemade Home was the subject of our most recent Bookmarks book review.

 

cover of a vintage craft booklet showing carved wooden animals

It brought to mind this pile of craft booklets we picked up at Huddersfield Fleamarket recently.

pages from a vintage craft booklet showing hand carved wooden bull pages from a vintage craft booklet showing hand carved wooden fox

pages from a vintage craft booklet showing hand carved wooden rhino pages from a vintage craft booklet showing hand carved wooden elephant

pages from a vintage craft booklet showing hand carved wooden ram pages from a vintage craft booklet showing hand carved wooden seal

They’re from the Leisure Craft series.

cover of a vintage craft booklet on how to do batik

page from a vintage craft booklet showing batik composition

There seems to be about 40 titles in the set…

page from a vintage craft booklet showing a cartoon type illustration of a person crafting

pages from a vintage craft booklet showing how to do batik

pages from a vintage craft booklet showing how to do batik

…covering a vast array of crafts & hobbies.

cover of a vintage craft booklet on how to decorate glass bottles

page from a vintage craft booklet showing decorated glass jars

pages from a vintage craft booklet on how to decorate glass bottles

…from familiar subjects such as fabric printing, enamel work and collage…

cover of a vintage craft booklet on how to make clay items

pages from a vintage craft booklet on how to make clay candle holders

page from a vintage craft booklet showing handmade pot page from a vintage craft booklet showing handmade teapot

…to more obscure topics such as coconut craft & pipe cleaner figures.

page from a vintage craft booklet showing collection handmade pots

cover of a vintage craft booklet on how to do collage

page from a vintage craft booklet showing felt lions

There’s been quite a resurgence in the upcycled, recycled, reworked & handmade in recent years…

pages from a vintage craft booklet on how to do collage

pages from a vintage craft booklet showing an illustration of a parade of shops

cover of a vintage craft booklet showing how to make hand made jewellery

…but we’re yet to see throngs of people queueing up for the local coconut craft classes!

page from a vintage craft booklet showing crafting tools

pages from a vintage craft booklet on how to make handmade jewellery

The booklets are lovely actually…

pages from a vintage craft booklet on how to make handmade jewellery pages from a vintage craft booklet on how to make handmade jewellery

pages from a vintage craft booklet on how to make handmade jewellery

cover of a vintage craft booklet showing how to use fabrics

…all dating from the late 60s & early 70s.

pages from a vintage craft booklet showing how to do block printing

pages from a vintage craft booklet showing how to do block printing on clothing

page from a vintage craft booklet on showing an illustrated book cover and red lamp with shade

There are lists of materials and clearly illustrated methods & techniques.

cover of a vintage craft booklet 'How to paint with Lacquer

pages from a vintage craft booklet on how to make handmade jewellery pages from a vintage craft booklet on how to make handmade jewellery

page from a vintage craft booklet showing enamelware boat

The photographs of finished results are also fab…

pages from a vintage craft booklet on how to make handmade jewellery

page from a vintage craft booklet showing enamelware jewellery

cover of a vintage craft booklet 'Paper, Scissors and Paste

…with a very distinctive period feel.

pages from a vintage craft booklet showing an alphabet illustration

pages from a vintage craft booklet showing two figures for hanging keys

page from a vintage craft booklet showing peacock and three wise men illustrations

Our particular favourites are the Paper, Scissors & Paste and Batik booklets…

page from a vintage craft booklet showing nativity scene illustrations

page from a vintage craft booklet showing train and countryside scene

…oh, and that gorgeous little fabric booklet with the pram on it has to get a special mention!

page from a vintage craft booklet showing greeting card illustrations

cover of a vintage craft booklet 'Tinfoil Decorations

So, no excuses now… time to get crafty!

page from a vintage craft booklet showing tinfoil starbursts

page from a vintage craft booklet showing tinfoil decorations

P.S. Compendiums… compendia… we looked them up, both versions are usable however our spellchecker doesn’t like the latter!

Watercolours

Tuesday, October 5th, 2010

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collection of small watercolour paintings by J A Hurley

These were an interesting little purchase recently.

small watercolour painting entitled, "Dales Road" by J A Hurley

This collection of watercolours caught our eye as we passed a secondhand shop in Clitheroe.

small watercolour painting entitled, "Bent Trees, Mitton Flats, Clitheroe" by J A Hurley

They were housed in a mish-mash of quite horrible frames, but we could see that they were in fact, original watercolour sketches… and very well executed.

small watercolour painting entitled, "Pots & Pans, War Memorial, Saddleworth Moors" by J A Hurley

They really capture the essence of the Northern country landscape with which we’re so familiar…

triptych of small watercolours by J A Hurley depicting trees

…moorlands, fells, river valleys, lanes, dry stone walls, farms and fields.

pair of small watercolours depicting "Knowl Top Farm near Pots & Pans, Saddleworth" (top) and "Farm, Clitheroe - Mitton Road - Longridge Fell in background" (below)

The artist is J A Hurley – who actually lives & works in the Clitheroe area. We’ve seen prints of his work in art galleries, so it was a nice to find a bundle of originals. Especially as we paid a very reasonable £40.00 for a total of 11 small paintings.

small watercolour painting entitled "Houses at Mitton, Ribble Valley" by J A Hurley

We’re planning to re-frame them and put them up for sale in our pitch in Picture House Antiques… after snaffling a couple away for our own walls!