Happy New Year world.

Hello world, this is my first post this year, it's now New Years Day in the UK.

I've been working on new techniques for my graphics. Some of the results are in this blog post. As always, I shan't comment on any images which don't seem to need it. Where possible, I like the graphics to speak for themselves.  Right; Curtains, lights, music... On with the show!

The first image is one of my favourites. I created it about 3 months ago. By the way, some of the work below, was only completed two days ago.

Organic UFO.

Anne and I went to see the Russian State Ballet of Siberia perform The Nutcracker Ballet, just before Christmas. It was superbe. The male and female principle dancers were incredible. The show stayed in my mind for a long time afterwards. The day after seeing it, I started work on the image below. I tried to capture the movement of the dancers, the swirl of the costumes and the colours. One of the ballerinas came and stood next to me for about 10 minutes. She was videoing part of the performance. I can say for certain, that ballerinas are as graceful and lovely as one would imagine them to be. It's nice when a dream come true.

Ballerina.

There is a trend for big buildings to be illuminated in bright colours, for special events. Earlier this year a small mill in Halifax caught fire. I took a few photos of it. Three weeks ago, I decided that I should "light up" this ruined building, on my computer. Below is the result.

Light Up The Town.

I've been developing my skill in creating Graphic Novel art, also known as comic book art. The next image was my first attempt with the new technique. I was very pleased with the way it turned out.

Comic Book Art.

Another comic book style.

Cityscape.

And a third Comic Book style piece.

Reactor Powerplant.

Here is another technique I worked on. I finished this one 3 days ago. A friend of ours was on holiday abroad. Thinking about where he was, triggered this image.

Maldives.

Two blog posts ago, I posted some of my Oilbar Monoprints, (or Monotypes). In the New Year, I'm going to start painting again. However, before I do, I need to have a little more practice at one of the new techniques I was experimenting with. It's a way to create images which look like standard Monoprints, but are made digitally. I've called them "Digital Monoprints". On the Internet, other people use the term for something rather different to what I'm doing. I'll show some of my results now, then go back to full colour art after. 

I discovered some time ago, that certain bits of work need a border to define them. It gives them a location in space and sets their limits. Others are spoilt by adding a border and confining them. This type need to be free to expand in the viewer's perception. (Just so you know!)

Udily.

A High Sea.

Oblique Triptych.

I'm really pleased with the next one.

Mutation.

As regular readers know, I am very much influenced by Abstract Expressionism. The next two images fall into that category 

Decay Study.

Tesra.

A bit of explanation about the next picture now. Early this year, (2019) I discovered Marco Breuer's work, He was born in 1966 and makes photographs without a camera. I don't wish to go into a lot of detail about him here. There is a lot of info on him on the Internet, starting with Wikipedia. Basically, he takes photographic paper and uses abrasion, scratching, folding and scorching, to make marks on the paper, which is then developed. 

I don't find new art techniques or styles and set out to copy them. I use the ideas, as a "springboard" or starting point, and see how I can change them. I decided to use one of my printed digital images. I scratched and abraded it with a variety of things such as; sandpaper, steel wool, screwdrivers, needles etc. I scanned the result and balanced the contrast, colour and levels in Photoshop. The result is below. I will be making more of these in the next few months, having been encouraged by my first go. Next time, I shall use a craft drill with various drill attachments, to see what effects I can get.

Climate Change.

This one turned out a lot better than I expected, it gave me some trouble at first.

Coalescing.

Fantasia.

Fireworks.

6th. Dimension.

Gasometers have fallen out of fashion over the last few years. In a way, it seems a shame, I think they are iconic structures, once so much a part of life for many people. I remember clearly when everyone in England was cooking Christmas dinner at the same time, the gas pressure to the cooker dropped a lot. There was often just a small blue flame from the gas rings. It took a lot longer to cook things then. There is a nice Italian saying: "As busy as an Englishman's oven at Christmas." I like that.

The discovery of Natural Gas removed the need for gasometers. This left a great many of them abandoned, not just in the UK either. Finally, some places around the world decided to make something from them, rather than destroying them. On the Internet there are some stunning examples of the re-use of these giant beasts. Some have been turned into luxury apartments, some into parks. There must be other uses I haven't seen. The Gasometer, below is in Huddersfield, the Halifax ones were dismantled. When I went to look at it, I was struck how similar the construction was like fairground rides. That was the inspiration for the image below. I have used the same gasometer for several other, very different interpretations. I'll put some on the blog in the next year. Have a look on the 'Net at photos of them.

Fairground Ride.

The following image is one of the wrecks on the Fleetwood Boat Graveyard. I found out about it on Dan Tirels Webpage. He also has art demos on YouTube. I've mentioned him before in theis blog. Don't forget to drop in at take a look.

www.dantirels.co.uk

Back to the image: I kept looking at the photo I took of this wreak. The sun was in a bad place to get a good shot. Still, I felt there was something about it. Finally, I saw that it reminded me of a Chinese Sampan, or similar type of boat. At last, I discovered the image I felt it should have been all along. I hope Dan approves.

Fleetwood Wreak.

My wife Anne, does not like the next picture, she finds it creepy and sinister.

X-Ray.

It took me a while to work out how to get the effect I was trying for here. I wanted a pattern going left to right and one going right to left. They had to have a different shape to each other, or the effect was not very visible. I got there in the end. It just needed determination and planning. as with most things in life.

Scales.

This seemed a good image to finish with. A laser light show at a rock concert complete with smoke. All computer generated.

Rock Concert.

I'm always late with my blog posts. Because of that, I've decided to aim for a new post every two months, barring unforeseen circumstances. I'm going to start preparing the images for the next post a few days after posting a new one. It takes me two days to chose 20 or more images, add the copyright logo, resize and shrink them for adding to the blog. After that, It's several hours work typing comments about them, and adding the images. Then checking for spelling mistakes, poor grammar etc. I'm sure some bloggers can do it all in a day. Someone told me he could read six blogs at breakfast time. I can't, I have a life to lead, a selection of tasks to do etc. With luck, my new method of preparing them will help a great deal.

I hope you enjoyed this post, whoever you are, whatever part of the world you live in. Be nice to each other.  Until the next time, keep safe. Gordon.