Portrait by Erin Emily Robinson

I’ve recently completed a portrait swap with a lovely artist from Canada called Erin Emily Robinson, the picture above is the beautiful portrait she did of me in pastels.

Its quite an experience seeing yourself portrayed by another artist, and portrait swaps are a good way to get to know other artists from around the world too :)

Just in case you are interested here is the portrait I did of Emily, its in Gouache, pastels and gold leaf:

Golden Section Software

Like a lot of artists I’ve found myself exploring the ‘Golden Ratio’ or ‘Divine Ratio’ as its also sometimes known, a geometric formula that’s supposed to be found in everything from simple plants to spiral galaxies - even the human body can be broken down using the golden section.

The formula is a very useful tool for artists in composing paintings and drawings - in fact Artists and Architects have been using the golden section as a guide since the time of the Ancient Greeks.

In order to make the process of testing out compositions using the Divine Ratio easier I decided to write a small piece of software to automate the use of compositional grids in setting up compositions, and have decided to make it publicly available for free.

 To find out more and to download a copy of the program just click Here

Golden Triangles

I’ve been experimenting with compositional tools just lately, especially ones relating to the ‘Golden Mean’ a system for creating perfect proportions that has been around since the Ancient Greeks.

A lot of artists will probably be familiar with the Golden Mean and Fibonacci spirals, but there are actually other ways in which the Golden Ratio can be used, the Pentagon for example revolves entirely around the golden Ratio, as is the Pentacle created from it, and the triangles formed by the Pentacle inside the Pentagon!

so I’ve created a viewfinder using two mirrored Pentagons which explore all kinds of golden ratio relationships, which I’ve printed onto Clear Acetate.

As an experiment I’ve overlaid the design over my latest work in progress and I’m very happy with the way the drawing falls so easily into the geometric patterns, I have a feeling this is going to be one of my favourite compositional tools for quite a while now.

if there is enough interest I may even sell some on my website for other artists to play around with :)

New Website

 

Its taken nearly 3 weeks of development, but my new website is finally finished and fully operational here: My New Website 

I now have an online shop where you can buy prints of my work, and anyone wanting to attend my courses can now book online via the workshops page, please take time to visit and maybe add yourself to my followers page!

Christmas Portrait Workshops

With Christmas coming up I’ve organised some portrait workshops where you can bring along a photo of a family member and produce a portrait of them as a Christmas present.

The first course take place on the 21st & 22nd November and is a  pastel drawing workshop, which costs £100 for 2 days tuition including approx £46 worth of art materials to take home with you afterwards.

The second course is a portrait painting workshop which takes place on the 28th & 29th November, this workshop costs £120 for 2 days Tuition and you get approx £70 worth of art materials to take home with you!

All you need to bring is a photo of your loved one and you will go home with a beautiful portrait that you would be happy to give away as a presesnt.

For more details or to book a place please visit my new website at:

Graham Hanks Website

Open Ehhibition

I've just had two paintings accepted to the annual open exhibition at the Doncaster Museum Art Gallery, which is kinda cool :) these are the paintings that were accepted:

Woman in Red  hood - Conte Pastels on paper

Blue Tribe Tuareg - Oil on canvas

Lets see if either of them sells :)

A Proud Father

I've just finished this pastel painting of me and my son Adam wearing our straw hats:

It was based on a photo my wife took of us during the Summer, which I submitted as a reference photo for a monthly portrait challenge we hold at my favorite Art forum www.artforums.co.uk

The painting was made using a mixture of different pastels (Conte, Winsor & Newton and Unison Pastels) its interesting how the different brands handle so differently to give different finishes, Conte Carres pastels for example are very precise whereas the Winsor and Newton pastels are much more painterly in their application and Unison are just very smooth and silky.  Individually they are all good pastels to work with but combined together you can get results that are much broader and more varied in terms of technique.

fustrations

i've not been posting much on here or my website for a while, partially because I've been busy but partially because I've been going through a crisis of confidence over the last 2 or 3 months.

I think it all started when i went for my first mentoring session with an organisation called CIDA who aere supposed to help upcoming artists to establish themselves in business as succesful working artists.

The painter who was assigned to me was a nice man but the first thing he said to me was that he thought my work was more like illustration than fine art, and then started going on about how I should work on loosening up my style and being more 'loose and sketchy' in how I paint and draw things - after a year of perfecting my skills in portraiture to become more precise it was quite disheartening to be told my work was too precise!

after that meeting I became quite dissilusioned and my work rate dropped off due to being disheartened, but then I've noticed that there is a lot of that sort of attitude in Yorkshire, if you are not an expressionist or at the very least an impressionist then your work tends to be dismissed by many artists and members of the art establishment here.

the pressure to become more impressionistic in my art was so persuasive that I actually started to try to be more loose in my paintings, but that just made me feel worse because I wasn't happy with the results and began to lose even more confidence in my ability to paint well, after all if I can't paint in a loose and impressionistic manner then I can't be a very good painter!

but I've taken stock of things just lately and I've come to the conclusion that these other people are wrong to try and influence the way I work, I'm an individual not a part of the herd - if they want to paint in that way then good luck to them, but why should I be pressured into doing the same!

as an artist the most important thing is to express YOURSELF not what others think you should be but what you truly are, I'm a quiet introverted person, very cautious in my relationship with the world, and I'm an obsessive perfectionist, anyone who knows me well knows I cant help trying to make everything I do perfect, its a symptom of the mental Disorder I suffer from - Social Phobia Disorder, which in laymans terms is basically an extreme form of shyness, luckily I've had couselling for it and am on medication that helps me overcome many of my problems and lead a relatively 'normal' life, but I'm still a compulsive perfectionist and get depressed if things aren't just so.

bearing this in mind its hardly surprising that my art is also obsessed with perfecting details and getting everything just so, to do any differently would be to deny the sort of person I really am, and this is what my detractors in the expressionistic camp don't seem to get - by being precise and controlled I AM expressing myself as an individual, I'm just not expressing myself in the way that 'they' think I should.

I've decided that its time to stop listening to the biased views of other artists and listen to the inner voice that is me, if other artists don't like that, its their problem not mine, I need to paint in MY style not someone elses otherwise there is no point in being an artist for me.

rant over :)

Some Townscapes

Its been a while since I've updated my blog and website, partially because the kids have been off school so we have been away on our summer hols ect and partially because I've gone self employed as an artist and have been swamped with getting all of that up and running.

Anyway here are a couple of my most recent paintings, both townscapes of my home town Doncaster, these were painted as part of a competition held in conjunction with our twin town Wilmington USA, the two winners of the competition will be going to Wilmington as part of a cultural exchange so it will be very exciting if I win!



To be honest I'm not overly happy with these paintings, but then I havn't painted townscapes for many years so I'm well out of practice.

I am however planning to do more townscapes as and when I get the time as I've really enjoyed doing these :)

Adams Hat

I've just finished this pastel portrait of my son Adam wearing his straw hat, I'm quite pleased with the finished image.