Searching out and finding it there all the time in the slow and silent time between Christmas and New Year: finding a new direction. Not all who wander are lost….

I treated myself to a lovely Mary Fedden book for Christmas and haven’t been able to put her down. Whilst at this still point of winter where I sometimes sit in an uncomfortable art fug, trying to peer into my future art direction, I decided to look at painting, as she did, some entirely domestic items. 

Having also purloined (gifted to self) some rather juicy Holbein gouache tubes and hauled myself from a mince-pie eating stupor, I played with a small painting in the manner of Fedden, only 18 x 13cm which suits this medium. It’s called ‘Julia’s Tea Light’ – still the usual bird theme, rather decorative and still using a bit of imaginative daydreaming as is my way.

I think it would translate well into a larger oil painting; when I enlarged it to print it out, the brush strokes showed nicely. I do love the way gouache paint can mimic watercolours (in the fat end of the squash) and opaque oil, all one one handy travelling palette…

… and travelling is coming up – so I am thinking I might take these materials to France in January where I am house sitting for a couple of weeks in the Languedoc (animal rights you know!) to explore the landscape and the domestic (there may be cat paintings of George and Zuzu and there are those beautiful Langedoc floor tiles!).

Then I was also thinking about how I often use my iPad to change my physical work on paper and whether I could develop some kind of studio diary in the future. I am completely inspired by the lovely studio journals of Mrs. Bertimus (I am fortunate enough to have purchased one of her beautiful paintings for my lounge) and although I can’t say that I can match her prowess in the tech side, I had a go this afternoon and think I might continue on in this way and perhaps show some here. Something like this:

Anyway I can see that it will unfortunately lead to any members of my household finding it even harder to catch my attention in the New Year, but when I am travelling I think I am going to like the combination of physical and digital. I am finding writing is an increasingly useful way to explore the scrapings from my mind which usually dance away into the atmosphere to somewhere I know not where ….

Will you join me in this diary form and follow along ? Thanks for reading – I appreciate knowing you are there. A great place to follow my posts is on Substack where I am enjoying a longer form of writing. Here is the link

https://clarewassermann.substack.com

You can comment here or over there! Substack is a lovely platform – no ads and no algorithms

That’s all for now – see you soon! – love Clare