“Rose Alike” – Belinda Lindhardt
Artwork size: 44   X 68 cms
Framed: 78  X 91cms

I think we are done

This artwork will be on display and for sale this coming weekend at the Central Coast Grammar School Spring Fair Art Exhibition.

Details to come

“Rose Alike” - (Temp name) Work in Progress

Where did July go?

It seems somehow I lost a month somewhere in there, I can’t believe its really August is time speeding up or is it just me?

As I mentioned in my last blog post, during the past month or so I have been locked up in “webdesigner” mode redeveloping the Australian Coloured Pencils Website.

The site redo has been a really interesting process for me. For once in the 14 years I have been building websites I became my own client. Frustrated with the fact that it took longer than had been anticipated, annoyed with the fact that during this time WordPress decided to upgrade its version so it meant all sorts of conflicts and problems with plugins after I had already spent hours getting them working how I wanted. As well as trying to keep my members happy during the upgrade process and them experiencing errors that I wasn’t experiencing. Having issues with the “way” things worked wasnt quite how I really wanted them to work but limited by the functionality and trying to tie mulitple plugins and functions together.   Fun fun fun.
During all of this I kept remembering the 80/20 rule. As long as the site was 80% right then that was good enough I could fix the other 20% after. This is VERY hard for me to do as I am a bit of a perfectionist (not in a good way) as it comes to these things.

ARTWORK: As you can see I have started a new artwork as per the above. It’s my biggest coloured pencil work to date  – 68cmX44cm, and its being created in preparation for an exhibition I have coming up in September.   I hope to be having 4 coloured pencil pieces exhibited. I think it will be interesting to showcase a few various sizes and pieces in a show like this – stay tuned for the details.

I am also videoing this one as I work – those of you who follow me on facebook will have seen the video already. I hope to compile all the video together on completion really interested to see how it turns out.

Here is the video as posted on facebook a little while ago.

“Life’s Lessons” – Belinda Lindhardt – Acrylic on Canvas
Copyright 2010

As we grow we teach others our life’s lessons learnt.

In our passing our teachings will continue to grow in those generations yet to come.

Those lessons learnt are our legacy that will live forever.

Progress on my latest work: As you can see,  I have added lots more layers of colour particularly on the yellow pear and some of the red.

For Artists: One of the things when I am at this stage of working is to be always checking my values.  I constantly check a black and white reference of the pears just to make sure I have the values of the shadows in the right position and that they are dark enough.
It’s really important with a round object like this to also use  pencil strokes in direction of the contours of the object you are creating.

This is where it’s really important to have knowledge of how the object is 3D / real life.   I tend to imagine how that curve is rather than try to copy what is on the photo. If I was to copy exactly what i see on the photo then  I would get a very flat looking piece.
This is why drawing from life regularly is so important even though you use  a photo as a reference in your final artwork, its important to understand how something REALLY is in order to capture that.

This is my first coloured pencil piece where I think I am going to leave a lot of the paper white. In most of my pieces i will  generally cover all areas of the paper but  I don’t think it needs it in this instance, we will see how it progresses when I get further to the end.

That’s it for now, on for more layers.

Anyone for pencils ? June 2^nd Workshop 2010

Last Wednesday we had a really great coloured pencil workshop.

I covered an Introduction to Coloured Pencils,  which means my participants got to colour in a bunch of boxes and circles. – hehehe
In this introduction workshop I  try to cover important things when starting out in coloured pencil art covering things like paper, pencils other coloured pencil artists going onto things like strokes, blending techniques,  mixing colours etc. Participants don’t walk away with a completed piece but i hope they come away with some ideas and new ways of working and a understanding about how coloured pencil artworks come together.

It was really good, i had a great time, i am really enjoying the teaching process in these workshops, and its so exciting for me to see other artists getting excited by all they could create with their pencils.

In the next workshop which will be on the 16^th June,  I hope to get into some of the more advanced techniques maybe getting students to work on a section of a picture to get a feel for mixing colours, planning an artwork, perhaps getting to experiment with some other supports.

Busy busy busy, aren’t we all

The next few weeks I am a particularly busy bee, I have two coloured pencil workshops for the CCAS which I am excited about, plus I have also organized a Biggest Morning Tea at my studio here on the Central Coast on Friday 4th June  in support of the Cancer Council which I am hoping will be able to raise a few $ for a great cause and  is a fantastic reason just have a catch up.

I also have two paintings “Red Onions“ and “Luscious Pear“ down at Creative Courtyards “Eat Drink and Be Merry” Exhibition which starts at the beginning of June.

I am also very excited to have finally launched into my new business direction!!! WOO HOO Regular readers of my blog will know its been a longtime coming  but finally I have a plan and a new logo! and a new business name:

Art for license – sale and commission from the creative heart of Belinda Lindhardt

I am so excited about this new journey, i have been doing heaps of research and planning and working on this new area, it will be working in conjunction with my fine art but slightly different hence a different logo etc. All my years in design and business so far have been gearing me up for this I am sure of it and the more I do the more suited I feel I am towards this type of business so really excited to finally have a direction now the hard work begins.

And for those who are interested my new logo has been made up of line drawings by hand, watecolour by hand as well as digitally manipulating images and colours (see this is why i love it i can incorporate all of my skills). ”

Anywho you will be hearing more about all of this in the future.
If you are at all interested in either exhibition or workshop details please don’t hesitate to > ask

June 2010 Coloured Pencil Workshop

In conjunction with the CCAS (Central Coast Art Society), my workshops for the society are coming up on June 2nd & 16th 2010.

These workshops are some of the very few colouredpencil workshops using dry pencils happening in Australia and I am excited to providing these again, I hope some local coloured pencil artists and artists wanting to find out more information will come along and have a great morning of pencils.
Last year I was so inspired to have such a lovely group of people from all levels and teach them all about pencils and its been fantastic to see some of these artists exhibiting coloured pencil artworks following this workshop in both CCAS and various Sydney exhibitions.

This year I want to again try to cater to both artists who have had no coloured pencil experience as well as those who came last year so depending on how many we have of both on the day see how we go.  I will try to specify that if you are a beginner please try to come to the first workshop as I will cover beginner techniques specifically on that day.

I will also try to have some supplies for sale on the day such as stonehenge paper and some polychromos and prismacolour pencils. One reason being that you as can’t get prismacolors up here on the coast. If anyone is at all interested in purchasing anything else let me know ASAP so i can cater for it. I was considering perhaps purchasing some Zest-It as there were many people interested in this last year– anyone?

Time: 9:30am to 12:30pm

Location: Gosford Art Gallery – the Studios
32 Web St, EastGosford NSW

Cost: $10- Including Morning Tea

Date 2nd June 2010 – Introduction to Coloured Pencils

This workshop will be covering an introduction to using coloured pencils. We will cover different coloured pencil materials, artists, techniques, supports, skills and process used in creating coloured pencil artworks. In this workshop you will come away with an understanding more about working with coloured pencils as medium as well as being exposed to the basics in creating coloured pencil artworks.

Date 16th June 2010 – Continuing on with Coloured Pencil Artworks

This workshop is where we will go beyond the basics working with complimentary colours, planning an artwork more advanced blending techniques.
I will demonstrate my processes with various supports for different effects and speeding up work time. From this workshop participates will gain exposure to different ways of working with pencils used in completing a coloured pencil artwork.

Reference materials and photos will be supplied on both days, however if you have something specific you wish to work on please bring it along.

Materials: As a guide it is best to use quality artists pencils and good quality paper for pencil work or you will be frustrated with the results.
So please bring along:  Stonehenge paper - can be bought in large sheets at Eckersleys (cut down into more manageable sizes)  or bring along your best drawing paper.
Pencils: Either Prismacolour or polychromos pencils in at least 3 values of the 1 colour of your choice eg. light blue, medium blue & dark blue & white pencil.
Cotton buds for blending and makeup pads if desired.

I will have materials available for artists to “try” on the day and I will have a small supply of papers and pencils to purchase if you wish but not required.

You don’t have to be a member to enjoy the society so there is no excuse hope to see you there!

“Red Onions” by Belinda Lindhardt

I saw these glorious red onions at the vegetable shop still attached to their green bits   It’s rare that you see these like this and thought how great they would be to paint – I think I might be a bit strange to be inspired by fruit and vegetables…

Tuesdays are busy days around here and are the day of the week I put work aside for the kids (who can fit work in with all the running around with swimming school and wot not – so i just decided that it was my one day a week for them) -  Today I had the luxury while lego was being played to  spend a bit of time having a coffee, filing and listening to a recording of SmARTist Telesummit did this as I was listening.

Enjoy your Tuesday

I love illustration, its fantastic!

I especially love taking something like THIS which is a pretty strange little watercolour drawing (not supposed to be meaning anything at all)…

and using my mastery of digital skills and tools, (yes yes tooting my own horn but someone has to do it) turning it into something like THIS:

or THIS.

As its digital the possibilities are endless of what you could do to it and one simple little thing now has many uses! LOVE IT and its FUN!

Enjoy! Have a great day!