Painted hearts and beaded Valentines

Looking for something to buy your loved one this Valentine's Day? Look no further. I have a range of heart canvases up for sale in my DaWanda shop. Click the link to go there:

http://en.dawanda.com/shop/Sneddonia




There will soon be hand painted cards in the same style.

I also have pendants, suncatchers and even a little heart hook for sale in my Etsy shop. Click the images to go there:



Happy Valentine's!

New Year, New Art

So what have I been up to since I last blogged? Working very hard for Acme Jewellery, mostly. But all work and no play makes Jen a dull girl, so I've had a few decent nights out too, including seeing Madness on the 12th Dec and Aladdin (a panto starring John Barrowman) on 20th Dec. Yayness! With them, plus Bill Bailey and Alice Cooper, I've had a busy winter :D

I started a new project in the Christmas holidays too. The actual paintings have nothing to do with this, but me starting to paint again was inspired by reading Anthony Keidis's autobiography. He described how he and the rest of the Chilis lived in a house while writing Blood Sugar Sex Magik, and that John would be painting in his room there. Just the word 'painting' made me want to paint stuff, so the next day I started off a new sketchbook of paintings, little ideas for future canvases.

The first page of the sketchbook is a version of this canvas (click the image for a little more about this piece):



Using that canvas as inspiration, I painted a similar scene in watercolours and acrylics:



I traced the outline of the tree onto a piece of acetate with a marker, then added to this using copper-coloured glass outliner. I cut a hole in the top of the plastic, then attached it to the rings of my sketchbook with black ribbon.







The next page. Painted in watercolours:



When I was in college, a few years ago, one of the things the tutors had us doing was drawing the negative space around a figure, rather than the figure itself. I've come back to this idea, painting the sky around the tree rather than the tree itself.

I'll have more of these soon, plus some canvases and Valentines cards based on them.

I love rock n roll

Indeed I do. It's been a while since I last blogged, and what a time I've had since. I started a great job making jewellery in August, so I've been having fun there. Not only that, but I saw Joan Jett, Motorhead and Alice Cooper on the 10th of November. I also saw Bill Bailey last Friday. What can I say, the man is sheer brilliance. And I'm seeing Madness on the 12th December. Yay! And then it's Christmas! I'm a happy bunny.

Talking of Christmas, I have lots of Christmassy goodies for sale on Etsy. Click the image below to go to my shop:



Check the "Christmas" and "Beaded Suncatchers" sections for things to make your tree and the rest of your home look gorgeous.

Happy shopping!

New job, and more ACEOs

I went for an interview yesterday, for a Jewellery Assembler job at a place called Acme Jewellery. (No, Wile E. Coyote is not one of their customers.) I didn't really know what to expect, as I've never had an interview for that sort of job. I've had so many interviews for retail jobs, so I pretty much know what to do there, but this was different. So I didn't know how to prepare, which made me nervous. Luckily, my enthusiasm for the job must've shown through, because I got it! It was an interesting interview, because they not only interviewed me, they also took me into one of the workshops and showed me what they did. I did a bit of soldering and whatnot, then they asked me a few more questions. Questions like "Could you start on Monday?" To which, I of course said yes! I'm so happy, since jewellery making is my dream job :D

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Recently, I also managed to list the last of my ACEOs:



Which are, of course, for sale in my DaWanda shop.

UK Street Team on Etsy

I'm a member of Etsy's UK Street Team, (although I really don't do enough promotion!). Some members of this street team are doing a trunk show at Etsy headquarters in Brooklyn, New York. To raise funds for this show, and other events, they've opened a UK Street Team shop. Click the banner to go there:



There are some amazing items there, including beautiful jewellery by Kalicat, BlueMarmalade and Sakurajewellery, a cute little zip-up bag by Urbanknit, fantastic collages by Rosehip71 and Bunny, a pretty little pin cushion by Bombus, a gorgeous felt flower brooch by charlottenarunsky and an ace Little Mr T by Kezzaroo :D

My first art cards

I've just listed a new ACEO diptych in my DaWanda shop. It looks like this:



and is for sale here.

It's a mini version of a favourite composition of mine, which I've used here and here. It depicts a tree spreading across two cards. The first card shows one side of this tree in daylight, and the other shows the other side of the tree at sunset. The tree on the daylight side has been painted using a mixture of copper poster paint and black acrylic, giving it a metallic sheen that looks different in varying light. The sunset tree is in silhouette, painted in black acrylic, a striking contrast to the bright acrylic colours of the setting sun. As I believe is standard with ACEOs (I did say these were my first!), both of my cards measure 6.5cm (2.5") by 9cm (3.5").

I've also painted a circular art card, on display here:

New on DaWanda

My latest DaWanda products, pictured below, include Purple Rose, Purple and Green Fire, Darkshines, and my newest listing, Dark Day:





The diptych "Dark Day" is actually a mini version of a previous artwork of mine, Dark Day and its Sunset. That piece is no longer for sale (I love it too much!) but if you'd like a similar one, I'm more than happy to paint that for you :)

Watch this space, I guarantee there'll be more art coming soon, including a Blue Rose painting and more trees.

Thanks for looking!