Magic of Mixed Media [269]
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I wrote this down beforehand in a note when I was thinking. Ooh. Here we go. When is it exploratory and helping you play and be experimental and lean into that trust?

And when is it a reliance in keeping you safe? Welcome to another episode of Art Juice. This is honest, generous and hopefully humorous conversations that will feed your creative soul and get you thinking with me, Alice Sheridan. And me, Louise Fletcher.

And this week we're going to be digging into the topic of mixed media. I'm sure there are lots of us who play around with this and if you don't maybe it could be something that tempts you into it. But first of all let's have a brief recap. What have you been working on? Real life working patterns of an artist.

What's included this week? Well, do you know, I have to just say, and I even made a note to remember to say this, isn't autumn fantastic in the UK? I always forget this.

I always loved it in New York because it's too hot for me there in the summer. So when autumn came, I could emerge from my air conditioned inside and come outside again. But here we always get, and I forget this, we get crap summer. It's depressing. It's raining. It's cold. And then September comes and

And we just get two months, September and October usually, of glorious weather and beautiful light and incredible. It's just the best. So I've really been trying to take some time to just be outside in trees, not up in trees, around trees. And looking at the sky and taking pictures of the sky, that leads me to what I've been working on because...

The place where I am currently, if you haven't heard, I'm working on renovating a property for use as somewhere for workshops and so on in the future. And it's in Cumbria, but it's in the lesser known part of Cumbria in the east, which isn't as dramatic as the Lake District.

But it's a landscape I didn't really know until I got this place and that I now love. It's a magical place and I can't really describe why. It's a very gentle place.

the scenery and but also so expansive the skies are huge and and because Cumbria's weather were it's really high up and it's ever-changing weather so you could literally just sit outside and watch the sky and the amount of times it changes in a day and

So I've been taking a lot of photographs just because I couldn't help myself. Like, oh, my God, look at that cloud. Oh, my God, look at the light there. And that then turned into, as it often does, me just wanting to make up.

And specifically going back to landscape inspired art, which I haven't been making for a long time. That's interesting. Yeah. And I had this part of me that was like, oh, you shouldn't be doing this because you moved on from this. No, no, I want to do this because I'm really excited. But I'm really at the early stages of experimenting with different media, which is hence the topic today.

And also different sizes of things and working a lot in sketchbooks and kind of working out techniques and processes like a beginner to see how I might, because I'm not interested in painting sky. Like the sky is better than anything I could paint if I'm going to paint clouds. Might as well just go outside and look at it. It's incredible. But I want to capture the feeling of it and the colors of it

And the way it shifts and the movement. And that's, this is what I always try and help my students to understand is it's a process. You've got to work out how to do that. So it's about finding the process that's going to work and the techniques and the media that's going to work. And it's not going to be,

I'd done some early experiments with acrylics and the way I normally work, and it's not going to be just acrylics, and it's not going to be the way I normally work. It's too dense, and this is shifting and subtle. So I've just been having fun, really good fun, and working out a new process, working out new techniques, working out new media, and there's lots to do on it. But I'm excited again, which is a nice feeling.

I think it's interesting, this little voice that comes up that goes, oh, I can't let myself do it because I'm going backwards. Isn't that funny? Because we're never going backwards. You're always coming at it from the point of now and everything you've learned since you were last exploring this as, I'm not even going to say as a subject, as a starting point for something. Yes. And it is my, I was thinking about,

Like I've lost a little bit of weight recently and that's made it easier to exercise, which I was struggling because I had gained quite a bit of weight. And so I've been out in the fields more, walking more, going up and down hills more. And there is a feeling that I get there that I don't get anywhere else. I can lift my mood instantly by being out in nature and walking.

why shouldn't I paint about that? You know, why should I tell myself that's not right? So, so yeah, that's what I've been doing. It sounds glorious. I'm not going to bore you with my week after that. Okay. Usually I'm the one going, well, I haven't had any time to do anything.

It's also not fair to say that it's been a boring week. It's been a delightful week in many ways, but it hasn't been creative. So, you know, I'm not sure how relevant that is really then for the podcast, other than to say sometimes there are weeks that aren't creative.

Exactly. And we're always like this. We're always on a, it's like yin and yang. If you're really flowing with paintings, I'm stuck. And also you've just finished a whole series, which is still on display. So you're bound to be not in that mode, I would think. Yeah.

Yeah. So I went down for a gallery visit for a day, which was gorgeous. It was just lovely to see them in that space. It's always different in person, isn't it? Like, it doesn't matter whether you've seen, like, I've seen that gallery on reels and, you know, I've seen the floor plan and I can imagine a space. It's always different when you're there and it's the same with painting. So yeah,

It was lovely. I think what I really appreciated was it gave me a sense of objectivity and distance from my own work that I don't usually have at that point where you've just finished it, because you're usually swept up in the finishing and the, you know, the excitement and the slight nerves about sharing things. But it was really nice to be able to go back.

and to meet everybody who came for the day, but also to see my own work from a, oh, I can really see where things are leading. And I've got, even though I haven't done it yet this week, because I have had other things that I have needed to be working on, I have got that creative, like, oh, I want to get back and see where this goes next. In a real, like, I can feel it in my body, like a real...

physical movement towards wanting to do it rather than just an idea of, oh, it will be nice when I go and do that. And actually that's, it's just a nice feeling, isn't it? So yeah, it's, it's been a, it's been a great week, as you say, blooming gorgeous weather. Mm-hmm.

Blimey gorgeous. We don't get the skies in quite the same way in London. And it is one of the things about living in a city that I miss is that kind of perspective and expansiveness. But yeah, it has been beautiful. Thankfully, we've got lots of parks and things nearby. So yeah, you get out and stretch. You get the benefits of a shop. Yeah, that's always nice. Yeah, you get to drive like 15 minutes to the to the shop and

So you get that benefit. You get things like a window cleaner. Someone said, oh, we did get someone to come here and wants to do the windows, but he thought it was too far away and he's not going to do it. And tonight I'm meeting two friends. We're walking to a lovely local cinema. We're going to see Lee, the film with Kate Winslet about the...

war photographer so it's no doubt going to be really cheerful and uplifting but I really want to see it so I've got three of us together to go and see that right let's crack on mixed media we've both used mixed media why now what do you want to bring as a question or exploration around mixed media how's it come up

Well, partly because of the work I'm doing in my sketchbook, where I finally found a sketchbook that can really take everything, and I had to pay for it too. Okay, you're going to have to tell us what it is. It's a Saunders Waterford, and it's a big square. I don't have it with me, so I can't tell you the exact size, but it's a big square one.

And the paper is hot press. You can get cold press or hot press, but I got hot press watercolor paper, which is taking gesso and watercolor and acrylic and everything. Hot press is the smooth one, right? Yeah, that's the smooth one. And it's, I can't remember how much it was, but I want to say, you know, the price of a small car. I don't know. It was like 50 pounds or something for a sketchbook. And it's got deckled edge pages and,

And at first I was afraid to use it. But anyway, having that beautiful paper, which will take anything. Also, the other thing that brought it up is, as I'm currently teaching as well in my course, there's a lot of questions from beginner artists who were struggling, for example, with watercolour. Well, I can't do your assignments in watercolour because you ask for layering.

Meanwhile, I'm doing layered watercolour in these books as well as using other media on top. And there's a real... As I'm doing certain things in the sketchbook, I'm thinking, oh, they'd freak out if they saw this because it's too adventurous. Like, for example, the watercolour...

I'd done some watercolour, some acrylic ink, and then I thought, I want some opaque areas, but I can't be bothered to go get some paint. So I'll just put some gesso into the watercolour and see what happens. And it mixed up like a kind of gouache type paint, which was fine. So I used that and putting on...

you know, I'm always getting questions like, can you put this with that? Can I use this with that instead of try it and see what happens? And then if it fails, you know, so the two things just brought it up to me. And I thought, you know what, we've never actually, I don't think we've done an episode on what we each mean by mixed media and anything we found that's really good and anything we found that doesn't work. And,

you know, just, just to kind of general discussion and also why, like why to do it or not. Okay. So that's a lot, isn't it?

So for me, for example, mixed media only work because it's like there are no rules then. Right. I don't like rule. Somebody said in our course, oh, well, I can't do this assignment you sent me because we're not allowed to use black in watercolor. It's like, who said you're not allowed to use black? Someone told them they can't use black in their watercolors. Yeah. And I'd asked them to use black. So that completely threw them off.

I don't like rules like that. I like using anything and everything and then just seeing what happens. It's interesting though, because in that, I've always found mixed media to be a way that opens up possibilities. Like you say, it lets me kind of explore, kind of mush things together in a different way. Like for me, it lifts any restraints.

And any kind of conditions around what counts, what's proper, what's allowed. I like that mixing in of it. And so it's always interesting when people come at it with this sense of, you know, there's a fear element in there, isn't there, of getting it wrong. And I think you're right. I think mixed media is the way...

It's the kind of the avenue that allows you to get it wrong. And by getting it wrong, you then discover, oh, wow, look what happens if I do that. And I also think the other thing, thinking about it now, that I find it very helpful for is it helps me notice my instincts in creating better things.

And what I mean by that is I think there is something in mixed media for me that gives me license to just stretch out my arm and reach for something, like reach for material and not get slowed down by, if I think way back to when I started painting and it was all about carefully mixing colors and learning which oil paint was more translucent than this. And there were a lot of rules about that.

And then when I started working in mixed media, it was like, I can just reach for a piece of paper. I can just reach for an oil pastel. I can just reach for colored pencil or a sponge or like whatever, like what is my instinct in this moment with this thing that I'm working on? What do I just feel that it needs? Grab it, go for it, use it. And I think that,

the that noticing and like what am I reaching for has been really helpful in my art when so there have been times where I've noticed okay I keep reaching for something graphic to counterbalance what feels messy on my page or I keep reaching for something that is plain and smooth and

as a counterbalance. Or I keep reaching for something dark because I have a sense that it needs something dark and the colours I'm mixing, I'm not quite being brave enough to go heavy enough. Or the opposite, I keep reaching for something light, lighter papers, neutral papers, because what I'm mixing ends up being too intense in colour.

That is a really helpful part of mixed media for me. I'd never thought of it that way. I'd never thought of it that way. And where I thought you were going to go with that is what, what I also like about it, right? I have a terribly messy desk because I sit down when I'm working in my sketchbook. It's the only time I sit down to work and,

And my desk is just hideous, but I'm working in the sketchbook and I'm like, right, what can I see? Oh, there's a charcoal stick. I'll just use that. And so there's that side of it as well, which isn't as conscious and deliberate as what you're saying. Although of course you do those things, but you also just get that freedom to go, I'll just use that because it's there. There's a color pencil on the floor. I'll get that and see what that does. And yeah,

I really enjoy that feeling. I needed to find a sketchbook where I had the paper that could allow me to cover that up if it was wrong, if it just didn't look right. Because, but the other thing is, hang on before we go on, I just want to say, I think we're saying the same thing because I'm not talking about choosing it consciously. I'm talking about choosing it

Because you can see it. Yeah, I can see it. And it's like there is a speed element, you know, you could just pull it in. But almost then afterwards noticing, huh, look, I'm always reaching for this at this point. Or I keep being pulled towards wanting to use particular colours. Right. That's interesting. Yeah. What's that showing me?

Yes. So it's like a two-stage thing. Yeah. And when you find something that doesn't work, so when you work like this, you will find things that you go, oh, no, that doesn't work. Yeah. But it doesn't work sometimes in a really cool way. And I'd forgotten that I'd put some oil pastel down on this page before.

I'd forgotten it was oil pastel. I thought it was soft pastel because I was using both. And then I washed some acrylic ink over it and then it resisted.

But then it made a really cool effect. And I was like, oh, look, that's interesting. I used gesso and used that. And then I thought, what would happen if I put watercolor over gesso? Because you don't paint watercolor on gesso. So I wonder what would happen. It was quite fun. Yeah, all these lovely textures. And acrylic ink made different textures. So when something goes wrong...

You can allow it because anything goes. It's like a party. It's like an art party. Anything goes. And it made me think how much fun it would be, and I'm planning to do this when I get my new studio. I have a couple of art friends up there already, and I was thinking, wouldn't it be great to get everybody around, get out a whole bunch of stuff, and say, right, here, just let's play with these, and just chat while we're doing it, and let people know.

let people have that experience of freedom that I have when I'm doing it. And it's not the same for me at the moment. I'm much freer with these on paper. I kind of go back to, it's not that I'm not free on panels and canvases, but I go back to my old ways of working at the moment. And that's why I think I'm happy to be experimenting with mixed media on paper. Cause once I get

some ideas together then I can start applying that and get my mind out of my old way of working because this is different you know I don't use watercolor and learning how to make it do what I wanted to do that's not going to be a quick thing but um but I'm also not necessarily going to be forcing it to do what I wanted to do I'm using it as an initial layer and then bits of it show through at the end

But what it allows as well, I'm always banging on to my people about contrast, contrast, contrast. And I know many years ago you did a project. I remember you saying on Instagram about contrast and it's my favorite thing to talk about because it's such an easy way to think about how to improve paintings. And,

the contrast. So yesterday I was working with washes of ink, acrylic ink mainly. And then I thought what this needs is when I'm looking at the sky, there's always this bit of blue and it's so striking because it's the only bit usually amongst all these dramatic clouds. And I wanted, how can I make that really strong? And I was thinking acrylic paint would be very different from what I've got. But then I thought, no,

I've got these really soft Sennelier oil pastels that go on like butter and they're usually too soft for me. But in this situation, they just make the perfect contrast. It's so bright compared to what I've done. It's so thick compared to the thin. And when I put it on, I was literally making little noises that if anyone walked by, they'd think I was doing something I shouldn't be. I was like, oh, oh, oh, that's so good. Look at that.

Because mixed media allows you to have the contrast in texture or thickness or, you know, appearance that you can't necessarily get when you're using all one medium. Yeah, and that can also feel quite exciting and also quite daring. I think sometimes you have to be quite bold.

quite brave to do that. And I think that's where it's also another area where it's lovely to play with because there are ways, particularly if you're talking about collage, you can almost test things out. You can move it around. You can change compositions. You can see what feels right before you stick things down and glue things together.

So there's a lovely, playful way in that. But when you're talking about putting extra marks on with something like an oil pastel, perhaps over something that you've created with collage or in your case, this lovely luminous watercolour layer,

there's quite a risk there that you're going to like get it wrong on a mark or you'll spoil it. Or that experience is also a really good one. But I think, I think the joy is in the contrast, you know, it's that combination, isn't it? With like, I use it quite a lot when I'm out drawing. I've sometimes I use just pencil, but more often than not, I'll take watercolor with me. And it is that combination of, for me, the,

underlying areas and bleeds of color and shapes with the watercolor and then the linear contrast of you know a nice 6b pencil mark and that there's a kind of zing that happens yeah i'm interested though and i think way back actually to like design days it's just always interesting you bring in something smooth against something textural and

Can we have too much of it? I think that is, for me, that is possibly the risk of mixed media, is that there's an element that you just throw all the ingredients in and then you lose the clarity of any contrast. And for me, it can become too complex sometimes.

And that might just be my way of working and what I want to get from it. Because I do see people who like create, like, as you say, a very happy mayhem party. And there's all sorts in there, you know, fabrics and paper doilies and like, like incredible stuff. Yeah. So I think there are quite different extremes of how we can use it. And I think that's just an interesting thing to notice where you are now.

On the scale of how you want to introduce it into your work. I think you're a mind reader because that's what I was going to bring up next is that I noticed on my sketchbook pages, there were some that were, I felt like, listen to me, perfect. They were just exactly what I wanted. And then others, and it was usually, I was doing two page spreads. So the left-hand side was,

would get busy and messy and the right-hand side would be clear. I was like, oh, what I need to do is do a big sheet of paper and then cut it in half and keep the right-hand side because the left-hand side is always useless. But what was happening there was what you're saying, lots of experimentation but no focal points of clarity. Yeah.

And the way I'm working in my sketchbook, I don't want to get hung up on making every page great. I want to just use the pages that aren't great to say that's where I went wrong. So now on the next one, how can I adjust that?

And what can I try next? And then I'll try something. And each attempt, and some of them are on loose papers as well, but each attempt throws up another question. Yeah. The ones that are good, funnily enough, they don't throw up another question. They're just like, good. But the ones that don't work, it's like, ah, right. Okay. So I need to try this next. And...

So I like the ones that don't work. So I don't want to cover them up. But later on in the process, I might go back to the ones that don't work. And as you say, then you've got to clarify and say, which, well, I do. Not everybody does. I do because I do like some space to, it's supposed to be the sky. It can't be nuts. You know, it's supposed to be about nature. Nature is kind of quite structured and ordered, even though we don't think it is. So, yeah.

There's got to be some clarity brought back in. However, when I'm just experimenting, I'm happy to just leave it and say it was a lesson learned. Yeah. And it is. It's not gone wrong in that sense, is it? No. And if you work in mixed media on a canvas or a panel, obviously you can layer over what you've done.

Even if you've put oil pastel on, because this comes up all the time, can I put oil pastel under acrylic paint? And even if you've put oil pastel on, you can paint over it with acrylic paint. It won't be stable where the oil pastel is. But I found anyway, on a slight technical digress, but I found if I, when it's finished, if I seal it with lots of layers of acrylic medium,

It can't get back through all that plastic. It's in there. It might never dry, but it's not coming back out again. Yeah, it's almost like you've made a cling film.

Yeah. Or the top that's like pinning it down. Sometimes when it's on the surface, the oil pastel, and I put a layer of medium on top, I'll scratch and I can still feel oil pastel. I'm like, oh no, got to keep doing another one, another one until I can't feel it anymore. Until all I can feel is plastic and then I can put my varnish on.

But again, that is a perfect example where the oil pastel not being stable is something I really like because it provides a happy accident when later on you forget it's there and you do something else or I do a lot of sanding or scraping and suddenly it pops back through because it's not really stable.

I like that. And maybe, maybe one of my paintings in 30 years, maybe something will happen. It'll crack and the oil pastel will burst back through. But I always think, well, I'll be dead by then. And if, if somebody wanted to preserve one of my paintings enough to, you know, if, if I was Jackson Pollock or Van Gogh, someone's going to work on making it, putting it back. And if not, it really doesn't matter because we'll all be gone.

I think you just have to accept that if you're working this way, you have to welcome in the unexpected and that's going to be part of it. I mean, I remember once doing something with oil pastel and it was much quicker than 30 years. It was like two days and I'd used a really bright kind of magenta carmine oil pastel and

and I thought it was part of under layers and then I'd gone over it with an acrylic that seemed fine dried fine and went away for two days came back this bright pink had come through was it a gallery oil pastel because I've had that pink do that yeah it might have been yeah I've had that pink do that now you say it I remember and I was

I could not get rid of it no matter what I did. No, you can't get rid of it. So I had to kind of work with it and incorporate it into part of the painting. So yes, if I had really wanted it to be a particular way, you could argue that that would have destroyed that painting. And it was like, oh, okay, it's done that. Well, that's not exactly how I would have planned it. And also it has honestly been part of what has contributed to getting to this stage of painting. So how do I work with that now?

You know, I could choose to write that painting off or I could choose to say, OK, we've got some sky with bright pink in. Well, that's quite fun. Let's work with that. You know, and it's helpful in that way. I think it's helpful because it really does let you explore that responsiveness and perhaps relaxation around the edges. But I think the archival thing is.

is interesting because it does come up again and again that and the copyright issue like if you're including elements of other people's work the other copyright and collage archival comes up a lot yeah what happens if it discolors what happened i and i just think maybe i'm very blasé about this stuff but i think well then that's part of the artwork if it

If it changes, I mean, personally, I don't have collage right on the surface so that it would matter. It's always partly covered up with something else or whatever.

So it doesn't, it's not like I'm, if you were, if you were sticking collage pieces and that was the only thing your artwork was, then yeah, I could see why that would matter more because you don't want it to turn brown when it's supposed to be white. It won't have the painting will lose its composition. But when it's built into a painting, I just think it's part of it. If it ages and changes. Yeah.

And I've seen that people recommend that you, for example, paint your collage elements with UV varnish before you incorporate them. Personally, I can't see the point of that. I would use a UV varnish over anything that included collage anyway. So if it's going to do the job halfway through, it's going to do the job at the end too. Yeah.

Yeah. Surely. So that's about as much as I worry about that. I do think though, that there is something to be learned from this collage and including collage elements. And again, it goes back to a bit what I was saying earlier about understanding what you're reaching for and why, and whether there are other ways of doing that. So for example,

If you're always reaching for, say you're like, I often reach for graphic elements, right? I think it's part of my background. There is a precision to it I like. But if I'm reliant on something that is external for me coming into the painting or the piece that I'm making, right?

Is that something that I really want to lean into even more? Because there are artists who make whole, like all their art is gathered and brought together, collected collage bits of

paper and pieces from books but they really put their own slant on it they really kind of recompose them and torn them up and included them but I think there is possibly a risk where you're pulling for something because there is a nervousness in you that you can't create it from yourself

Collage elements.

Am I relying too much on something else that I'm bringing in rather than something that I create? Yes, I know what you mean. So I've seen people, they might have a collage and it might be a mixed media painting, but there's a bird painting.

Which is a photograph of a bird and it's stuck on. Yeah. And it's like, okay, but then the paint, the picture is someone else's photograph of a bird, not your interpretation of a bird or your feelings about a bird. It's just, here's a bird. And it's easier to stick that on than to paint a bird. Yeah. And it's very visually satisfying. Yes. Because the contrast between that and the abstract background is lovely. Yeah. Yeah.

But the bit, and so I'm not, I'm not discounting it at all as a process or as something to enjoy, but I would, I would be looking at it like, why, why have I picked this bird or flower? Like, why is this of interest to me? And how, how do, if that really is of interest to me, how do I really go down that route further? Otherwise it's just an element. Yeah.

I really enjoy it. I saw somebody, and I can't think of the name of the artist, who was taking that kind of element, but then hand painting parts of it over the photograph. And then the contrast was really cool because it was their painting style and a bit of photography. And I don't know the legalities of it. I'm sure it's not legal, but...

I think people worry about that too much. When I did those paintings that were inspired by Taylor Swift, I got all these messages saying, what if Taylor Swift comes after you? Cause you've used the title of her songs in your painting titles. I was like, if Taylor Swift ever hears about me, then I'm really happy. Cause then I've reached a level where, where I'm not currently like, I'm fine. I don't think she's going to come after me. But so I think that if you paint over someone's bird, the legality of it is, is,

is not really a problem anymore because now you've changed their original thing. Whereas if you just stick their, their photograph on, no, they'll probably never find you, but it's still ethically a bit dubious, I think as well. And it can be a great first step, but maybe that leads you into wanting to go out and do your own photograph. So like I noticed that I was doing at one point a while ago, you know, quite a lot of image transfers from magazines of buildings and things and,

So, you know, that prompted going out and photographing more of that myself. You're all photographs. And I don't have any concern about it. So, yeah, I think that's the question really. Where is it exploratory? I wrote this down beforehand in a note when I was thinking. Here we go. When is it exploratory and helping you play and be experimental and lean into that trust? Yeah.

And when is it a reliance and keeping you safe? Hmm. Do you think that can apply to things other than collage? Oh, for sure. Definitely. And I, and I think it's something that particularly I work, I come back to a question for me and my art a lot. And, and,

is this balance between, yes, we all love to do something that feels satisfying and, you know, gives us those, ooh, ooh, lovely moments. But, you know, actually after a while, when you know you can do something, you

Okay, where is that? Where am I relying on something so that it's no longer exciting or challenging or changing me, actually? Oh, because you mean if you knew that would be the outcome and you go do that thing, yes. Right.

I mean, there's got to be a little bit of that, hasn't there? Yes. There's always a little bit of that in any piece because you need to control people's react. Oh, you need to control what you're communicating in some way. But yes, I see what you're saying. If all of it is just, well, I know it's cool if I do this and this. Yeah. I mean, for me at the moment, it's very much a discovery thing.

And then there will be, though, when I've discovered how I can make this work for me, then I will be taking some of what I've discovered and trying it out on different surfaces and making bigger paintings. And for me, for a while, that will be exciting. But then after a while, there'll be a period, there'll be a point where it's like, yeah, okay, done that now. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's a fabulous thing for breaking down

breaking boundaries and breaking rules. And there are so many, I mean, you just have to go onto Pinterest, go onto Pinterest and search mixed media and collage and start creating and gathering, you know, your own boards and you'll see the variety of, you know, how people are using this.

It's a lovely thing. I mean, I come back to, I've got that tiny little book, which I haven't done anything in for a long time. And all it is, is collage. And it was deliberately started as a no drawing book when, you know, at a time when actually drawing and creating from scratch felt like too much, but just collaging. And it was just like colored strips often and patches from magazines. And it's, but it's, it, that little book taught me so much about, um,

what I wanted to create in my art that I think I still haven't fully understood.

reached by any means so it's a very interesting signpost for me is what I'm trying to say in a very random way. Yeah that's interesting because I've got a little sketchbook that's collage but it's for a different reason it's when I was starting out and I couldn't understand composition I don't have a design background design completely through me and so I made this little sketchbook which I haven't worked in either for a long time but it was

using collage paper to try and make compositions that were pleasing by putting dark and light papers together, because it's just easier than it just felt easier and something I could do in the house at night and working out, Oh, I like that composition. I'd sometimes draw on them, but otherwise it was collage papers. And I like collage for that, but the collage I use in my paintings is almost always to create textures that

of the paper when I sand back like because that is lovely especially old vintage paper when it was proper paper that was almost like cloth when you send it back it it literally melds into the panel it's not even it's not even a bump or raised up anymore but there's still a line where the edges of the papers are and I really used to enjoy doing that I haven't done that for a while but

But I personally don't like collage very often when it's showing mostly. And if it is showing, I really distress it in some way. So it's not a thing standing out from everything else. Yeah, it can get quite overpowering. What else is there about mixed media then that we haven't touched on?

that we need to talk about? I think, I think substrates like where you're doing this stuff. So every substrate that you use responds differently, as we know to two different media. And when you're working, say solely with charcoal or solely with acrylic paint, you get a rhythm and you choose which substrates work best for you. And I really love acrylics on wood panels. So that's what I do mostly. Um,

But now I'm on this, now I'm mixing all of these different things together, including watercolor and ink. It's about learning, well, what does happen? And I don't know yet because I haven't done it. What does happen when I put these gesso shapes onto a wood panel and then use watercolor and ink as my first layer? And then what happens on canvas? And is it different on raw canvas versus prime canvas? And is it different...

I mentioned to you last time that I was working on cardi paper. I always forget how much I hate that stuff because it looks beautiful. And then I try and use it. I hate it. I can't stand it. And then I got some other watercolor paper. I can't remember what it was, but it was horrible. It soaked up everything in a horrible way. And now I found this paper that's beautiful. So, and the paper that...

the person listening likes will be different because they'll be using different media and different layers. And so this is one of the reasons why I don't like being asked, like when I do a video or something, people say, what sketchbook did you use? It's like,

Well, it's kind of pointless to tell you. If you spend £50 on the same sketchbook I bought and then it doesn't work for you because you use the media in a different way, you're going to be really pissed off. So I don't like recommending things for that reason. Yes, it's expensive to keep experimenting and find the thing, but that's part of it, I think.

So you found this when you changed the way you were working with pain that you changed, I can't remember which came first, substrate or the way you were working that changed. A bit of both. I think it's very rarely...

The sudden and clearly defined change of direction, isn't it? It's a flowing, it's a flowing into, as you say, how you're using everything in your particular unique combination. I mean, I quite enjoy and want to do more of

I love collaging paper onto canvas because when you do it and you let it soak and stretch and then it dries, you get a really lovely, tight, smooth drum like surface, which is beautiful for painting and drawing back into the paint on. And I have all sorts of ideas in my head, like what is it like if I cover the whole canvas with this? What is it like if I just use it in elements?

What is it like if I paint underneath it first? So there's bright colors first and then use that as a neutral layer on top and tear back. I mean, it's always questions, isn't it? What is it like? What could it do for me? What can I discover? Like, am I interested in this? And that's why I think mixed media can be so much fun.

fun because I think it opens up all of those questions yes and that is what I find that going back to newer artists that it's so hard to get them to switch their mindset from is this the right thing to do to what could this what could happen if I did this

And then, oh, that didn't work. What could happen if I tried it this way? No, that wasn't it. In people who are new to painting, what happens is they try something that doesn't work and they go, oh, no, that means I'm terrible. That means I have no talent. That means I should just give up. That means, that means, that means. And then it gets really depressing. And then they start avoiding painting because who wants to feel like that all the time? Yeah.

So if you're going to dive into mixed media, you have to be willing to make some giant messes. Well, I think that applies to all of us. You have to be willing to do a lot of things that don't work to find the things that do work. But then when you find the things that do work, like yesterday, I'm still buzzing from yesterday because it was so much fun because things were working. And I think things were working because I was totally unattached to an outcome.

And so it was just working because I wasn't, didn't have anything in mind. And it is totally a work in progress, isn't it? That, I mean, that exploring your own comfort, it's essentially like what are your own comfort levels around, around risk, around judgment? Yeah. And are you going to let it, I mean, ultimately it comes down to, are you going to let it stop you exploring? Yeah.

You know, when you get into that state and we all, we all do it. Like when there's something new that we're trying, like we talked about this before, but when there's something new you're trying, you're never going to be very good at it the first time. Yeah. I was just, I was listening to something this morning and it was, they were saying, um,

Who was it? Oh, it was a friend who was talking about a speaker on stage and he was a basketball player, championship basketball player. He could like pitch a basket in from a distance and there was this performative. Can I still do it from here? If I get back, can I do it from here? Can I do it from here? And he had somebody up on stage, you know, trying to get the basketball in the hoop.

And, of course, first time he couldn't do it. So then he was giving him a little bit of encouragement and a little bit of tips on style and angle and approach and coaching and getting further and further back so that he was getting more consistent with getting his hoops in the basket. But also being prepared to go back and try it again in front of a whole crowd of people and get it wrong. And it's this, if you stop when it's failed, you just stopped, haven't you? Yeah. Yeah.

Like I was saying, the bad pages in my book are the jumping off points for the next thing. If you stop, where are you jumping off from? You have nothing to go on to. I just wanted to mention, but to wrap up perhaps, an artist just this morning in The Guardian, I came across this article. I've never heard of this artist. I don't know if you have. It's called Jack Coulter.

And apparently he's very popular with musicians and celebrities. And he, he has that synesthesia thing. So he paints music and his work is owned by the musicians. Who's, um, he's painted and, but in the article it says, um,

I feel music so much I want it to be expressed in my work. Canvases are placed on the ground. He rarely uses a paintbrush, and if he does, he uses the wrong end, the wooden bit. He prefers to utilize objects he finds lying around, including the backs of CD cases. As well as paint, he has experimented with turpentine, vodka, whiskey, and Coca-Cola.

It's like, okay, that's mixed media. And if you look up Jack Coulter and The Guardian, if you want to see these paintings, I think they're quite cool and abstracts. And he just paints what he sees in his head as he listens to the music.

But I love the idea. I don't think I'm going to try Coca-Cola or whiskey, but you never know. Might give it a go. That's quite an expensive use of whiskey. Although, mind you, the cost of glazing fluid, maybe whiskey's cheaper. I don't know. And it's a lot healthier use of whiskey. That's a fun experiment though, isn't it? To maybe write about your art as if you're a journalist five years in the future, discussing this time period in your art and what you were experimenting with and where it could lead you towards. Yeah.

Yeah, that would be cool. Okay. Let's wrap up then. Um, do you have something to share with what's inspired you this week?

I do. It's not uninspired. I've been sitting in front of the TV as the nights get darker. This time of year, there's too many good things to watch, so I can't keep up with everything. All summer, there's nothing to watch. And I only have time to watch one thing, and now there's a gazillion things. So I'm currently on Shrinking on Apple TV, and this is the second season.

I just think the best TV show since Ted Lasso. I love it so, so much. And it stars Harrison Ford as a grumpy psychiatrist. It's called Shrinking because it's about an office of psychologists. And, oh, I can't remember the main actor. Very attractive guy, but in a kind of normal way. He plays the...

the main character in a character. Anyway, this is like that, do you know that Monty Python sketch where they're like, you know, that woman who was in so-and-so with so-and-so, the thing, you know, the thing. Anyway, really brilliant shrinking Apple TV. There's a,

Go back to season one if you didn't watch it and watch season one. And if you don't have a subscription, get one for a month and watch them all and then scrap it. It's really, really good. And the reason it's as good as Ted Lasso is it's written by the same guy. Ah, okay.

I've still not watched Ted Lasso. That's my recommendation. Oh, you're so lucky. I know, I know, I know. We're gearing up. It's waiting for you. Gearing up to be an autumn subscription watch. Well, when you get Apple TV, you've got to watch Shrinking Ted Lasso and Slow Horses, apparently, which I've never watched, but everyone says that that's a drama about spies in the...

thrown out of mi5 and put into some graveyard for old spies um it's english it's set in britain apparently that's genius but i haven't seen that yet so those are the three things to see on apple

Right. Okay. Anyway, what about you? I have got something. It was a reel that I shared in my stories. I'll put a link in the show notes to it, but I will describe it for those of you who can't be bothered to go and find it. But it's the reel of a guy obviously about to cross the finish line of a marathon or some kind of race. Oh, I saw that.

And he's about kind of 10 foot and everyone else is just running over the line. And he is sort of 10, 15 foot away and he kind of slows down and he's dancing and he's kind of like really reveling in the moment before he crosses the line.

And it's just, it's just a lovely reminder and very fun. And of course they've put great music to it. So it's very uplifting, but it did make me realize that I have just been enjoying music so much more and also aware of how maybe we have different phases in our life with music. Like we all have that music from our teenage early twenties years that are obviously often have those really strong emotional ties and,

And then I've noticed that I'm enjoying different types of music now and discovering different types of music. And I'm thinking, for me anyway, there was a kind of bald, nothing years of music when I was looking after small children where I couldn't discover anything new. And I have no connection to that period at all.

Anyway, my inspiration for the week then is just music. What's your relationship to it? What are you enjoying? Do you listen to it enough? Are you dancing before the finishing line enough? I did a little happy dance last night just before my bed because I've got my HMRC audit 98% finished. Oh,

oh that needed a dance yes that does need a dance well when you get the results back that says you're okay then you need to dance this i need to it's actually worked out really well because you know i discovered i discovered a whole bunch of um costs for an exhibition stand that because it hadn't come through my usual process of email invoices i haven't included them oh i've got like

Extra. So it's all going to work out in my favour, I hope. Note to self, better accounting systems.

So that's it. We will wrap up. You can find out what we are doing on Instagram. Louise is at Louise Fletcher underscore art, and you will find me at Alice Sheridan studio and our websites and links are in the show. Next. We will see you next time. Have a happy week. Bye. Bye. Bye.

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Thank you.