Old Leaf New Work

Winter has come to Coldstream, but it hasn’t managed to devastate the new shoots yet.   I went out in the dark and my feet were crunching on what felt like soft glass fragments, I didn’t realise what it was until the morning. Snow has nearly all gone now, except for a ring of white hills against the sky line.  I spent the afternoon in my studio, playing around with gouache and crayons and pencil, and at last started to get some idea of how I might make the illustrations for a new picture book. I have been looking at other people’s pictures in some books about the techniques of illustration, and after what I thought was a pretty organised rough, realised the placing of the text was all wrong. Now the words and pictures are one entity. It has been such a luxury not to have to deal with deadlines, unpaid bills, lack of materials, chaos, frustration.  I have always enjoyed working, but “Work” gets in the way sometimes. Something seems to be emerging at last.