Something dark & magical

Legend was one of my favourite childhood films.  I must have watched at least 10 years later than when it was made.  I love some of the sets and the costumes. 

Althoguh a lot of it is very cheesy, including the lines and acting, there are some parts of the film that capture something......something that I feel or sense in my dreams.  Other places, other worlds, full of magic and full of mystery. 

You know nothing John Snow!

Ok, so you will only get why this is funny if you like cats (specifically Grumpy Cat) and if you're familiar with Game of Thrones.  This sentence is repeated quite a lot in the book.....too much.   It seems like the editor should have stepped in to take some of it out, but hey, at least it led to this great grumpy cat pic! 

More Winter

 At first the head dress was going to be a half-circle, then after seeing some great reference photos of other traditional Russian headdresses, I changed my mind.  A different shape suited this character better......but painting over the headdress I'd already started was very, very tedious!!

Lumionous Skies

Unfortunately I don't think I can post the photos here in case of copyright issues, but I have provided a link below which will show you photos on the BBC news website.

We hardly ever get to see the Northern Lights here in Britain, but some people captured some amazing scenes recently in the skies.  The second photo looks like it could be a scene from Harry Potter on Privet drive...........maybe there are witches & wizards battling with each other in the skies above!!

Enjoy! 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26378027

Winter

Winter is slowly going away, relasing its grip.  Time to show a painting I've been working on this winter.  I'd been wanting to paint this for a while, but it never seemed the right time.  I needed to paint it in winter, since for me, this painting is a kind of personification of winter.  It was also inspired by a track from a artist called Grimes, which I'll post later on.

Here's how the painting started, just with a drawing on paper, and later a drawing on canvas.  There's bad lighting I'm afraid because there isn't much of it in my house in winter!  There's only so much you can do in photo editing without losing detail!

Anyway, here's the start of it - 

Sochi design

I'm not into watching sport at all, not even the Olympics, but this Sochi design is worth a look.

 


 As well as being vibrant and colourful, this patchwork is supposed to represent all regions of Russia, drawing inspiration from various traditional textiles from different regions.   The people at Graphic Art News have produced an interesting piece about it -

http://www.graphicart-news.com/the-olympic-patchwork-quilt-sochi-2014/#.UuOmdfYo7-k%29



 

Shchedryk

It a bit late to still be listeing to Chstimas music right now.........but this carol is enchanting.

Most people will recognise it from the Home Alone films, but this carol is actually a Ukrainian carol called Shchedryk, and is mesmerising and stunningly beautiful in this version by a Lithuanian Choir.  Enjoy!