Hi, my name is Nikki Brown. I recently joined WNAA after a friend of mine who I had lost touch with, Esther Marshall, contacted me having seen a painting of mine on social media. The painting was of Hunstanton lighthouse, the result of a competition I staged on several FB pages during lockdown. 

We have all had such different experiences during lockdown. It would be interesting to compare how this has affected our creativity. I don’t know about you, but initially it seemed to suppress my freedom of expression and motivation and I had a real ‘block’. All that extra time and freedom to concentrate on painting and I couldn’t produce anything! Almost in desperation I joined a free online course suggested in Update – Louise Fletcher, ‘Find your Joy’ – and the very simple exercises she suggested bounced me right back to the way I love to work. (More about this course in the next issue of Update.)

click on images to enlarge them

I was asked how I did the cat and robin layered papercut.
For this article I have simplified the stages, number of layers and individual pieces used.
From a master drawing, on A4 (60gm) tracing paper I traced guidelines to create a 10” x 7” image (inclusive of 1/2” bleed all around) to be cut down to a 9” x 6” finished image.

Debbie 60th birthday Oil on board.

I paint because I enjoy it – not because I’m good at it.

This title was paraphrased from a T-shirt I saw about playing a guitar, which I also happen to do with a fairly amateur level of competence. So, I thought the sentiment was particularly relevant to me and my painting.

Thinking Deeply

I have been thinking about an ‘abstract’ image for the next online show and have made a choice.

Last Tuesday evening I was sitting out on our terrace, with my back facing west towards the setting sun and looking towards the east. 

Several friends have asked me where the idea for my “inside looking out” box came from. It may be of interest to members of WNAA as it clearly illustrates how, over many years, you can store visual information, and much later, use it creatively.   

I have been asked to put a few words together to run through the thought processes that I go through before putting paint to canvas!

Unlike most members I am not trying to make painterly representations
of the world around us.

I seek to present visual references to what I call InterActions between the physical world and our emotional responses – to curves, volumes and colour masses, hills, holes and hollows – stroking the senses of touch and feeling.