If you’re into vast skies and rolling hills covered with heather in bloom, exquisite man-made grey stone walls crisscrossing them, beige-grey stone houses with slate roofs in which you can just imagine the Brontë sisters writing their novels and, of course, sheep… Northumberland might be just right for you. (Read the fine print before moving…
Category: pigments
Dear Pigment, (a love letter)
As I needed a link so that readers of the wonderful Institute of Making‘ s newsletter could read the full version… there it is! Dear Pigment, I thought I would give you an update of where I’m at right now. As you might have understood from all my probing, I’ve been researching you for quite…
in bed with… natural pigments
I know, I know, there should be caps to Natural and Pigments. It just looked more yummy this way and in bed with… natural pigments, just the thought, hey? Bit messy perhaps but ever so colourful! (In the mood for real beds and natural pigments? check out my ochre blog page) The droughty, scorching summer is…
In bed with… She-who-whispers-to-the-ochres, Heidi Gustafson
Just as I cross the border from Canada into the States, the sun emerges from the lake on my right… It’s beautiful, and I’m early. I stop for a coffee with a sunrise view, then drive leisurely along little country roads enjoying the farms and the stunning colours of autumn in Washington state. Yellows, oranges,…
Pigments on my bucket list…
I always found bucket lists an idiotic first world annoyingly greedy ‘even-if-it-costs-the-Earth-I-want-to-have-it-all’ sort of thing. Until I realised I had one! Mine of course, haha, is of the more educated type. My wish list comprises to be able to touch the medieval manuscripts in the Cambridge collection and A. Boogert’s sole copy of his Traité…
in bed with… the Sennelier family
I could have subtitled this post “12 shades of grey” but perhaps, just perhaps mind you, it might have been going a little too far… and yet they exist: Cold grey, Blue grey, Light grey, English grey, Yellow grey, Grey green, Reddish brown grey, Medium grey, Violet grey, Grey deep, Payne’s grey, Charcoal grey… see…
In bed with… Ochre
Ochre? Ocher? I’ll choose the first spelling… No offense intended, ochre is simply more visually pleasing to me, in all probability only because it’s closet to the French spelling I have always been familiar with. Oddly in English (being the baffling thing it is) ochre and ocher are pronounced the same. Personal taste will make…
In bed with… Isabelle Roché & Margaret Zayer
Hard to believe Margaret is not a direct descendant of one of Renoir’s favourite model… perhaps that rather cocky girl tying the ribbon of her hat? Or that one leaning her whole body to better hear her lover’s words in her ear… Although today positively more in the vein of La Femme à la collerette…
In bed with… Daniel Smith
(Well, John Cogley really, CEO of Daniel Smith art materials and the man who, for all intents and purposes, has now become Dan Smith) Any reason that would require to go to Seattle I would probably have been game for… I’ve always wanted to go there and see for myself this city of which I’ve…
Calligraphy, the art of fin(er) writing – Part 1
At some stage in the Western world most of our languages made the switch to a restricted number of symbolically meaningless shapes which, combined, made the infinity of words we needed to share our ideas and our emotions. There are still variations among alphabets and it took a while to agree on the number of letters…
Pigments… from ancient recipes to ‘modern’ colours
I first discovered the PIGMENT store in Tokyo on the web… it arrived one morning in my daily Flavorpill (thank you guys by the way you do an awesome job of weaving an international artistic community), and after clicking on the link, instantly, just like that, I was in love! In a second I knew…
in bed with… Art
Sorry but when I get a chance in a million to interview someone called Art, I then find it impossible to resist this title! (Although, as his family name is Guerra, it did cross my mind to go “Make Art, not War” but then again… this is supposed to be a serious blog so… maybe…
in bed with mona lisa 