A lot of work …

but nothing to show for it – in blog terms, at least.

I spent all yesterday afternoon assembling the ‘A3 and smaller’ stuff into the A3 portfolio, and this morning doing the same for the A1 stuff. Not that there is that much of it – but by the time I’d mounted it and punched holes in it and written my evaluations on it – it took a couple of hours at least.

This afternoon was spent assembling and mounting:

1. samples from artists’ sketchbooks – which I knew I had to do
2. and linked examples of their finished work – which I didn’t. [When all else fails, read the marking criteria.]

Of course the samples I had already found for 1. had to be rethought in the light of  2. The printer has been working overtime – and of course good quality print outs use up a lot of ink - so it is all finished bar printing out another copy of a Raphael fresco, because the first one changes colour part way down.

I did make two discoveries in the course of all this – well, discoveries for me, I’m sure you know all about them.

One was Henry Moore's ‘Shelter Sketchbook’ on the British Museum website- drawings he made during WW2. If I could draw a tenth as well as that I’d be a happy woman. I think they are magnificent – and perfect for my purpose because some of them show ideas for sculptures.

The second, also via the British Museum, was Samuel Palmer’s sketchbook – quite different in style to Moore's, and strangely modern for the 1820s. [I love the way the website says the book was ‘bound originally in sheep’.]

According to Wikipedia, Palmer influenced two of my favourite artists, Eric Ravilious and Laurence Whistler. Mrs Cheddar introduced me to Whistler’s glass engravings, [here’s an example]  and now I’ve really looked at Palmer I can see the relationship.

So tomorrow – after spending an hour with my lovely but expensive hairdresser – I will print that Raphael out again [useful article in the Guardian yesterday about the importance of a Raphael cartoon and why we should prevent it being sold abroad], write some more evaluations – and start thinking about the next deadline …