Film of the seals from yesterday, swimming, on land and calling.

As well as sketching yesterday I did take my camera, so have uploaded some film clips of seals. I love the seal who played in the sheltered pool.

If you listen you can hear them calling.

Seals, sunshine, sketching 2

When I was younger I would draw all the time. Now for the first time I am learning how to look sharper, better. Leaning about how drawing is memory, is seeing, is learning. Simple lines capture shape.

Almost finished.

The painting of the puma has been leaning against the wall in my studio for a while. I was going to scrap it. Then a family came in to wander around and look at things and the father said something about the painting. Out of all of the things that were there. It pulled me up, made me look again, and so now 'I am Cat' is almost finished.

Meanwhile while at Art in Action I got together with Catherine Hyde, Hannah Willow and Tamsin Abbott. There was much laughter, but also a plan. So now we have the beginnings of a small group. We will exhibit together, at least once a year we hope. In the meantime you can wander through our studios and see our work on facebook at The Sisterhood of Ruralists.

An Open Letter to Mr Daunt

Dear Mr Daunt
For a while now I have been musing on what it is that makes a person a 'reader'. I have watched as government schemes to encourage reading have come and gone, even been a small part of some of their campaigns, but always somewhat discouraged by their thinking.
The only conclusion that I can come to is that what makes readers out of people is good stories. Yes, you have to learn to uncrack the code of the alphabet, but once you have that trick what you need is stories. Stories that have the power to transport across time, to different lands. Stories that catch you up tight in their alphabet nets and hold you until the world around you falls away and you become a part of the pages.
These come from writers, and from painters, through pictures books that catch at the hearts of children to novels that dash and rage at the souls of adults.
Like you I believe in the power of the book to continue through these changing times. But I would ask you this. Please will you support us authors in what we do by paying a fair price for our work. Do not demand the 50 and 60% discounts from our publishers that push down our royalties so far that we cannot make a living from our drawing and dreaming. Help us to inspire new generations into the love of books.
So very many writers find that they have to work at other jobs in order to make a living. This is not wrong, for if we lock ourselves away in our towers made only of words then where will we find the inspiration and the empathy that we require to feed our souls. But I ask only this, a fair wage.
Thank you.


Other thoughts on what makes our children into readers:
1. Example. If your children see you reading then they will see this as a worthwhile activity and become curious to discover what the pleasure is that you find between the pages of a book.
2. Sharing. So many people will sit and watch a film together but few these days will sit together and share the pages from a book. As our children grow older we forget that we can still read books together.

More thoughts on how to make readers out of our children are welcome through comments.

Auction of Artwork and Free Books for Schools.

Press release from Amnesty International.
 EMMA THOMPSON MAKES UNIQUE HUMAN RIGHTS GESTURE TO MARK START OF NATIONAL CHILDREN’S BOOK WEEK

Emma Thompson is one of three Amnesty supporters who have donated nearly 6,000 copies of Amnesty International’s award-winning book We Are All Born Free to primary schools across the UK.

The renowned author and actor is a long-term supporter of Amnesty International and her gesture will mark National Children’s Book Week, which starts on 3 October.

The book is a collection of 30 beautiful illustrations, each of which represents one of the 30 articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – the document that is a foundation stone of Amnesty International.

Among the top illustrators who took part were Axel Scheffler, who illustrated The Gruffalo, Korky Paul of Winnie the Witch fame and multi-award-winning John Burningham.

Every primary school in the UK can apply to receive their free copy via the Amnesty website www.amnesty.org.uk/primary. To enable as many schools as possible to get this resource, Amnesty is asking schools to only pay for the post and packaging.

In addition to the book, the schools will also receive a copy of Amnesty’s excellent new primary schools resource Learning About Human Rights in the Classroom, which contains innovative lesson plans that enable teachers to explore human rights and use We Are All Born Free in the classroom.

Emma Thompson said: “Human rights mean a great deal to me and I’ve been a keen supporter of Amnesty International for years. I was hugely impressed when I saw their delightful book We Are All Born Free, which explains the importance of human rights through truly beautiful illustrations.

“It is clear, simple and uplifting and makes it very easy to raise difficult subjects, even with young children. It is a wonderful educational tool and I strongly believe that every school should own a copy.

“There is something about story-telling that is integral to well-functioning human society. Stories have tremendous capacity to engage our imaginations and to inspire empathy and understanding. I hope that, in the long run, exploring the stories contained in every picture of We Are All Born Free will help children to become tolerant and compassionate human beings, who fight prejudice and stand up for the rights of others all around the world. That is why I am supporting Amnesty in this initiative and I really do hope that primary schools will take up this amazing opportunity.”

The original artwork from We Are All Born Free will be exhibited at Amnesty’s Human Rights Action Centre, 17-25 New Inn yard, London EC2A 3EA for one week from from 9am-5pm, 26-30 September. This exhibition is free and open to the public.

Many of the illustrations in the exhibition will be available to buy, in a unique opportunity to own original artwork by some of the world’s top illustrators. All proceeds will go to Amnesty International. 

Above is the page from We Are All Born Free that was my contribution. It shows Max relaxing with a child in a hammock. You can bid for this and a selection of other pieces either on teh day or by phone or email at The Illustration Cupboard. 

Seals, sunshine, sketching.

It was good to feel the sunshine on skin as I sat above the beach of seals sketching. Good to sketch from life, though difficult balancing on the cliff top with glasses and binoculars, sketchbook and pencil. Beautiful to watch the seals and hard to pull myself away and back to the studio.

Astonishing things.

1. Jon Mayle has made a clock that looks just like the clock on the endpapers of The Cat and the Fiddle. For me it is strange and magical to see this 'made real'. The clock will be exhibited at The Imagine Gallery, Long Melford, Suffolk, for an exhibition themed around nursery rhymes, opening on 8th October.

2. Dropping Hannah off in town yesterday I heard someone talking about the van. It was a family on holiday. I stopped to talk before heading off shopping. The mother had made a cake based on one of the images in Tell Me a Dragon for her son's birthday. So lovely. The dragon curled around the sleeping child. I asked her to send me a picture so that I could put it here. She did.

Jane Ryan and the Ship of Fools

Icon

Too long

My list grew and grew until it became too big....
1. Hang washing out
2. Draw cat for cover ( still thinking about this one, as it is a tricky balance)
3. Draw wild cat
4. Hang more paintings on the walls ( the house is an obstacle course of huge drawings and paintings in frames waiting to go to Oriel y Parc in October)

Meanwhile I have work on display at Theatr Gwaun in Fishguard, in the theatre foyer.

5. Text Sophie and drop off the last of the calendars.
6. Stretch paper.
7. Put away the logs.
8. Sweep away the dust and the dirt from the studio floor and think about finishing painting the walls.
9. Send more images to Jane for the book.
10. Finish the Dream of Six Kingfishers and put together film.

Meanwhile the endpapers are now done for I am Cat and only two and a bit spreads to go. Soon I will be moving on to East of the Sun and West of the Moon.