Soon to be a Bee Keeper

I am almost, very nearly a Bee Keeper. My friend (& neighbour) and myself have a bee hive. It has been cleaned, prepared and ready to go for the last 2 years. We had both gone to Uni as mature students and this year sees my friend Graduate too and we are now in a position to go ahead. So the phone call has been made, order placed tomorrow and we’ll be eating our own honey next year, with any luck.

I have been so excited, I love Bees. They are fabulous things, we NEED them and Me & the Family love honey, so it’s a win win! I had to do a piece about Bee Phobia or Apiphobia or Melissophobia. I like the latter better as it is a reference to the bees love of Lemon Balm (Melissa officinalis) which is similar to, but different from Bee Balm, which is a type of Bergamot (I think).

Anyway, as a balance to making the phobia piece, I wanted to make something which celebrated Bees. I have been heavily into Typography/fonts for a while, learning all the time, and wished to use text in some way and I wished to combine all of this with my brand new shiny Graphics Tablet. The result was realisation of a concept which started with a letter B based on one from Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow. Brilliant Film, Loved the illustrations by Arthur Rackham for it which I saw in the Chris Beetles Gallery in London and I admire the way Mr & Mrs Burton (apologies Helena BC) live their lives. I would ‘Heart’ being able to live next door to my partner. I could go visit him when the mess gets too much at mine 🙂

Any way, you can see the influences. So after a few hours perfecting the letter shape needed, working it into a bug/bee and making various brushes, I got to work drawing on my Graphics Pad.

There is nothing quite like the first time I suppose, to draw on a surface and leave no mark is something reserved for mono prints or niche techniques. As someone who likes to doodle and sketch on paper, this was a new and slightly unnerving experience. This was unlike anything I could conseivably create by hand and the nature of digital allowed for changes and steps back you just can’t take with pen or paint. Some hours later, well maybe a couple of days, I produced the following image. I have an A3 print of it at home as it reminds me what asking questions and perseverance can do for you. Hope you enjoy it 🙂

Mono Print & Mixed Media Plane

Mixed Media Art Print

I used this to develop a mixed media canvas of the same image.

This is one of my abstract illustrations. Drawing from static aircraft at RAF Cosford & inspired by the shear volume of rivets holding this thing together.