Red Roses

red roses oil on canvas

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I saw a girl in a yellow dress
She was prettier than all the rest
With hair dancing upon the breezes
That was as black as light can conceive
She ran upon the grass barefoot
And all the Gods did come to look
To see her dance upon the ground
But not a sound, no music found
For something seemed so very sad
In everything she said and had
Like a little butterfly in the night
No words of rhyme could ever feel
What beauty lost and hate did steal
Symbols of a race and clan
Shadows that erase the hand
Blood and death upon the land
Meaningless to all, but man

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More than eyes can see between you and me

oil on canvas

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Are we just pawns upon a board?
Just little puppets on a cord
Just picture within a frame
Just players within a game
Just candles that burn down
Casting shadows all around
Or are we the creators of
More than our own beauty and love?

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Do the atoms come together?

through the eye of a star

oil on canvas

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Do the atoms come together?
For our momentary pleasure
Or do we form them as we go?
Creating all that we may know
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Little specks in each you will find
That reflects all of humankind
Within the centre of the joy
In the heart of the girl or boy
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And every duality
Could be just one reality
The probability of fate
Ability to love or hate
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For there is more than one and zero
Between both Christ and Nero
For there is the gratitude of
The magnitude of love

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Could just a happy face

oil on canvas

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Could just a happy face
Create ripples in space
And reality begin
With morality within
For birds sing upon my roof
Creating their own eternal truth
So let the little swallow fly
And yesterday’s sorrows die
And infinity will bring
The birds to whistle and sing
And all life will embrace
The beauty and the grace
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Light and time

oil painting of Jupiter
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Light and time

Upon a Sea of Beauty
Move like words of rhyme
Caught in a moment of light
Then gone forever
From our sight

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This is one of my favourite

paintings

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A time to live

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A time to live
A time to die
A time to sit
And wonder why
But is it here today
And gone tomorrow
Or is it more
To do with love
And sorrow

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watercolour and ink

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Poem to the unforgotten.

Athena crying again

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All of ninety years has come and past
Since I was laid beneath the grass
In that Great War that came to pass
But for me time has not run so fast
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Because I can still see the faces
Of young lads with faith and graces
Of all those different races
From so many different places
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That came to die among the living dead
Things that in ink and pen cannot be read
For Mother Nature brought the poppies red
In defiance of what cannot be said
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Both glorious and forever sad
Like something from the Iliad
Lost forever in the dyeing lad
In a world where the dead were glad
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For in youth it's not easy to be bold
And fight and die among the fold
And truth was a story to be told
By those so powerful and so cold
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They used the fear of shame
To try and stain the name
Of those that went insane
That could not stand the pain
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That died by their countryman's own hand
To have no place in a foreign land
To hear no glorious marching band
To be known as those that broke and ran
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For ninety years the pain of shame
Has been laid down by their name
And by those who carry the same
Has those who came and fort in vain
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But what would Athena have to say
If she look down upon this day
Though immortal eyes of bluey gray
To see us forgive those that broke away
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And forget those that held the foe at bay
For all those living souls we did betray
In the twilight of so many a day
And in their children, the men of today
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Just a moment of love

Watercolour and ink

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Is quantum reality
Beyond actuality
Does just a moment of love
Create all the stars above
Like a rainbow in the rain
Truth is never quite the same

For one that comes in love and pain

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Porky the dog

Porky in pencil.

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This is a drawing of Rosy dog Porky from Fritzy Art Blog.

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The drawing is from a photo and I used the grid system.

I like doing freehand drawings but I find the grid system is best for creating a true likeness.

Portraits of people and pets in pencil

Flop a black and white dog

in pencil
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If anyone would like a portrait of a person or pet please contact me at nickharvey2@tiscali.co.uk

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I like to work from photographs and it is important that I have a photograph that you really like.

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Drawing of girl with

pearl earring.

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Marilyn Monroe finished.

Marilyn Monroe
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This is one I did earlier on in pencil in some ways I prefer drawing to painting it always seems to look more dramatic. I like old black and white films for the same reason.
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In the future I am going to put less writing on this blog I find it take up far too much time, but I will put some finished works of art with one or two words. I read the other day that someone takes ten minutes a day to run their blog it takes me to about midday and that is far to long.
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Below is the finished painting of Marilyn Monroe I have painted the background in violet and blue using the complementary colours of yellow ochre and Naples yellow for the girl and dress.
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I always feel there was something sad about Marilyn Monroe, but then I see sadness in the leaves on the trees.

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Butterfly in the night

Marilyn Monroe unfinished oil painting on canvas.

Marilyn Monroe, unfinished painting.

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Broken brush strokes are used on the background to create a feeling of movement.

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The hair and earrings have been built up with thick paint so that they catch the light.

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It is difficult to know what to do next with this painting sometime I feel that less is more.

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The next time you see this painting it will be finished.

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Marilyn Monroe unfinished.

Unfinished painting of
Marilyn Monroe
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I am going to call this painting butterfly in the night because her dress looks a bit like a butterfly, but she also looks a bit like a moth caught in the light.
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The skin is going to be painted smoothly without any brush marks in yellow ochre and white and the dress will be more textured. Hopefully this will create contrast between the two.
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Blonds are very difficult to paint I never seem to have the colour right, that is way I like painting Audrey Hepburn because she is dark. Some people paint ordinary things and make them look beautiful this is very clever, but I like to paint beauty and try to create a likeness.

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Marilyn Monroe drawing

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This is a drawing of Marilyn Monroe I have used the grid system a technique used by the Old Masters. This system is not perfect you don’t achieve the flowing effect of a free hand drawing. Also sometimes the grid shows on the finished painting, but even this can look quite nice.
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I should imagine a lot of people have painted this photo before. I want my painting to be different so I am going to paint the people in the background. It would make sense to simplify, but they look very interesting to me. One man is knelling with a box camera and there is a fat man laughing and a man trying to look the other way.

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Audrey Hepburn and baby.

Audrey Hepburn and baby.
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The painting is now finished, I don’t know if I’m happy with it or not.
I have tried to create a sense of movement with the baby being pulled up from the poverty towards the light.
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The background is distorted there is more behind Audrey than in front. This is like the horizon in the Mona Lisa. Leonardo painted a reality that is difficult to see and even harder to paint.
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I have painted across the folds of the drapery this works better than painting up-and-down with the direction of the material.
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Both faces are mostly monochrome like a fresco painting. I like this but I think the shadows should be darker on both faces. It must have been the camera flash that made the faces to bright and also gave the baby funny eyes.

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Unfinished painting of Audrey Hepburn.

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I have now covered almost all of the canvas with paint, using the complementary colours yellow with violet and blue with orange.

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Broken brush strokes have be used in the background, painting over the child on the right. This will hopefully push him into the distance and make him fainter.

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The drapery around the baby is too bright, but when I lighten it I will have a chance to change things.

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I use the paint straight from the tube I don’t mix the paint with anything. This is because I don’t like the smell of linseed oil or turpentine.
The next time you see the paint it will be finished.

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A new Painting

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Audrey Hepburn looks older in this painting, but she has a kind of inner beauty that is nice to paint. I like painting portraits of older people they have character and it is more of a challenge.
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This painting is going to have a lot of broken brush strokes with the white canvas showing.
It is like painting in watercolour but using oil paint. You don’t have any second chances once the canvas is covered the effect is lost forever.
This is a good way of painting if you don’t want to use too much paint or you are running out of white paint.
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Hopefully this will make the painting much freer than the others. I am using yellow ochre and burnt umber these colours will unite the painting together.

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Art in progress, day six

Beauty Shared

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The painting is finished now, but I will keep looking at it and I might make some changes in one or two week’s time.

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I have lightened Audrey’s face and hair this gave me a good chance to change things.

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I have also lighten the darkest shadows on the horse and put some light paint in the centre of his eye.

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I used broken brush strokes in parts of her hair and near her fingers. This is to try and create a sense of movement.

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I will use broken brush strokes more in my next painting on this blog.
I am going to paint Audrey Hepburn when she is much older. I am also going to leave the horse out!

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Art in progress, day five

The painting is not finished yet but I have done a lot of work on it since the last posting.

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I have added red paint to the horses’ nose to draw it forward and blue paint has been added to other parts of the horse to push it back. There are also many other colours added to the white of the horse.

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Different colours have been added to the girls face, I am trying to get the expression right.
The face is to dark at the moment, when I lighten it I will have a chance to modify it again.

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I have added blue paint to the green grass on the horizon and lighten the lower part of the sky. This is to create a feeling of distance in the painting.

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Hopefully the next time you see the painting it will be finished.

Art in progress, day four

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I have now covered the whole canvas in paint the difficult part now begins.
Painting in this way is very easy but it can look as though you have painted by numbers.

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I am now going to take a little bit of each colour and mix into every other colour.
This will unite the picture together with a bit of luck.

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Most of what you can see on the canvas now will be painted over.
I find it very difficult to paint something right first time, but the great beauty of oil paint is that you can change things.

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It looks as though I am going to get a lot of trouble with ears, eyes and mouths in this painting and that’s not counting the horse.

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Art in progress, day three

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I have painted the horse in just the two colours, mixing black and white together.

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I am a great believer in keeping everything simple.

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My aim is to cover the whole canvas in a type of monochrome and only then will I add other colours.

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In my other blog I have linked my painting and poetry together, the classical artists of the past believed there was a link between the two.
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I try to paint poetry and write pictures they should both tell a story.
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The truth is always beautiful
And beauty always truthful
Hopefully!

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“It’s a horse Jim, but not as we know it”

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Art in progress, day two

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I like to get the eyes right first, but they are not right yet and I have decided to leave them.

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The painting is still in monochrome of ochre and white for the skin, burnt umber and white for the hair, blue and white for the sky.

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Brown paint dries very quickly this makes life difficult. I have to paint the blue sky in now when the paint is still wet because I want soft edges.
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I can see I am going to have a lot of trouble with eyes, mouths, and ears in this painting and that’s not counting the horse.
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There is more art on my poetry blog at
http://www.quantumartandpoetry.blogspot.com/

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Art in progress, day one

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My blog does not get up dated very often because I take a long time to complete a painting.

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Because of this I am going to put my art on the blog at different stages of completion.

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I hope this will be interesting for people who like painting or who just loves art.

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I paint the part I find most interesting first, normally the face.

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This will be like a lesson in how not to paint.

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I only use two colours at this stage with a small brush and my fingers.

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Audrey Hepburn, oil painting in black and white.

Waiting for Immortality.

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This oil painting is in black and white I believe it makes the painting more dramatic, like old black and white films. I love drawing in pencil and painting in one colour is very similar.

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I set up the composition all wrong her head should be off centre towards the right. I tried to correct this by adding the curtains on the right-hand side.

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The painting might have looked better if I had simplified by leaving out the drapery in the background. But it was lovely to paint I used long broken brush strokes so that the canvas would show through.

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The sunlit part of her skin has been left unpainted, like in a watercolour painting. I was hoping it would look like radiant light, there is no harm in hoping.

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A moment of kindness, a painting of Audrey Hepburn

A moment of kindness.

This oil painting is set in very bright sunlight the light is coming from the left. Some of the detail is lost because of the brightness of the light.

The painting is from the film The Unforgiven.

I am not very happy with Audrey's mouth and I will probably change it later. Sometimes it take a long time to see what is wrong with a painting and you have to come back to it later.

The horse is looking very sad and proud and is catching the bright sunlight. I am pleased with the horse it is the best horse I have painted.

I hope to do a similar painting with Audrey and the horse looking happier.

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An oil painting of Pegasus and Cassiopeia.

Pegasus and Cassiopeia

I wanted to make this painting look as classical as possible. Cassiopeia skin is painted in monochrome and the paint is very smooth. This creates contrast with her hair that was painted with thick paint over a dark under painting. Pegasus eyes have been built up into a pyramid so that they catch the light. I have tried to use the complementary colours yellow with violet and blue with orange.

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Immortal Life an oil painting of Sarah Chang

Immortal Life.

This is an oil painting of Sarah Chang when she was a little girl.

The background is the Pillars of Creation a star-forming region in the Eagle Nebula (M16).

I have tried to echo the background in her fingers and in the creases of her dress. There is also a similarity between the flowers on her blouse and the stars. I have curved the background slightly around her because I wanted it to look as though she is in the centre of her own universe.

The Dance of Creation an oil painting.

The Dance of Creation.

In this painting I wanted it to look as though the dancer was creating the galaxies herself. She is standing in the Orion Nebula and the Whirlpool Galaxy. The other two galaxies are M81 and M101 from the constellation of the Great Bear. The planet Saturn is an ancient symbol of perfection and is a type of halo above her head, the painting is 16" by 20".

Drawing of a girl with pearl earing

Pencil drawing of a 1665 oil painting by Johannes Vermeer, painted in the Golden Age of Dutch painting.

The drawing was created by covering the whole picture with pencil and then lifting off the highlights with a rubber.

Pencil drawing of a girl from Afghanistan.

Copied from a very famous photograph.

Portraits of Audrey Hepburn in oil paint.

I painted this portrait from a famous black and white photograph. I used bright colours to make the picture look as dramatic as possible. I have tried to capture a look of sadness that was not in the photograph.

In this painting I have used the complementary colours green and red.

I have also used the contrast between the roughness of the tree bark and the smoothness of her face to try and bring out an innocent childlike beauty.

I created this painting out of several photographs. The paint on the eyes is very thick and stands out. The idea is that if you look at the picture from different angles the light will reflect off the eyes differently. This will give the impression that the eyes have moved. The paint on the earrings also stands out and cast its own shadow. I painted the queen on the chess board to echo Audrey Hepburn giving them both the same hair style. The painting is 16" by 20" and is signed with a star in the top right hand corner.

Oil Painting of Patrick Moore and the Moon

Patrick Moore's face is full of character and determination and is perfect for a portrait. I painted his monocle and eyes in gloss so that they would catch the light. One eye is slightly magnified and is larger than the other.

I know that he loves the Moon and people say you resemble whatever you love, so I used the same colours on the Moon as I used on his face and hair. I then rounded off is shoulders to resemble the shape of the Moon.

The Orion Nebula in charcoal.

Portrait of the Mona Lisa in pencil

The Mona Lisa is by far my favourite portrait painting.

There is a great sense of truth and oneness in the painting.

Notice how the horizon is lower on the left, it is as though Leonardo was trying to paint more than just reality as we see it.

Leonardo used a technique called the Leading Eye Technique. The head is slightly off centre and one eye is in the centre of the canvas.

This is a technique I try and use in my own portraits.

Her hands are rather large and manlike I believe this is because Leonardo used a mirror and copied his own hands. But I have never read that he did this and she might have just been born with big fat hands.

In this drawing I have tried to achieve an exact copy. But this is always impossible, she is scratching her wrist with her finger, the drawing is 10" by 15"

Drawing of a girl in pencil

by Nick Harvey.

Drawings of pets in pencil

I create my pencil drawings using a technique called the grid system.

This system was used by the Old Masters and I believe it is the best way to get a likeness.

The trick is to use a photograph you really like. The background can be changed or faded out. Two pets from different photographs can even be put in the same drawing.

Wecome to my Art blog.

My Art is created using the techniques of the Old Masters. I admire the artwork of Leonardo, Raphael, Titian, Renoir and the Victorian artist Albert Moore. I am inspired by the classical Art of ancient Greece and by nature itself, I have tried to achieve a sense of truth and oneness in my paintings.

If anyone would like a portrait of a person or pet please contact me at nickharvey2@tiscali.co.uk or phone 01258472313. I like to work from photographs and it is important that I have a photograph that you really like.

I hope to build this blog into an art gallery of my favourite paintings and drawings I hope you enjoy look at them as much as I enjoyed painting them, feel free to leave commence if you like.

In my Art and Poetry blog Quantum Art and Poetry I have linked my paintings and drawings to short childlike rhymes because I believe there is a link between poetry and painting.