Here’s a way to tweak up the formatting in your posts
On the left is the code – On the right is the result
Click large image immediately below to see what I’m writing about.
[grid]
insert another image here
[/grid]
I decided sod it
the right hand don’t work
left hand will have to do
someone said it looks okay
thank you – needed that today
I’ve still got a mind, a heart and a soul
easy come easy go
anyway the wind blow
Some like this and some like that
And some don’t know where it’s at
If you don’t get loose, if you don’t groove
Well, your motor won’t make it and your motor won’t move
Bow-legged woman doing the boogaloo
She got a jive, she got a move
Turn around, do it again
Bow-legged woman, where you been
Fat Jack owns a honky-tonk downtown
You can catch a woman if you hang around
You can tear down the door, tear down the wall
Fat Jack he don’t care at all
Easy come, easy go
Anyway the wind blow
Hey, drummer, drummer, can you give me that beat
Can you give me that beat, got to move my feet
Guitar player been all around the world
But he can’t play a lick for looking at the girls
One two three four five six seven
Well, you’d better change your ways or you won’t get to heaven
Eight nine ten, gonna stop at eleven
Eleven just lays around with seven
If time don’t tell you then don’t ask me
I’m riding on a hurricane down to the sea
If you can’t hear the music, turn it up loud
There’s movement in the air and movement in the crowd
I appreciate the encouragement that I have received. It really makes a difference. Thank you.
So, I turned our house upside down and gave it a shake.
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”
He chortled in his joy.
. . . and Treasure fell at his feet.
I found olde sketchbooks, watercolour pencils, drawing pencils from 6B through to 5H.
Sketchbooks with ancient arte worke, sketchbooks with untouched pages which shouted out – work here!! A caligraphy brush already to go, A pad of watercolour paper.
Some of it from more than twenty years ago.
So much was lost, yet these delights remained unplundered.
@Bobbi you are very talented. Love all your artwork. And did I spy some Tunnocks teacakes too. My favourite…they’re very moorish & I eat far too many of them they just kerp calling me from the cupboard. Naughty tea cakes.
Hilary likes the first one, it was put together from other photos.
I quite like imaginative work.
The real world has its place but imagination can be used to find new answers.
The first picture is an allegory.
A wall is an impenetrable barrier. Similarly a moat prevents access, but a hole in the wall and stepping stones provide a way of reaching what was out of bounds.
What a talent. It’s amazing work. I love the imagination behind the first picture & I can totally see it.
Art has always been something I can’t do. My artistic side came out in music. I’m always in awe of thos who can draw, paint etc as I would love to be able to.
I always say my art is naive, I’ve never studied at art college.
However that isn’t strictly true as I have practised exercises from a book written ‘for the ordinary working man’. The author asserts that although talent does vary in fact anyone can be taught how to draw and produce credible images.
I didn’t progress with the book as far as I should have and got very little distance with colour work. I think I should return and tackle what I have been missing.
I believe the author is correct and I am sure it is possible to learn the skills. Of course that does mean time and effort. I’m too old to become anything but an amateur, but it gives me pleasure and sometimes pleases others too, it has to be worth a little application.
The author is John Ruskin and the book The Elements of Drawing published in 1857 is available (free) at:
Also there is a free online course at:
Anyone with even the slightest shred of interest should take a look and maybe even spend a little time on this.This stuff is timeless and still worth working through.
Years after leaving school I met my old art teacher who by then was retired.
The school taught children from wealthy backgrounds who were to become professionals, politicians, business folk.
Not I, who was from a poor family and on a scholarship.
The old art teacher told me that his instructions were to discourage the development of artistic talent as becoming an artist was not a promising start to life. So you could well think you have no artistic ability because that is what you were intended to believe.
I am glad to be working through this. My first reaction to the effects of stroke was a long period of mourning for the loss of my many skills that depend upon right hand dexterity and mobility in general.
I am starting on a new path where what I can do with what I have left is an attractive challenge. It means there is still a way forward with somewhere to go. I am discovering that I can still be creative.
A pencil, a ball point pen and any old paper are good enough to begin. You can use materials you already have.
Once you learn some control which is what the exercises give you then you will be pleased with the results you can obtain.
I’ve bought cheap materials on the market sometimes, no need to pay a lot at an art shop. The exercise can be boring but with practise you will find you can improve. Ruskin’s explanations are easy to understand, it isn’t rocket science.
Take a picture of your efforts maybe we’ll end up with a stroke art movement.
This is one of the first exercises, creating an evenly shaded area then producing a gradient shaded from black to white. This illustration was with pencil but using a ball point pen seems incredibly difficult until you begin to realise how to do it..So start with the pen.
And its a bit of challenge to coordinate to the rythm and speed of the beat 
