90 If you give up New York

I’ve had the idea of creating a heart playing card right from January, but it slips in and out of my mind – and as I give myself the rule of ‘daily inspiration’ it’s been quite a challenge to bring it to the table. However today, I’m in a drawing mood and feeling quite at peace, so I got my sketchbook out and wanted to take my time on something.

Being so heavily influenced by listening…almost compulsively to the Kings of Leon lately I naturally had The Face playing away (inside my head) and inspiring me to focus on my ‘kings of hearts’ card idea. The Face, is officially 1 of my all time fave songs by now…it just gives me goosebumps…you must have a song that does that for you right? Well I confess-this is currently mine-by the time the track hits this last line, I’ve melted.

Beneath the dance hall lights,
You seen a girl so sound,
Lights up the ground.
If you give up New York,
I’ll give you Tennessee,
The only place to be.

First verse, The Face by KOL – lyrics here hear the tune here

I’ve made it up as I’ve gone along, so it’s not quite symmetrical but I quite like that element…and those that know me well will recognise that as a very ‘me’ effect!

89 How do you like your eggs in the morning?

I’ve been inspired by this awesome animation based on ‘What Makes Your Day?’. I’ve ended up creating something a bit different to what I imagined in the process and pretty ‘off-brief’. Initially I had a little doodle in my sketchbook listing out things like the sunshine, tea and biscuits not being late for something or another, but wasn’t getting anywhere specific or personal.

I had a good think about what makes my day…so I started at the beginning. The first thing I see is my Rick. The second thing is his smile…which sparked off an echo of  that classic Dean Martin song in my head – the lyrics ‘how do you like your eggs in the morning? I like mine with a kiss’…well in my head the lyrics say ‘I like mine with a smile!’ – Don’t you hate it when you learn the words wrong…the right ones  just never fit as well!

Anyhow it helped me decide that all I need to make my day is a smile…if everything else clicks into place it’s a bonus…regardless to what words are right or wrong!

This is also a great chance for me to share this bit of heart-shaped eggsellence with you too!

88 Sharpen your pencils

I’ve got a friend,
Shows me all the good times,
Tells me I look better

…the 1st few lines to my fave Kings of Leon tune playing in my head at the minute and quite fitting for my dailypost too…

A school friend of mine, fellow geek and true inspirational sketchy goddess, has set herself up a blog and goes by the name ‘HB the Pencil‘. I’m slightly cuckoo over her…and actually maybe having a little creative girlie crush on her work! The freedom, randomness and fairytale-esque of HB’s every-day subjects has me hooked.

She is a constant influence, friend and adorable geek that just seems to get me.

I started off just collecting HB pencils around the house, then found other pencils that looked different and interesting. So while the majority are HB, a few are not. I then sharpened them and arranged on an already prepared painted page in my sketchbook.

Also I recently discovered an artist that is more than nifty with a pencil – the rather astonishing and very talented Stuart Whitton

87 Silver Birch Stripe

I picked up a piece of silver birch bark from the woods at the weekend, they look like pretty papers naturally littering the ground. This bit was quite clean and flat so I thought I’d bring it back for some heart art.

My inspiration for my heart art today is that the majority of the graphics team at work today were wearing stripes today…everyone except me actually. So to keep up with my graphic buddies I have cut the silver birch bark into strips along the naturally weaker parts to create a stripey heart.

I’ve stuck the arrangement to some black mount board with some PVA.

86 Oh Rennie

I was for the 1st time this year a little stumped about what to create today. So what to do in a crisis…?…I made myself a cup of tea. Not any cup of tea…I made it in a special little gift mum gave me this weekend – an awesome little tea-for-one-tea pot in a beautiful Charles Rennie Mackintosh style print. This was half my inspiration today, and discovering an old card I received from my college teacher in 2004 – which actually gave me the extra push to create a heart in his style. I sketched out a few designs and then cut it out as a stencil, I used a sponge and some acrylic paint to create my heart art today.

85 Growing stars

Today out on a local dog walk I passed a plant that I don’t name of – but my name for it is the ‘growing stars’ plant (if you know the name please tell me!).

I took a fab picture of it in bloom in the summer and retook a picture of it today with all of the flowers dried out, as usual you can see this on the Flickr archive. I also picked a bunch of them to create my heart art, initially I tried painting them and stamped them in my sketchbook but wasn’t effective. So in my true ‘make-it-up-as-I-go-along’ style I cut up a sponge and used this as a base to insert the stems into and create a 3D heart.

84 A Whale of a Time

I love this little saying and wish I used it more! I saw it today in the little puzzle book we have at home and doodled myself a pair of whales making a heart shape. There’s not really a lot more to it. Hope you like it! :0)

83 Pick me up and take me away!

I’ve just returned from a fantabulous creative evening with Geek Heather at the 2nd Annual Pick Me Up fair in the beautiful Somerset House. The most special thing about this contemporary fair was Anthony Burrill…the studio and interaction in his room was on fire! I love his motivational art and ability to constantly inspire and generate smiles with his simple yet joyful work.

So Heather and I sat around a giant table with at least 30 other visitors  and from a supply of Anthony Burrill prints,  we cut-out, sticked-together and created our own Anthony Burrill posters. I of course created a heart! Yep, this heart art is created at Somerset House, London. You can see the whole poster on the Flickr Archive – plus other photos of the evening.

I’ve also found this great little blog that gives a cute insight into some of the works featured by some up n coming artists from Pick Me Up ’11.

82 Pretty peacock

My sister has always loved peacocks, and today in London I stumbled across a beautiful design in Harrods (click here to see it). This has been my heart art inspiration today…

81 Wind-up

This is my post from yesterday. Unfortunately WordPress was broken, so I was unable to meet my daily post yesterday. I did post on Flickr, Facebook and Tweet it too – so I can prove to myself that I did in fact meet my 365 mission, despite not being able to pause time for WordPress to get fixed before midnight. Anyway, winge over,hopefully they’ve fixed it and it won’t happen again….post from yesterday below: I’m not 100% sure on my heart art inspiration today but it is quite fitting that wordpress isn’t working in my crucial last hour of the day to post!

I’ve drawn today’s heart art in pencil and then coloured in felt-tips….I gave myself the rule of trying not to think to much about the colours and being spontaneous with the technique…the not choosing colours bit was tough…so I closed my eyes.

I’ve been thinking of changing the look / theme of the geekheartsaday blog to a plain white – so it looks more tidy and ‘neat’ if you like…but I’ll see how I go…no promises…I’m not typically smooth – the majority of my ideas need refining and I’m forever changing my mind.