Sophie Ploeg

My Artists Materials shop Jackson’s has featured me as a guest artist on their blog: http://blog.jacksonsart.co.uk/2012/02/27/guest-artist-sophie-ploeg/ For which I thank them very much!! I hope you find it an interesting read. Let me know if you have any questions or comments! Here is the text: The Guest Artist section is a place for artists to talk about their work, techniques and materials. I am sure that one artist explaining how they solved a problem will help other artists and I hope that a community evolves where artists will assist each other with their artistic dilemmas, share ideas and technical information as well as make connections and give each other friendly support. To join the conversation please add your comment below. It will be great to have some interaction! Here today to share her art with us is  Sophie Ploeg  who paints in Gloucestershire, UK. Thanks Sophie! 'Autumn' by Sophie Ploeg, oil on canvas (Click on the images to se...

Started working on the next project...a very big painting (for my standards), which I fear is going to take forever to paint but I know exactly what I want to paint, so hopefully....it will paint itself. It involves a beautiful Victorian parasol.

As good as finished but without a title yet, so for now, it is called ‘The Blue Dress' oil on linen, 50x60cm This painting was inspired by a condition called POTS , something I have lived with all of my adult life. POTS is a fairly unknown condition of the autonomic nervous system which makes you dizzy and faint, at best, and wheelchair/bed bound at worst. I wanted to express the feeling of dizziness and loneliness in a painting. For this painting I looked at medieval art, like Fra Angelico’s architecture and drapery, Vermeer’s use of blue, and of light, I picked pieces from Blenheim Palace and my imagination to put this all together in a vision of Alice in Wonderland-styled confusion and dizziness. For more on POTS, check out the patient charity STARS Edit spring 2012: I did some more work on it, here is the final image:

Katherine, who writes the fabulous ‘Making a Mark’ blog where she keeps up with all that’s happening in the world of art, has written a lovely review of the annual exhibition of the Pastel Society which opened yesterday. ‘Love Pastels 2012’ will be on untill 25 February and my painting ‘Flowerbed’ is featured amongst a huge variety of styles and subject matter - but all in pastel. A brilliant medium, my first love amongst art materials, which deserves every bit of extra attention it can get. Review: "Love Pastels" - The Pastel Society Annual Exhibition 2012 Here are some pictures of the show, taken from the review on the Making a Mark Blog. Works by Felicity House, who won The Artist Magazine Award. Works by Matthew Draper, who won the PanPastel Award, for another painting. Patricia Cain’s award winning work, I love here work and I am sure this triptych is hugely impressive in real life! My painting ‘Flowerbed’ Thank you, Katherine!!

This is something about a realist art show in Australia...not something I’ll be visiting any time soon, but I really like how Jim has described contemporary realism and the role of the internet. Have a read on his blog: Cube Contemporary Art Projects: More Real Than Real; Realism from the USA and Cana... : More Real Than Real; Realism from the USA and Canada is an exhibition curated by Jim Thalassoudis for Peter Walker Fine Art and is on durin... A little extract: In the last decade there has been a proliferation of “atelier” art schools teaching the methods, the knowledge and the revival of the skills of the past. Coupled with this is the use of the Internet allowing literally thousands of like-minded painters to find each other, to form social collectives, to teach, to learn and to pass on information. Graydon Parrish,   Susanna looking to the right     oil on panel  50.8 x 45.5 cm

 I am working on three paintings at the moment, which is very unusual for me! This small one below is one I did for a bit of fun, just making it up as I went along...its only 18x24cm and am calling it Antique Fantasy , because well, that’s what it is. This one below is 50x60cm and still in the ‘ugly’ stage...just blocking in, working on composition etc. I think you can already see what it is going to be like however. Yes, confused! My third painting will involve a nineteenth  century parasol...but I am still at the canvas priming stage. I like my canvas as non-absorbent as possible so like to apply an oil primer before I get started. That way no paint will ‘sink’ into the canvas, creating a mat effect, but the paint will glow in all its glory.