This is what’s currently on my studio wall, in different states of completion… a series of abstract landscapes inspired by my visit to St Ives last Summer.

Art is so subjective. I love that about art. And I appreciate a wide variety of kinds of art.

And also, as an artist, creating involves constantly practicing discernment. Each next creative move means saying yes to one choice and saying no to everything else I could do.

At the end of each year it’s become my practice to print out pages with thumbnails of all of the art I made that year so I can look back on it, and reflect on my practice, my growth, and where I want to go next.

These are all the paintings I completed in 2024. One hundred and five paintings!

In between walks, family time, naps, spring-cleaning the house, and fighting off the flu, I’ve been lining myself up for a good start to 2025 in my studio…

I’ve been enjoying exploring poetry in recent months. I love finding poems that resonate deeply or express experiences in ways that move me. And I love it when I find a poem that expresses through words something that I was trying to express through the painting I created, as happened with these collections:

I’m producing a limited range of greeting cards locally. Here’s how you can order them…

I’ve been really enjoying the fluidity of inks, but realised I needed to do some methodical research into the capacities and qualities of different inks. Some dull a lot more than others when they dry, for example, which can be quite a disappointment! I wanted to compare brands and see which colours hold their colour best as they dry.

• 
  GALLERY

• COMMISSIONS

• SHIPPING

• ART PRINTS

• STUDIO NOTES

• EXHIBITIONS

• NEWSLETTER

• CONTACT

Cath Duncan Art Copyright 2020

Research into Protective Coatings For Artwork

A final protective coat is so important for the longevity of artworks. There are so many options these days for works on paper, as well as works on canvas, wood, or other surfaces where vulnerable mediums like water-based, chalk-based, mixed media, charcoal, etc have been used.

Choosing your finish is pretty technical … use the wrong one and you may smudge the charcoal or the water-based medium may bleed… a disaster on a piece that was finished and looking beautiful before you applied the protective coat!

One of my sticking points this past year has been a new-to-me feeling of dissatisfaction with canvas as a surface. I’ve been feeling drawn to surfaces that feel more natural, textured, “imperfect”, absorbent, “alive”, like wood and papers. In comparison, canvas feels manufactured, almost plastic, dead.

My son is home from school today so we did some art-making together. I did these simplifying landscape practices (Use 3 mediums and just 3 marks to draw the landscape), while he did his own thing.

I love the colours I found in St Ives… silver and yellow ragwort, soft sands, warm rusts, sages, aquas, cool greys, and deep browns.

These studies I created today are an initial exploration of the colours and I’m also noodling over the mediums I want to use too… I’ve used acrylic inks, coloured charcoal, water-based pastels, and oil sticks for these studies.