portraits – Chrissy Turley Artist

One year Anniversary – where on earth has the time gone?u

I have now been an Artist for just over a year. I am shocked at how far I’ve come in one short year. I’ve made so much progress and I’ve been able to address some of my confidence issues.

Above is one of my very first sketches……. 🙈🙈

As an artist you are forever being judged. So many people think you don’t actually “work” and that it must be easy to throw some paint on a canvas. There will always be someone sniggering behind your back, sometimes even to your face. But you know what the best thing I’ve learnt this year is? Is not to care or listen to the armchair critics. The quicker you learn to ignore the ‘know-it-alls’ the better off you are going to be.

Above is a short video a start of a puffin sketch. It turned out really nice. It just shows a little bit of effort every day over time is totally worth it.

I have enjoyed so much about the last year. I’ve loved that many people love my art and that lots of my pieces (prints and originals) are making lots of people happy. I’ve loved learning new skills and learning how to perfect certain techniques. I’ve even enjoyed finding myself lost and not sure how to move a piece forward. I have also enjoyed being able to put those pieces down, move to something new and then coming back to the old piece and knowing exactly where to go.

Learning that I don’t have to force myself to be creative and enjoying the fact that some of my better pieces were created when I threw the rule book out the window.

I learnt to TRUST myself. Trust that I am actually good at this. It’s wonderful that after many years, several different jobs and career choices that I have finally found something I love. And yet I still have SO much farther to go. The road may seem never ending, but holy moly I am going to enjoy strolling off down the winding dirt path with the fairies.

Keep up with my progress and all my new pieces for this next year by following me on Instagram and Facebook. If you would like to see what original pieces and prints I have on sale at the moment check out my Etsy Store or my Redbubble Site.

Charity Art Auction

I’m holding a charity art auction in aid of the RSPCA and the RSPB. Please pop along and visit my Facebook page for all the details! These Charities are very dear to my heart. I love animals and I think it’s important to protect our wildlife, as well as protecting the domestic animals.

I will have many pieces of my Art available to bid one. There will be graphite sketches and acrylic paintings. Most will be of animals but there will be one or two pieces that will be Portraits or landscapes.

Bidding will start on the 16th of July and go until the 30th of July. Please come and support a good cause!

www.facebook.com/chrissyturleyartist

Cheers,

Chrissy

The Fantasy Art Collection

Here you will find all of my Fantasy Art and links to where you can buy prints, originals and merchandise! I will be constantly adding each of my collection so please keep visiting to check out my latest pieces!!!

You can find Original pieces in my Etsy store https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ChrissyTurleyArtist for prints and all other merchandise go to my redbubble site https://www.redbubble.com/people/chrissyturley

The first fairies I painted! Wattle and rose!

Another fairy. This one looks particularly awesome on a phone case! You can find it here: https://www.redbubble.com/people/chrissyturley

My dragon is next. This little guy looks amazing on a shirt!

And lastly my house by the river.

So that is my fantasy collection of art work. Thank you for reading and supporting my art works!

My Redbubble store is here: https://www.redbubble.com/people/chrissyturley

My Etsy Store is here: https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ChrissyTurleyArtist

Cheers

Chrissy

Sketch from start to finish.

When I start my commissioned graphite portraits it’s fairly straight forward to begin with because I don’t have to choose what to draw or what size it’s going to be, the customer does that. So all I have to do is draw what’s in the photo we have agreed on. Which to most sounds easy, but it’s not really.

I start by sketching the outline, and general shape of everyone’s head and body shape is. I look closely at the size and position of each face.

Then slowly I fill in the facial features of each person. I will make adjustments to face shape as I’m doing this.

Then I continue to add shading and value to the piece until I’m finished. I try not to look at the picture as a whole but break it up into shapes and shading. Sometimes I will have to change the pictures slightly. For instance, for this one I took the sun glasses off one person. So I had 2 photos to merge together.

If you would like to purchase a graphite portrait, go to my etsy store. https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/

I run competitions often on my Facebook and Instagram pages so please pop over and have a look.

I am now on Redbubble! You can get phone cases, hardcover notebooks and other things with my paintings on https://www.redbubble.com/people/chrissyturley

I hope you enjoyed seeing a step by step approach to my Graphite Portraits.

Cheers,

Chrissy x

Day 29 and 30 – 30 Days of Art

Well I’ve finally finished, nearly 30 days of non stop drawing or painting! The final piece in my this Challenge is a portrait of my family. My world. My life. The reason I am who I am.

When I started 30+ days ago, the extent of my drawing abilities was not great.

A drawing I did a few weeks prior to starting this challenge. I am so utterly proud of how far my graphite drawings have come. I’m so happy with what I’ve achieved. Before this art journal challenge I would never have called myself an Artist. Now I do. I know I have a skill and talent that I can improve on, and how far I’ve come in just 30 short days is just amazing.

It should prove to all of you, that if you put your mind to it, you can do anything!

If you would like to view my current work for sale, please go to my Etsy store. https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ChrissyTurleyArtist

I have 2 competitions running on my Facebook and Instagram pages so go check those out as well!

Cheers and thank you for watching me grow over the last 30 days!

Chrissy xxx

Day 26 – 30 Days of Art

We have more lip practice today. I’m really proud of how far I’ve come. No matter how far I still have to go. I am really loving Graphite. It gets a little messy but I love it. For the next 4 days of my 30 Day Art Challenge I will be producing 2 pieces. One Acrylic Landscape of Stretched Canvas and one Family Graphite Portrait. I’m really excited to see how they come out.

If you would like to see all of my the pieces that I have created, go to my etsy shop – https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ChrissyTurleyArtist

I have 2 competitions running in my Facebook and Instagram pages. Go and check them out for your chance to win a free print!

https://www.facebook.com/chrissyturleyartist

https://www.instagram.com/chrissyturley30

Cheers,

Chrissy

Day 24 – 30 Days of Art

A graphite portrait of my girl. This child of mine is just so unbelievably perfect. I’ve started doing full faces and really getting stuck in to the graphite at the moment. I’m happy with my progress with my portraits and am offering a deal on my etsy shop if you would like one! Just pop over to my store to check it out! https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ChrissyTurleyArtist

I have 2 completions running at the moment, one on instagram and one on Facebook. You’ll win free prints if your drawn as the winner! Pop over and check them out!

https://www.facebook.com/chrissyturleyartist

https://www.instagram.com/chrissyturley30

How I rekindled my love of Art after many years of not drawing a thing. I love dragons and fairies, and anything fantasy really!

Cheers

Chrissy xx

Day 15 – 30 Days of Art

Faces and noses…….. it’s time I got serious about this art thing. I’m determined to draw and my angels perfectly! I’m really happy with my sketches today! They are really lovely. I think they’ve improved greatly. Thanks to the Art Sherpa’s you tube videos! If you are looking to improve your skills, watch her and others on you tube!

Tip: you need to practice drawing what you see, not what your mind thinks you see! This is more difficult than you would think!

I think it’s important to continue learning new skills, no matter how old you are. It’s certainly helped me get through some really un-happy times.

You can find videos of me in action on my Facebook page www.facebook.com/chrissyturleyartist and also on my Instagram at www.instgram.com/chrissyturley30.

If you would like to purchase any of my art work then please visit my etsy store https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ChrissyTurleyArtist

Cheers,

Chrissy

Day 14 – 30 Days of Art

As you can see, I am still having trouble with faces! Argh! It’s driving me mad! I think it might be time to do a little more research into them! You-tube tonight it is!

Fairies again! I love fairy art. Fantasy art is something that I would like to become better at. I love all those kinds of things. I love reading about fairies and vampires and all things magical. The worlds of Harry Potter and the likes really make me happy and get my imagination started!

I found this writing in google and I absolutely love it! I love getting creative with writing.

Remember, if you would like to see any of the pieces I have available for sale you can visit my etsy store https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ChrissyTurleyArtist

You can also follow me on instagram www.instagram.com/chrissyturley30 and now you can like me on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/chrissyturleyartist

Cheers

Chrissy xxx

Day 10 – 30 Days of Art

Flowers! My favourite flowers in the whole world are lilies! I love the different colours. So I thought I might draw a few different types of flowers. I obviously need to work on shading but I like the general shape of them all. While researching flowers I was so surprised at the amount of different kinds of orchids there are,and the different colours they come in! WOW!!

Below, is the start of a portrait I’m doing of my monkeys. It’s my ‘take my time’ piece that I hope to finish. If you’ve been reading my posts then you know faces elude me. So I think this will be a great help for me to improve my skills. I think it’s really important to tackle the things you find the hardest head on. There is no point sticking your head in the sand!

To keep up to date with all my art and other things like my triathlon training, follow me on instagram at www.instagram.com/chrissyturley30. If you would like to see what pieces I have on sale in my etsy store click the link – https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/ChrissyTurleyArtist

Cheers,

Chrissy xxx