Jo Blaker

During a talk from Jo Blaker, she talked about her focus of collecting and gathering, looking and noticing; being drawn to natural forms and the qualities of line from nature. 

 

Being able to look through her sketchbooks has inspired me to let go of the idea that my sketchbook work should be laid out with precision, and rather, create and experiment and collage and use colour to express many ideas without doubting whether or not they belong. 

In my work i like to use many lines within portraits like Jo does, however i'd never considered collaging materials and combining them with the line work before now. 

Another quality of Jo's sketchbook work which i think works effectively is the variety of materials she uses to get different line qualities and textural effects, but also the versatility of one singular material such an the oil pastel piece above; and the way she is able to create many different effects which can all be used to communicate different messages once applied to a piece of work.