The traditional art of the Isles has always fascinated me, but daunted by its complexity, I never attempted any on my own. That is until I found a book that changed my artistic life: How to Draw Celtic Knotwork by Andy Sloss. It's a very simple technique that is extremely flexible and can be adapted to suit an infinite variety of purposes. I started primarily exploring simple variations on symmetry and manipulating the number of strands in the knot. However, that wore thin quite quickly - I started thinking of ways of integrating much deeper layers of meaning. To that end I came up with a method of encoding text directly into the pattern of crossings. As a rule I don't reveal my technique but everything that a motivated individual needs to work out the scheme is present in the knots themselves.
My Mother is responsible for teaching me the basic rudiments of drawing when I was a child - she's quite an excellent drawer too. Everything after that, however, is basically self taught - well that's not entirely true... I've never really taught myself anything, its always just been something I did. Unfortunately, my ability to draw is not regular - have to catch the inspiration and then do it as quickly as possible, or it just doesn't work. Every time I've tried to force myself to draw something has ended in dismal failure. My ability also seems to depend on the level of emotional attachment to my subjects - my best drawings are the portraits of my friends and family.
Because I have never received any formal drawing instruction, my media tend to be fairly simple - HB pencils on bond paper. It's only now that I'm beginning to use a variety of pencils and papers.
It is important to note that I do not draw for any other reason than to express my own personal inspiration. Even those works that have been used in publications began as such - other people later found use for them. And those works that I have done with the intent to give to someone else, are pure expressions of how I feel for them. I am not a professional artist, nor do I have any desire to place any monetary value on my work. I do, however, enjoy letting people see them. So please enjoy.
One day after class, a student of mine brought up a photo album of his to show me. They were filled with anaglyphs---red / cyan 3D photos. I was really impressed, and was quite taken with how easily they can be created using Photoshop. Or at least the putting together of the images is easy. Taking photos that will make good images is a lot harder, and at that I am still a rank novice which I'm sure is apparent.
This is an area that I have been on the fringe of for many years. It is much less an expressive art for me - the costumes I put together tend to be for specific purposes - either for productions, or for competitions. Tights, duct tape, nylons, and paper seem to be a general trend in materials for my costumes - with much more success that you might expect!
I, of course, am only a very novice costumer. If you are interested in costuming, Others in my close circle of friendsdo some truly amazing work.