Draw, Draw - and a little painting

Inbetween organising things so I can open TED CONEY'S FAMILY PORTRAITS in April and visiting my mother, who is supposed to be fading away, (however, she did get up for three days and got her hair done!) I did lots of exploritary drawing in preparation for the next painting. I had treated myself to a new charcoal pencil, a 9B lead pencil and one of those pencils you can dip in water, to prepare myself for the challenge. I always find having nice new materials gives one confidence. I did lots of drawings of old telephones and typewriters to represent my great aunts former life in the second world war. I then started a tiny sketch canvas to work out how I intend to abstract some of the shapes I had drawn. I am painting these in monotone as the first layer. I then intend to skim a thin membrane of encaustic wax over the top, before painting the 'afternoon tea' with coloured traslucent oil paint. I had been inspired by an exhibition of Chris Offeli's work, were he had separated layers of paint with transparent resin. However I hate the smell and feel of resin, so hope the encaustic wax will work just as well Bye for now Ted