Scraps of Valentine wishes

Thinking of Valentines Day in many ways but illustratively in terms of Little Red Riding Hood, so scraps of paper are littering the kitchen table, my desk etc I will share some of the results this week on the run up to Saturday.

Nicholas Stevenson

        Fig 1 (above) Nicholas Stevenson, Sketchbook

Nicholas Stevenson's sketch is very strange, it reminded me of a gaggle of Red Riding Hoods carrying a wolf through the forest which is why I have included it here. The 'dead' tree is very wolf like to with its open mouth at the front, running stance back legs and tail aloft. 
Often I have miss read images and that has inspired other ideas for pictures.

On closer inspection though the dea tree is covered in frogs or babies and it seems that they are red coated soldiers carrying the tree. 

"This piece was inspired by a dream I had, about a regiment of soldiers in red coats, who dig up a tree from an icy pond in a forest, but it's covered in little sleeping creatures frozen to it. They carry the tree to a lake, where the creatures unthaw and swim off in to water out of sight." Nicholas Stevenson 

References 
Fig 1 Nicholas Stevenson, Sketchbook

http://www.nicholasstevenson.com/

Sketchbooks and working process

                           Fig (1,2 Above and Below) cover from sketchbook, Hazel Terry

This is a little Red Riding Hood Sketchbook that I made in September. I made the cover from a mono-printed piece of plastic and then pulled the wolves from the darkness.

Unfortunately it is empty, I have a terrible confession, I don't use sketchbooks, I don't find that they help me in my creative process. When I have made/ used sketchbooks they are an entity in themselves and not a map or path in the development of finished pieces of work.
My thoughts come in sentences, poems and hastily scribbled sketches or doodles on scraps of paper, receipts, envelopes.

                                               Fig 3 ( Above) sketch for Folk Wolf, Hazel Terry

This 'litter' then percolates in my head for a while until I get the opportunity to commit it to paper. Then my ideas will evolve through several pale incarnations until I am happy.
Or sometimes it is as with a plastic bag monoprint, I make some sort of mess on the paper in print, bold paint splodge etc and pull (rescue) an image out of it.

                                      Fig 4 ( Above) sketch for Hobby Wolf, Hazel Terry

My brain is full of a litter of thoughts. My desk, bag, bedside table is a paper chase of litter that is my real sketchbook, it is not pretty, but it is how I stop thoughts, ideas and dreams disappearing.

References:

Fig 1,2 Cover from sketchbook, Hazel Terry
Fig 3  Sketch for Folk Wolf, Hazel Terry
Fig 4 Sketch for Hobby Wolf, Hazel Terry