Portrait Artist of the Year

I found series 1 on SkyPlusHD and watched 2 episodes tonight. Very interesting stuff so far! Also, a great way to see how people work with different materials and how they approach creating their pieces. Episode one whittled down group of artists chosen from 1,800 in London to 3 groups of 4 and then to just 1 winner, in episode 2 the same process took place in Glasgow.
It was so fascinating watching how these groups of people took on the task of observing a life model and getting their portrait on to canvas. The subjects were mostly people from the entertainment industry and the occasional sportsperson. Each artist had 4 hours to complete as much of their portrait as possible all the while standing side by side, which looked unnerving to say the least!
Throughout the episodes I felt the urge to give portraiture a shot, or at least practice painting more often and just produce pieces as a way of developing my technique. This may indeed just be a fleeting, temporary ambition as so often happens whenever inspiration comes my way... but hopefully not!

Recently I have felt the necessity for information.
More specifically, information on certain artists, their work, the reason for it and the circumstances in which it was created. I am realising more and more whenever I feel the need to express myself and talk to people about my interests in art and the direction I want to take with my own work that it would help me a lot if I had references. If I had movements to source my influences, artists to procure technique from and concepts to base my work on I feel like my work (or at least ideas and development) would come across more credible and possibly be taken more seriously. I believe that wielding intent is sometimes more essential than wielding all the expensive materials and tools. Of course that helps, but what I mean is I want to be able to justify any development of an idea or experiment with references and reasons for it.

The past year on this course has really helped me get into the routine of reading regularly again. I love having books to hand and being able to read not just for entertainment but to broaden my mind and improve my knowledge on certain things. I mentioned in the last post my interest in contemporary art, and so I am hoping to get into the library this coming week and take out some books about it. Reading is one thing, but retaining the information is another! Note taking is always present in my reading, which does slow the process d--  I feel like I am rambling on a bit, so I'll stop now.