Its Christmas.... Well almost

It is nearly the end of December and that time of year when people start to really become excited about Christmas. For me Christmas is one of my favourite times of year. I like being able to listen to Christmas music and decorate the house. Every year I decorate my bedroom on 1st December.

Shops usually start bringing out their Christmas decorations and stock around Halloween time, which some people see to be too early. But now Christmas lights are going up, Christmas adverts are on the TV and people are now realising that they don't have long to finish their Christmas shopping. It won't be long until Christmas films and Christmas specials will be on the TV.

December is not far away, which means Christmas will soon be here. The lead up to Christmas has now begun.

 

 

What's your favourite part about Christmas?

 

Simple acts of kindness

An act of kindness can be anything. It be anything from complementing someone, offering to help someone or just being there to talk to them. This doesn't require a lot of effort, but to the person you have shown kindness to it can mean a lot. They may not have self confidence in how they look and by having someone complement them they feel better about themselves and that comment may have made their day.

This post was inspired by an act of kindness that someone showed towards me. Obviously A-Levels and other forms of education require a lot of work. This means that there are times when some work needs prioritising. I have to write long essays that go on for pages and pages. I put this work before my art A-Level work. Anyone who has taken art at GCSE or A-Level will tell you that if you ever fall far behind with work it is a nightmare trying to catch up. My artwork was not dangerously behind, however I was struggling to remember everything we needed to have included in our sketchbooks.
The other day I was telling someone in my art class that I couldn't remember everything and that I didn't have a lot of free time to do artwork. Without hesitation they told me that they would make me an art list. For the next hour we went through our sketchbooks and wrote down what I needed to add.  They even decorated the list saying to me, "who wants a boring list when you can add colour and pictures".
I really appreciated their help as I didn't ask for it an wasn't expecting it. Thanks to that list and a bit more free time I have almost caught up with all of my artwork.

What I'm saying is that that person didn't have to help me but they chose to. These acts of kindness mean something to the people they help and is always appreciated.

Tumblr Addiction

I have had Tumblr for almost a year and I can say that recently I have become addicted to Tumblr. I find myself constantly checking my Tumblr dashboard and reblogging endless numbers of photographs and gifs. Five minutes turns into half an hour. Half an hour becomes an hour. I think you get the idea.

I like going on Tumblr because I can see photos and gifs of things that I like. If you were to look at my Tumblr you would soon work out that I like F.R.I.E.N.D.S (TV show), Disney, 10 Things I hate about you (film), art and vintage things.

I especially like going on Tumblr at the moment because of the excitement about Christmas next month. There have been some lovely photos of decorated Christmas trees, Christmas lights and beautiful snow scenes.

I know that I'm not the only one who is a little bit addicted to Tumblr. What do you think of Tumblr?

Here are some of my recent Tumblr posts.

Lichtenstein A Retrospective

Back in April this year Mum and I went to London. While we there we visited an exhibition at the Tate Modern which had an extensive collection of work by the artist Roy Lichtenstein. I was studying Lichtenstein for my GCSE art project and wanted to see his work.

I can honestly say that it was one of my favourite places I have been to in London. It is a shame that it was only a temporary exhibition. I enjoyed walking around the exhibition, listening to the audio guide and being able to have a proper look at the artwork. Looking at the artwork in front of you is completely different to looking at a photograph of the piece.

You could clearly see every detail of the artwork, from the bright, bold colours to the sharpness of the lines and shapes.  On his famous painting, 'Look Mickey' you could see Lichtenstein's original pencil marks.

Also there was a programme on BBC Four, presented by Alistair Sooke, which looked at the exhibition. It was a fantastic programme. The programme offered an in-depth look at Lichtenstein's work where Alistair Sooke and guests talked about the appeal of Lichtenstein's work, his influence on artists today and the controversy surrounding his work.

This exhibition gave me a better understanding of Lichtenstein and his artwork. It contained work from every decade of his career. Not only did it show some of his most famous work but also showed his less well known artwork. There were pieces in the artwork that I would not have thought was Lichtenstein's style.

I wanted to share this with you because I am really interested in art and this was the best exhibition I have seen. I hadn't started a blog when I went in April so I thought I would share my thoughts now. There is so much more I could say, but I'm sure you wouldn't want to hear me rambling on for ages.

'Look Mickey' 1961