I’ve already received some great designs – you can see some of them in the picture above – but we need MORE!
The more we get, the more money we can raise. But the deadline 19th MAY is approaching fast so get out your pens and brushes and get creative.
Anyone can join in – wherever you are in the world, whatever your your age, artistic skills, experience or ambitions. All you have to do is design a Christmas card and donate it to the project.
Designs will be made into A6 cards and sold in packs of 6, with all profits going to fund the 2019 Christmas lunch at Cafe No. 84 https://www.no84.co.uk/ for those who would otherwise be alone, and if we raise a lot of money, any extra will be donated to Crisis at Christmas.
Nearer to Christmas, we’ll have an exhibition of all the cards at No. 84 and a launch event. If loads of people get involved we could also have other exhibitions or events at local venues.
If you want to join in, here is what you have to do:
Design a Christmas card that you are willing to donate to the project free of charge
Get your design to me by the 19th May 2019
You can send a digital image of your artwork (minimum 300 dpi) to duncangrant158@gmail.com – please put your name and contact details in the email OR
You can send me the original to be photographed professionally. Please remember to write your name and contact details on the back.
If you live further afield and need to send an original, drop me an email and I’ll send you my postal address.
RULES
Only one – designs must be rectangular. They can be in any size and any medium because they are all going to be photographed.
After I came back from the Liberty factory in Milan in March I wrote in my blog, ‘I wondered where this journey will take me next’. Well one answer is possibly ‘Windsor’ and I certainly didn’t expect that!
A couple of weeks ago, I was contacted by award winning homeware designer, Lisa Todd, who is Director of this year’s Lions of Windsor project https://lionsofwindsor.org/, to ask if I would be interested in decorating a life-size resin and fibre glass lion to be displayed somewhere around Windsor this summer. The original lion was created by Bath sculptor Alan Dun https://alandunsculpture.weebly.com/ as a 3D canvas.
The project will involve a giant pride of over 60, individually decorated lion sculptures being positioned around the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead from 10th August until 27th October this year, to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Queen Victoria. There will be an official public art ‘safari trail’ where visitors can see the bigger lions, decorated by artists and designers, plus a mini-pride of lion cubs decorated by schools and charities.
The project will culminate in a Lions Roar Goodbye festival (9th/10 November) and then a charity auction on 22nd November. All profits will be donated to local charities, including the new Thames Hospice in Maidenhead, Look Good Feel Better and the Lions Club of Windsor, for distributing to good causes across the region.
I haven’t really got much experience of 3D art or drawing (on) animals really. I did decorate this set of Russian Dolls in 2018 for ‘Art on a Postcard’ https://www.artonapostcard.com/ and I’ve done relief prints of a few cats, birds, water creatures and insects over the years (see below) but a 3-D lion is going to be a bit of a challenge. Not least because I have to get it home, paint it and then get it back to Windsor, without being eaten!
Russian dolls decorated for ‘Art on a Postcard’
As you might be aware, over the last year I’ve been working on a series of Small Town ink drawings. You can see then all in my Gallery under ‘Original Artwork: Ink Drawings’. https://duncangrantartist.com/product-category/original-artwork/drawing-ink/ They are all also available as digital prints. I submitted one of the Small Towns to the #LibertyOpenCall competition that I won and the two designs that Liberty have been produced are due to be launched next month as part of their Summer Collection. I’ve included elements of the Liberty Small Town design in my lion design because Liberty fabric designs were very popular in the Victorian era.
My lion design is called Night and Day and depicts Windsor in daylight (on the side of the lion with his eye open) and Windsor at night (on the side of the lion with his eye closed). Each side will reflect Windsor’s position on the Thames, and will feature prominent landmarks, such as the castle and the Great Park. You might even spot some Windsor collars and ties with Windsor knots on the final product. I haven’t really decided.
Anyway, that’s for the future. I have to have my design accepted first. The templates are really small so what you can see here is only an impression. If I’m successful, the design on the final lion will be much more intricate.
Here is what I have submitted:
Front viewWindsor by day
And the other animals….. As mentioned above, here are some of my earlier encounters with animals. They’re all for sale via the Gallery on this website – just follow the links.
Visit Duncan Grant’s gallery
How many of you remember the Hand of Artists project back in 2015, when 108 artists designed two sets of playing cards that raised £3,000 to benefit community art charities? For a trip down memory lane, flick through the slideshow at the bottom of this post.
Well, now it’s time to get out those paintbrushes and pens and get involved in a new community art project to benefit another local good cause.
On 25th December last year Adrian and Andrea at No 84 Tearoom and Eatery at Echo Square, Gravesend https://www.no84.co.uk hosted a traditional Christmas dinner, free of charge, to anyone in the local community who would otherwise have spending the day alone. The event was funded entirely by No. 84.
I’m organising a community art project to fund another Christmas lunch at No. 84 this year (2019) and I’d love as many people as possible to get involved – wherever you are in the world, whatever your your age, artistic skills, experience or ambitions. All you have to do is design a Christmas card and donate it to the project.
Designs will be made into A6 cards (at cost by Singlewell Stationery and Print http://www.singlewell.co.uk/) and sold in packs of 6, with all profits going to fund the 2019 Christmas lunch at No. 84. If we raise a lot of money, any extra will be donated to Crisis at Christmas.
Nearer to Christmas, we’ll have an exhibition of all the cards at No. 84 and a launch event. If loads of people get involved we could also have other exhibitions or events at local venues.
If you want to join in, here is what you have to do:
Let me know you want to take part via ‘contact’ on this website, or via Facebook etc
Design a Christmas card that you are willing to donate to the project free of charge
Get your design to me by the 19th May 2019
You can send a digital image of your artwork (minimum 300 dpi) to duncangrant158@gmail.com – please put your name and contact details in the email OR
You can send me the original to be photographed by the talented Roger Crosby. Please remember to write your name and contact details on the back.
For those of you in the Gravesend area, I will arrange some local collection points and let people know where these are via Facebook. I’ll also put an ‘Event’ on this website and keep it updated with the latest news and information.
If you live further afield and need to send an original, drop me an email and I’ll send you my postal address.
RULES
Only one – designs must be rectangular. They can be in any size and any medium because they are all going to be photographed.
Here is what I’ll do:
Collect the images and arrange for originals to be photographed
Get the cards printed and put into packs
Arrange the exhibition(s) and launch
Put them up for sale online and at events
Collect the money and forward it to No.84 to cover all the costs of Christmas lunch, with any extra going to Crisis at Christmas.
Please get involved, it will be fun. Here are some pictures from Hand of Artists 2015 to get you inspired.
Last night Liberty launched their brand-new bi-annual publication The Liberty Book at their flagship store and I was invited with the other winners – we appear in the book – along with the great and the arty.
The first strip is Catherine Rowe’s designs