So pleased to be told by a visitor to the V&A hosting the Dundee Tapestry that I’m included in a beautiful piece of embroidery depicting artists in Dundee! I went along for a look and there I am! My name! ”Linda Brownlee” and a wee embroidery of my drawing of Magdalen Green Bandstand with the Law in the background. How pleased I am to be celebrated in this way! The whole exhibition of 35 tapestries is superb! A unique depiction of Dundee over the years since it was granted city status. I see other friends celebrated in other works and there’s even a tiny Westfest Bandstand in the music embroidery! What a delight! The exhibition is free and is on until 28th April!! Pop along and see if you can find all your Dundonian Heroes!!
Summer in the city.
Summer is here and you might spot me out drawing in the city! Check out my Instagram page to see where I’ve been! I’ve had a busy year working on drawings for the new web pages of a local business. Hopefully not the kind of site you will need dear reader as it’s the local family funeral business of Sturrock Comb and Davidson. I am delighted to have been working with them to give a different softer touch to their website.
Lindabee's Christmas Dundee
I’ve been working away like a little Christmas elf to complete my Dundee Festive Window - Lindabee’s Christmas Dundee! I’m delighted my design was chosen to add to the beautiful festive window trail on our high streets! Mine is on Reform Street! Come on in to see all the beautiful Christmas displays around the city! Thanks to UNESCO, City of Design and V&A Dundee in partnership with Dundee City Council. You can find my work on sale in Dock Street Studios around the corner from Malmaison, Kist on the Perth Road and Pretty Fly in Broughty Ferry.
On line digital prints may not arrive in time for Christmas.
Let's get up to date!!
This version of my website has been resting for a while so let’s get up to date!! I’ve found that lockdown has left me living like a teenager - you know - expertly procrastinating!! But now that there’s signs of activity in the high street and I’m inspired again!! I have cards available in Kist on the Perth Road and I’ve made a new collage of The Kist - next step is to get this darling building added to my post card collection so that I have a range of new work and who knows it may be ready for Christmas!! Ha! Ha! I’ve entered Dundee City Council Window competition! If successful it’ll be a chance to create a Selfie Window that will help draw people back into town. Fingers crossed for success. It’s a great idea and will bring a little vibrancy back. We can do this!!
Dundee Art Fair 24th - 26th May 2019
I’m very excited to be preparing for the first ever art fair to be held in Dundee and also the first ever for me!
I have lots of new collaged drawings finished and beautifully framed ready for my stand and I’ve also been printing like a little fiend at the DCA Print workshop. I’ve had fun experimenting with a new muted colour palette for my prints and I’ll have some of these hand made prints on sale unframed in a browser . I’ve gone on the basis that my prints of Dundee were popular with my customers at the Christmas market and so I’ve tried to expand the various popular buildings that were suggested.
Christmas Market, City Square, Dundee
My persistence has paid off! I’ve been really fortunate and feel privileged to have a space at the Ethical Trade Christmas Market in the City Square. My drawings are on display on the very streets that inspired them! I have my trike “vintaged up” with an old Fortnum & Mason basket in the centre of my stall. I explain to the many Dundonians who stop for a look that I hope to draw Dundee from my trike in the dry weather on the streets, sitting alongside it of course! It’s day 14 of 18 on my art stall and although I’m pretty exhausted, my sales are going well, I’ve had great feedback and lots of new ideas for 2019. I’ve had offers of commissions, of rental space in shops and coffee shops and I am absolutely delighted with the whole experience! What a fantastic opportunity! This is a great launch for Lindabee Draws Dundee and my business cards have been flying off the shelf and my drawings are also on their own journeys off around the world from Singapore to Canada! Happy days!! Who knew that selling was the key to putting a smile on my face at last at Christmas!
Back home in Dundee
A couple of sales in Dock Street Studios and some useful customer feedback has me pedalling down to the V&A whenever the sun comes out and the wind dies down to get more sketching done. I find the V&A very inspiring especially on bright sunny days. I get lots of nice smiles and comments about my quirky trike and encouraging words when someone looks over my shoulder to see what I’m drawing too. I’m loving the vibe in the cafes around the town. It seems everyone is using their game for the influx of tourists especially on the vegan front. Today I’ve been in the White Goose and Marwicks for great tasty treats while working on some of my drawings. Its a lovely life!
Lulu's Cafe Wall
There were squeals of delight when I brought out some of my promised drawings, even one on canvass, for Lulu’s Cafe walls. I am absolutely thrilled that they chose two and they are up there for everyone to see. It makes me feel very proud every time I go for breakfast!! I can see them from the street as I walk past and an extra benefit yesterday when, and this doesn’t happen often, one of my long time Barcelona friends was having a vermouth outside at Lulu’s and Ioannis and I having met around the corner were invited to join their little party. I felt like a proper artist. “Oh yeah, this my art up on the walls, can you see?” That was a first for me and I loved it!!
Lindita!
Walking smartly across a little square. (I like to walk with intent as I believe that keeps the would be pick pockets and lonesome fellows from approaching me.) I think I hear my name and suddenly recognise my friend Hugo. He’s calling me by his pet Barcelona name for me “Lindita!” Ha! Ha! No wonder it took me a while to recognise he was calling me. He’s very affectionate towards me and kisses my cheek as is the Spanish way. He’s waiting for the barber’s shop to open and is having coffee at the little street bar managed by a Chinese family. I show him my recent drawings and the Chinese bar manager spots this and is very impressed with them too. Today an American lady also remarked as she passed my chair in another waterfront bar that, “ Your drawing is gorgeous!” Well that was nice of her. One of my drawings is actually of this little place with it’s white umbrellas, the palm trees and the post office, the Correos, in the background. I’m pleased with it because I worked hard to arrange the composition before I started the collage. When I showed it to one of the waiters there he passed it around all of the staff and they each came by my chair at some point to tell me that they thought I was a very good artist! Very sweet to have such nice comments. I didn’t stay long because I can’t drink too much beer any more, and it was definitely beer I wanted but I’m an absolute lightweight and also I’m starting to swelter in the heat! I will make a mental note to read this again in the middle of the long dark winter ahead in Scotland!
An invitation to display my drawings
The owner of my favourite coffee shop is so pleased to see me return to draw in her cafe! She loves my drawings and asks to take a look. I ask her if she would like to have the one she likes? She is astonished, and probably waiting for me to name an exorbitant price….” No, its is for you!” I tell her and suddenly she’s leaping around the coffee shop laughing with glee to have my picture for herself!! Now it’s me who is taken by surprise, as she tells me I am welcome to put my work up on her walls. Well, you don’t need to ask me twice! I’ve been shopping for frames and will be in their in the morning to see what she thinks!!
Taking a break in Barcelona
...and why not! The sky is blue, its warm and there's so much to see and inspire! I find places to draw so easily, coffee shops, bars, park benches amongst thousands of other people. No one cares what you're doing here and everyone is trying to be different. I chat to shop owners and other tourists and the day is always filled with meeting new people. Drawing is slightly more difficult as there's so much to choose from and every building has dozens of balconies each with it's own collection of plants, birds in cages, colourful washing, flags and bunting everywhere. I feel completely relaxed and although I am studying Spanish in general I have no idea what's being said around me and its bliss!
Delivering my drawings to Dock Street Studios
I packed all 40 pieces carefully into my folio each wrapped in pristine cellophane and loaded them all onto the back of my tricycle. It was a lovely crisp sunny morning and as I cycled along I met a man with a barrow! His was very neatly painted and had "K-Art" painted on the back. We chatted as we travelled side by side along the railway embankment path into town. His was a community art project and he was on his way to the V&A for a photo shoot. A nice wee moment sharing our art adventures. He was envious of my pedal power!!
Sara at Dock Street Studios loved my drawings and was delighted to take me on so you can browse through 40 pieces of my unframed drawings there for the next 4 weeks and hopefully purchase something that brightens up your room and reminds you of the lovely old Dundee city landscape.
Drawing Discovery
Saturday afternoon, I cycle along riverside to have a go at drawing the Discovery. I know it’s going to be tricky, and tall ships are not my area of expertise, but I do love vertical lines and I have set out some collage to help me get started. I’m sitting next to my lovely new tricycle on one of those stone mushrooms in front of the new railway station hotel . The sun has warmed it up quite a bit! I look up from my drawing eventually and notice there are about 150 people coming my way! A soft opening rehearsal at the V&A is finishing up and I’m on the exit path. Some lovely people approach me from the crowd. The first asks if he can have a look. Nice touch. He likes my line work. Cool! The second is slightly disappointed that my drawing isn’t of the new fabulous V&A and she encourages me to tackle it next time. Nice! The third asks me “Is that your trike?” He had one just like it red with two seats on the back for his kids! So did I! It’s not til I tell my son this story that he (now age 32) suggests it might have been the same guy we sold our trike to all those years ago when, outside Ladybank primary school one day the weight of my wee girl and her pal on the back raised the front end way up in the air as I got off, I decided I should pass it on. Our neat red “Pashley” three wheeled miracle had had its day with our family. My fourth face in the crowd was my one time hairdresser, “I thought I recognise that hair colour!” It’s red so yes, you can see me from across the street! How cool, I get a real nice interaction with passers-by when Lindabee Draws Dundee!
August comes to a close
The town is buzzing with tourists! It's such a novelty to hear French, Spanish and the good old American drawl on the streets as I pedal along. Dundonians chat to me and eye the skyline that I'm trying to capture with my pen. The sun is shinning, the wee pigeons are strutting their stuff, the buses are charging past and life is pretty good here in Scotland. I flit from coffee shop to coffee shop preparing my collage to work on outside. Still haven't quite plucked up the courage to take my bike into the mainstreams and use it as a workspace, you know lean on the handle bars like an easel and transport my work into the local shops to see if they'll sell for me. But here comes September with the promise of a culture change with tourists flocking to see our fair city. Hopeful that they'll take some local art home as a reminder of their visit!
Summer in the city 2018
The blistering heat has cooled off, we've had torrential rain with thunder storms so that now the grass has revived and is green once more. The circus is in town. Swifts are racing and shrieking overhead and there's plenty of time to get out on my new tricycle and maybe use it to set up my art board to make new drawings of our fair city.