New paintings , Digital art work
Painting from the Irish Bogs.
Digital art work : Nigel Borrington
First paintings for over a year :
Its over a year since I did any painting, I have been working with my photography so much, but as its the start of a new year , I felt a real need to paint again.
This painting is the start of a project I will work on , based on the upland bogs of Kilkenny and Tipperary.
It based on a series of photographic images from these great places.
Tony O’Malley
Self-Portraits Tony O’Malley, Centenary Exhibition 2013
Over the last five years I have been working for Jane O’malley, a local artist and wife of the late Tony O’Malley , photographing all of Tony’s archive work along with some of Janes own paintings.
Tony is a very well know artist in Ireland and it has been a great pleasure to work with Jane and record and see most of Tony’s Career through his paintings and sketch books.
Some of these photographs of tony’s self portraits have just been used in a new book and exhibition being held in the Butler Gallery in Kilkenny.
The below images taken this weekend are from the exhibition.
The Exhibition, held in the Butler Gallery Kilkenny
“Tony O’Malley holds an important and distinguished position in the history of twentieth century Irish art. A highly respected and beloved artist, his works are represented in all major Irish museums and included in the most significant public and private collections of Irish art. Throughout O’Malley’s working life he made self-portraits. They became a way for the viewer to know him. O’Malley taught himself to draw and paint, and in the early days the self-portrait was a convenient immediate means in which to put marks to paper whenever a mirror was available. The mirror was a non-judgmental, reliable ally.
Through the diversity of his self-portraits, we see O’Malley’s practice evolve. The self-portraits stare back at us, mostly unexpressive and unsmiling, sometimes severe, sometimes with one eye closed. Always we see O’Malley’s distinctive strong nose, bearded face, and a bald head at times dressed with skull cap, in later years with sunhat, protection from the hot Bahamian rays. From time to time, we see O’Malley viewed from only the side of a mirror, with the studio or the garden taking prominence in the remainder of the frame. The monochromatic self-portraits are stark and economical and echo the words of the artist himself, ‘The more I paint the less of myself is there’. O’Malley has left us a great gift: a wealth of self-portraits by which to remember him.”
Irish arts festivals
Carlow Visual arts center
Photography by : Nigel borrington
Irish arts festival season.
The next two weeks is and big period in Ireland for arts festivals (From Carlow,Kerry to Galway) and I intend to visit as mush as I possible can, so I will not be posting as much as usual over the next two week’s.
I will when possible check peoples blogs and see what your all up to, but for the time being I will be getting out and about to learn about and see as much art work as I possible can.
Beach sculpture at Tramore, Waterford
All images canon G1 x
Art students working a a beach sculpture, Tramore, County Waterford
Photography by : Nigel Borrington
Dragon Sculpture
A little while back on a visit to Tramore Beach, County Waterford I photographed these art students working on beach sculpture before a competition the following weekend.
It was amazing to watch them for a while as they practised their projects, the images below are of a dragon that they intended to create on the day.
Gallery
Photoshop : Producing a painting from a photograph
Nikon D7000, 18-200mm lens, iso 100
Grange Crag walk, Co Tipperary
Landscape photography: Nigel Borrington
A very different post today, For many weeks I have just posted photographs and it remains my main interest here but I just wanted for a little time to talk about Abode photo-shop and an application called My-paint.
Art has always been of a big interest to myself and I view all my images as a form of artistic production, some people don’t see photographs as art they are to much of a completed process or they don’t see any artistic process involved in the taking of images using a camera. To a point I do get this view, however I think the speed and directness of a camera can offer results that a painter or an artist with a pencil will not capture.
Here I post some result from working with a photograph in adobe camera raw and then photo-shop, in order to produce more developed results. In the first of the images below I have converted the photograph into black and white then using photo-shops levels and curves tools I have increased the brightness and contract until only the outlines of the trees exists.
In the third image down I have taken one of these black and white images and over painted it with photo-shops brush tool adding layers of different colour.
The last image and painting is taken from the second black and white image loading it into an application called My-paint, this is a free painting tool and is packed with great brush and pen tools. Using it I have created lots of layers of different colours and opacities in order to produce the final result.
Waterford Crystal
Waterford Crystal Craftsman at work : Nigel Borrington
Waterford Crystal.
Waterford Crystal Limited was, until March 2009, a subsidiary of Waterford Wedgwood plc, itself formed through the acquisition by the then Waterford Glass Group of the famous pottery manufacturer Josiah Wedgwood in 1986. The last chairman was Tony O’Reilly, and the CEO John Foley. The leading shareholders of the holding company were former billionaire O’Reilly and his family, joined in the last decade by O’Reilly’s brother-in-law, Greek shipping heir Peter Goulandris. Waterford Wedgwood was forced into receivership in early 2009. On 5 January 2009, news of the receivership of Waterford Wedgwood Ltd.
Scanner Art
Scanner art - Nigel Borrington
Scanner Art, by Kilkenny photographer and artist : Nigel borrington
Digital art – Photographic Interpretation
Photographic Art - Scanner art
Digital photography and digital images can be produced without a camera of any kind (Phones, Scanner and fax Machines) can all be used to produce images of many kinds.
Scanner Art by : Nigel Borrington
Kilkenny photographer and Artist.
Kilkenny Art
Kilkenny Photography
Grennan mill craft school
Grennan mill craft school
On returning after my summer break (September 2011), I have made a decision to do a full review of my current portfolio along with the direction my photography is moving in over the next months. Even in good times I think this is a good thing to do once a year.
Grennan mill craft school - Art and craft work
I have kept all my portfolio work over the last years and started to do a review at the weekend. One area of my portfolio I have not posted to date is my Art and Craft work. For starters it’s not exclusively photography and as such I have not wanted to muddy the waters.
However I feel that this work is as much a part of my portfolio history as anything, so I am going to show you some of the work that I submitted in order to pass the Level five course that I attended at the Grennan mill – craft and art school, Thomastown, county Kilkenny.
I attended the course full time between 2005 and 2008 and I enjoyed every minute, its without doubt one of the best things I have ever done and I would recommend this course to anyone.
The course involved the following subjects below and the pictures are from my portfolio in these areas.
Batik, Ceramics, Design, Drawing, Painting, Metal craft, Printing, Photography Textile weaving.
Grennan mill craft school - Exam exhibition
Grennan mill craft school - Metal craft
Grennan mill craft school - metal craft
Grennan mill craft school - Print making
Grennan mill craft school - Print making
Grennan mill craft school
Grennan mill craft school - Art and design
Grennan mill craft school - stone sculpture
Grennan Mill craft school - Batik
Grennan mill craft school - Ceramics : Sun dial
Grennan mill craft school - Design
Grennan mill craft school - Metal craft
Grennan mill craft school - photography
Grennan mill craft school - Photography and design sheet image
Grennan mill craft school
Grennan mill craft school - Metal craft and design
Kilkenny art work and design
So there you are that’s my craft and art work, does it relate to the photography I am currently doing? You bet it does!
This course helped me with the design and vision that I hope I can put into my current work and who knows maybe one day I will come back to a more direct application for it, maybe I already have.
Kilkenny art work and photography by Nigel Borrington.
Nigel Borrington 
Images of my Violin
Hand made Irish Violin,
made my Michael Allen, Ardfinnan, County Tipperary
I have been playing the Violin for sometime now and it is one of my favourite pass times.
I loved violin music for many years before taking it up myself with artists such as Nigel Kennedy and Jay Ungar being amongst my most loved.
Here I just want to share some images of my own violin made by Irish Violin maker , Michael Allen from County Tipperary.
I am very happy to have found him and felt it was a great thing to support a local crafts man when getting this violin from him.
Image Gallery
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June 26, 2014 | Categories: Art and craft work, Comment, Nigel Borrington | Tags: county Tipperary, irish music, Jay Ungar, Michael Allen, Music, Nigel Borrington, Nigel Kennedy, Photography, Violin, Violin makers, violin music | 28 Comments