This year, with no Thursday meetings and no Christmas party, it was decided that the patchwork picture would go ahead, although mostly only those who had been participating in the blog have taken part.  And because we still cannot meet, although Sally P. will be putting the sections together in the usual fashion, we don't know when we will get to see it in the flesh.  In the meantime, I have stitched it together by scanning all the pieces, and we thought you might all like to see it, in lieu of a proper blog this week. 
Does anybody know the name of the original piece, and the identity of the artist?  If you think you do, post a comment with your guess, and all will be revealed next week!
So, Happy New Year to all, with what I am sure you will agree (despite all the grumbles about the difficulty of doing it) is a very joyful and appropriate painting for this time of year.

Entries for the blog for 7th January 2021 will be gratefully received, even if (or especially if) you haven't been contributing in 2020

Welcome to Christmas at EAG!  Here are greetings from members, as well as the artwork they have been busy with this week.

So here first is our chairman, Sally P., who is trying out using a picture of her own from Ayers Rock as the basis for a Gelli print, in response to the tree provided by Frances last week.  She has also made wrapping paper using newspaper and leftover acrylic paint very effectively. Her Christmas card is the beginning of a projected day of collage in the new year.

Another Gelli print (with watercolour) - Great minds thinking alike!

Carolyn has produced an ink drawing of the tree from last week, full of movement, and a superbly relevant Christmas card!

Here is an interesting progression of images from Noreen towards the finished card.

Jane is visiting family in Dorset this week, and has sent this greeting.

Ian says, 'We have a pair of buzzards living near to us.  One of them decided to have his lunch (pigeon) right outside our lounge window so I took it as inspiration for a quick life sketch.  He was there for quite some time. I didn’t include the lunch.  I have also added a couple of the trees as a study.'  He added this message:
‘Best wishes for Christmas,however you may be spending it, and for a marvellous 2021 to all my fellow club members’

From Sally T. 'This is a photo of the woods as you go towards Thornham Woods. We aim to cycle every day weather and doctor 's appointments permitting and have done so since the beginning of lock down and take photos of the same location each time. We have loads now and it is interesting looking at the changes. This was taken earlier in the year. It does not look like that now!'

'Hope you all have a very happy Christmas and thank you for keeping me sane with attending the zoom meetings as it has been so nice to see and hear from you.'
Is the message from Avril to go with the card.

The greeting from Jackie that accompanies this festive arrangement is:
'Wishing everyone a merry time this Christmas.'

One oil pastel and ink, one bird print on tracing paper mounted on a stencil print and one Christmas card to say,

From Diana,
'Another collage, with  Press and pencils.  The Fuchsias are in full bloom in the garden, so they can  be my Xmas card to everyone:
'Wishing you all a peaceful and hopefully  uneventful  New Year. Thank you to Noreen and Hannah  for the blog and everyone’s ideas  and challenges, which I’ve really enjoyed.  Diana x'

Two cards from Lesley, who has had trouble sending email to me this week.
First, In the Bleak Midwinter :

The second is a collage (a lot of us this week were on the same wavelength), and is:
‘A light to illuminate the darkness’; a collage of acrylic painted newspaper using paint left over at the end of a session and leaves printed from Indian woodblocks.

June has decorated the tree from last week to create a unique Christmas tree.

Sally L.  says, 'My father-in-law Bill, a keen bird watcher, used to send us hand painted watercolour cards of birds for birthdays and Christmas. So I decided to follow in his footsteps.'

Freda has also been in touch this week to send her good wishes to everyone in EAG.

Finally, here is my card, a digital collage created using scanned wrapping paper and old cards, assembled on the computer together with a clever font.

This will be the last blog before Christmas, but there will be another Zoom meeting next week, on Thursday 17th.  We would love to see as many members as can make it, with mince pie in hand, and coffee, tea or even sherry!
Have a wonderful Christmas - as much as is possible in the circumstances - and let's all look forward to a New Year that brings good news of vaccines and herd immunity, not to mention, peace and goodwill to all...

Hopeful news at last, with a vaccine in the offing!  I know it's still quite a long path back to 'normal', but at least the gate has now been opened a crack.  And with Christmas just around the corner, albeit maybe rather a strange-shaped Christmas, we can all start to look forward to a new year at EAG IRL (in real life)! 
In the meantime, The Bank has written to me to pass on to you all that they are offering on line art lessons, starting this month.  You can have a look at this HERE
I am not going to post this until Friday, to allow for a late straggler or two, if there are any...

Next Avril, who has been working further on lino cuts.  She says, 'I was very lucky to see Frances through my window and she gave me several Lino printing items, e.g. rollers cutters, board so I have been having fun using them this morning.  The registration is not very good and I learnt a lot about which bits to cut out, there are three layers here yellow, red and blue. I did use tracing paper to try to register the boards which I think helped a bit.

And here is Frances' own linocut, plus two other pictures of hers, from Jane's images last week.

Collage with Found Objects from Diana. 'The collage was nearly finished when I decided to cheat, hence the pens, the quill I made about 30 years ago. I decided to work on pastel paper and found 7 sketch books which I had forgotten about, reminded me how much I loved Becky’s classes.'

From Sally T.;  pictures for today of pots, watercolour (a bit wonky) and charcoal pencil. Sally told us on Zoom about two videos she had watched this week.
Maggie Hambling talks about her time at Benton End CLICK HERE
Tate How to Draw Like Paula Rego CLICK HERE

Harriet has painted Jane's anemone from last week and a collection of the last flowers from her garden.

I have made another painting from my abstract of a few weeks ago - great fun to do, with a palette knife - but too quick, so I will have to do another!  Then I used pen and ink for this drawing of an oak tree in its autumn finery.  This isn't finished (and may not be!)

As you can see, Frances has given us a variety of images to think about, and use for next week. 
Don't forget about your Christmas greeting, which can be sent to me for inclusion next week.  Even if you haven't been contributing to the blog, we would all like to hear from you!