First Night Design | Flying Colours — New!

Flying Colours at Saatchi Art

As a lover of all things maritime and a descendant of admirals and sailors, I am often drawn to centuries-old paintings of seacraft at work or play. I created Flying Colours with two images far apart in time. One layer is the Russian Squadron at Malta, 20 October 1827, painted by Alfred Gomersal Vickers which is in the public domain. The other is a photograph of Bembridge Lifeboat which I took the other day. I have melded them together using Photoshop’s various tools to make it look as if it were an original 19th-century image.

Flying Colours Fleece Blanket at Redbubble

Available at the following galleries:
Redbubble
Zazzle US
Zazzle UK
Fine Art America [14 fulfillment centers in 5 countries]
Saatchi Art

Take care and keep laughing!

There Were Never Such Devoted Pumpkins Binder | Zazzle #Sold

I’m delighted to have sold this binder to follow the matching card I sold the other day.

Source: There Were Never Such Devoted Pumpkins Binder | Zazzle

Take care and keep laughing!

Devoted Pumpkins Halloween card #Sold!

Devoted Pumpkins Halloween card. Personalize any greeting card for no additional cost! Cards are shipped the Next Business Day.

There were never such devoted pumpkins! Fresh pumpkins to make an exquisite pumpkin pie for your Halloween supper. Also suitable for Thanksgiving.

Source: Devoted Pumpkins Halloween card (866786)

Take care and keep laughing!

First Night Design | Bembridge Lifeboat Station #Art #New

Click to buy Bembridge Lifeboat Station framed print (Fine Art America) © Sarah Vernon

As some of you know, our summer holidays as children were spent in Bembridge on the Isle of Wight where I now live. The other week I trundled round on my mobility scooter visiting my favourite haunts. This shot of Bembridge Lifeboat Station through the trees is just where the steps lead down to the beach and to the exact spot we invariably used for swimming.

It is true the original photograph is rather appealing and some of you on Facebook have already seen it as my header but true to form, I had to play.

I used two textures from Design Cuts — a yellow-based and a green-based one. I ran the photograph through Topaz Impression three or four times to produce different effects. I chose to layer ‘Cezanne 1’ and ’Cavedweller’ (as you do) and blended them with the textures to produce a digital painting. I hope it pleases you as much as it did me in its creation.

Click to buy Bembridge Lifeboat Station tote bag (Fine Art America) © Sarah Vernon

Part of a paper read to the Ladies of Shanklin Evening Institute, October 1951.

“It is quite possible that some among you are quite ignorant of everything connected with Lifeboat work […] I have no intention of going back into remote history, or to the founding of the Institution in 1824.  Moreover, I expect you will think that I have gone back quite far enough if I commence with the time of your grandfathers, and I select that particular time because it was then that the proud reputation of the Lifeboat Institution was built up, on the great hearts and stout muscles of the grand old men who served as crews for the small pulling and sailing lifeboats stationed round our coasts.  But to really understand the heroism of these grand old fellows, and to give them full credit for their marvellous rescues, and for their self-sacrificing efforts, one must be possessed of…” Bembridge Lifeboat

Available at the following galleries:
Redbubble
Zazzle US
Zazzle UK
Fine Art America [14 fulfillment centers in 5 countries]
Saatchi Art

Take care and keep laughing!

First Night Design | A Burgundy Rose in Snow #Art

Thank you all so much for commenting on my Rose in Snow post and giving me the confidence to upload the piece to my galleries. I made one change, which was to ensure the rose itself covered the whole area so that no background green is showing. I like it better this way.

A Burgundy Rose in Snow Flask by FirstNightDesign

A Burgundy Rose in Snow Throw Pillow by FirstNightDesign

A Burgundy Rose in Snow Card by FirstNightDesign

A Burgundy Rose in Snow Postage by FirstNightDesign

Available at the following galleries:
Redbubble
Crated
Zazzle US
Zazzle UK
Fine Art America [14 fulfillment centers in 5 countries]
Saatchi Art

Take care and keep laughing!

First Night Design | Pre-Raphaelite Beauty #Art

Pre-Raphaelite Beauty © Sarah Vernon – Fine Art America

This adaptation of an autochrome photograph from Wikimedia by Robert Demachy (1859-1936), which was taken some time between 1907 and 1915, took a great deal of work to get just right.

Female nude draped in a blue veil, autochrome by Robert Demachy

The original image is enchanting but as soon as I saw it, I wanted to turn it into a painting with a hint of the Pre-Raphaelites about it — yes, one of those rare occasions when I knew what I desired and didn’t wait for one of my ‘accidents’!

I used various textures to give it colour and texture before using a detail of the clock from this image to create the top right-hand detail. I duplicated this detail and warped and shaped it to create an art nouveau pattern for the drape. I also removed her left arm as it looked slightly odd!

Pre-Raphaelite Beauty Mugs © Sarah Vernon

I had to think carefully when uploading it to my galleries as a lot of the groups (such as on Redbubble) don’t accept nudity. I had to tick boxes about ‘mature content’. I’m not sure I’ll do another nude any time soon!

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Look in my face; my name is Might-have-been;
I am also call’d No-more, Too-late, Farewell — Dante Gabriel Rossetti, (The House of Life: 97. A Superscription, 1-2)

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Not as she is, but as she fills his dream — Christina Rossetti, In An Artist’s Studio

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The term ‘Pre-Raphaelite’ is in danger of becoming one of the most misused tags in art history — Christopher Wood, Author of The Pre-Raphaelites

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Available at the following galleries:
Redbubble
Crated
Zazzle US
Zazzle UK
Fine Art America [14 fulfillment centers in 5 countries]
Saatchi Art

Take care and keep laughing!

First Night Design | Bound for Santiago #Art

Bound for Santiago © Sarah Vernon

I created Bound for Santiago in the form of a collage and then blended the images into one with Photoshop. It comprises one of my textured backgrounds, two photos by Joshua Earle at Unsplash, and a lovely antique ship by Zakhar Kleyman on Flickr.

Why Santiago? The title came fully formed from the mouth of Mr FND; where would we be without dreams and imagination? The fact that the antique ship photograph was taken from Staten Island ferry is neither here nor there!

Bound for Santiago Tote Bag © Sarah Vernon

Available at the following galleries:
Redbubble
Crated
Zazzle US
Zazzle UK
Fine Art America
Fine Art England
Saatchi Art

Take care and keep laughing!

Mosque of the Janissaries

Mosque of the Janissaries

The perfect binder to keep all your travel plans in one place!  This is a digital painting of the mosque in the Venetian Harbour in Chania, Crete.  It is one of the oldest surviving buildings from the time of the Ottoman Empire and was built in 1645.  Worship took place in the mosque until 1923 when the Muslims left the island in an exchange between Greece and Turkey.  Janissaries is the Turkish word for ‘new troops’, men who were recruited, ironically, from the non-Muslim fraternity and worked as household troops and bodyguards of the sultan. Once containing the Chania museum, in recent years the mosque has been hosting small art exhibitions.

Take care and keep laughing!