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"Bits of Wood"

1/30/2025

"Bits of Wood"

Back in 2011 I was invited to go and paint a mural at a festival called Out of the Ordinary…

With the festival being held out in the middle of a field there weren’t so many walls around to paint on so the organisers suggested I paint something on a large piece of wood so that the painting could moved around and displayed at the event...

Turning Surplus Materials and Paint into Art...

I never like to waste materials or paint so after finishing the mural I used what was left of the paint to create some mini hand-held versions of the mural on some old bits of wood I found lying about.

Unfortunately I didn’t get any photos of the original pieces but I did use the idea to start making more when I got back home to my workshop and this is how they turned out:

There was something very satisfying about painting on wood as well which I enjoyed - something about the way the paint gets soaked up by the wood that you don’t quite get if you’re painting on a wall or on a canvas:

"Bits of Wood" In Progress...

Miniature Murals on a Bit of Wood...

It was also really nice to be able to apply the same process I would use to paint a mural (below) but to be able to do it on a small, portable scale:

What was also nice is I could use the colour schemes of some of the existing murals, paint them on a bit of wood and then it’s almost like taking a brick out of the mural wall so to speak, that I could then put on a shelf or surface somewhere!

Miniature "Brick" from the Wall

More "Bits of Wood" Coming Soon...

There will almost certainly be some more "Bits of Wood" featured in my next collection, which will be coming soon...

New "Bits of Wood" In Progress...

If you'd like to receive an email when the new collection is ready then click below to subscribe to the newsletter: Michael Carlton Newsletter

Hope you enjoyed this post!

Speak soon,

Michael

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Story Behind My "Coloured-In Doodles"

1/29/2025

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Story Behind my
"Coloured-In Doodles"

When I first started out back in 2005, before I’d completed any finished pieces of art or had any exhibitions or anything like that, I used to keep sketchbooks of doodles and Mind-Maps, a bit like a doodle-journal, with various ideas and inspirations that I’d had...

Sketchbook of Mind-Maps and Doodles...

To start off most of them were in black and white as this was before I’d discovered the pens I now use for colouring-in my pieces:

Black and White Doodles in my Sketchbook

One day I was showing one my books to someone I’d met and he suggested I colour them in and turn them into finished pieces of art…

So I went to my local art shop, found some nice pens and stated experimenting with a bit of colour in my doodles:

Doodle with a Bit of Colour Added...

First Pieces...

The first piece I created in this style was around December 2005 and I called it “Swirl”, although to start of with I just called it “Number 1”:

"Swirl" - first full-colour piece from December 2005

The original idea behind it was to put a bit of colour from each of the pens I had onto the paper just to see how they would look, but then it started looking like a nice piece of art so I ended up filling the page, signing it, and then claiming it as my first piece!

It’s quite interesting looking back at this piece because to me it looks like a lot of coiled-up energy and creative potential waiting to explode and turn into the 30 or so pieces that followed shortly after (a bit like the inside of a seed before it grows into a tree or a plant).

"Painted Kites" - First Piece with a Black and Gold Border...

The next piece I created I called “Painted Kites” (above) and it was named after a line from the song “Summer Wind” by Frank Sinatra (whose music I was particularly into at that time…):

This was also the first piece to feature a black and gold border, which I went on to use as a border for many other pieces and also became a bit of a trademark over the years.

I then had quite a creative spurt over the following few months and ended up creating more than 30 or so pieces in a similar style:

"Molecule"

"Boiling"

"Saffron Sun"

"Freemasonic Floor"

"Prussian"

Of course this is just a few pieces from that original collection, but I’ve put a link at the end of this post to a page where you can see them all... ;)

First Exhibition...

In summer 2007 I had my first exhibition at the RISC Global Cafe in my hometown of Reading:

First Exhibition at RISC Global Cafe in Reading

The exhibition was a success and I also sold quite a few of photographic prints that I’d made of my work which encouraged and inspired me to do more creations and exhibit more…

So I went back to my drawing table (I did a lot of my pieces on a rickety old card table that I’d inherited from my grandparents!) and created some more.

In the next batch of pieces my style refined itself somewhat and I also started doing more pieces on larger pieces of paper (in my original collection a lot of the pieces were A5 in size - around the size of my sketchbooks - I then started using up A2 size paper and including a lot more detail):

"Pebbles Together"

"A Scream and a Tear"

"Diamond in the Dirt"

One of larger more detailed pieces was called “Pyramids” and it was a development of a smaller version of a similar image from my original collection:

"Pyramids"

This was also my entry into the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition - the theme for the exhibition that year was “Light” and I was bold enough to think I might stand a chance of winning because the piece had, I thought, a very interesting interplay and contrast between darkness and light…

Entries to 2007 Royal Academy of Art Summer Exhibition

Unfortunately, I didn’t even get past the first round :(

…but it did give me the impetus finish the piece, which I probably wouldn’t have done otherwise as the piece was so intricate and detailed, and took a lot of time and effort to create.

Although I didn’t win the prize at the exhibition, won in another way in that this piece went on to be one of my most popular and recognisable pieces in my body of work - which is in itself a wonderful prize I think :)

Craft Fairs and Online Shop

As well as creating new pieces I was also exhibiting my work locally, and going to local markets and craft fairs where I was selling small photographic prints of my work which you can see below (by the way please excuse the poor photo quality, this was before the the days of iPhones and this was just a quick snap on my ancient Nokia phone :D)

First Sale at a Local Church Fete

As well as selling at markets I also set up an eBay shop to sell my prints and originals - which was a lot of fun, and I was so happy when I got my first sale!

"Opening" - First Original Piece to Sell From my eBay Shop

The first pieces I sold was called “Opening” (above), and I sold it for £80 to a buyer in Ireland :D

Solo Show in London

In Spring 2008 I randomly met someone in and art shop in London and we started talking about art…

I didn’t know at the time, but he turned out to be a gallery owner and very kindly offered to put on solo show of my work at his gallery in London.

Problem was he wanted quite large pieces for the show, and up until then most of my work had been quite small.

So I tried my hand doing a similar style of work on canvas with paint, instead of pen on paper, and although the paintings had an interesting character to them, I really wanted to exhibit some of the earlier pieces I’d created and include them in the show in London...

So, I thought, what do I want? I want these images, on canvas, and quite large… I wondered, how would they look if I got them printed professionally onto the canvas, would that still work, would they still look good…

So I found a company that made such things and gave it go, and I was very pleased with the result…

When they prints came back the colours were bold and the original energy and detail of the pieces was captured very nicely I thought:

"Residue Gone" - Giclee Print on Framed Canvas

Details of the piece well captured by the print...

Bold and faithful colours from the Giclee printing process...

I’d never heard of giclee printing before but now I had and I loved it because now I could turn the volume up on my work by printing them large - it was like my original little photo prints, which were very small and cute, had suddenly been given a new turbo-charged lease of life!

The exhibition went ahead and was held in London in August 2008, about a year after my first exhibition in Reading, and it was well-received again, which I was very pleased about :)

First Solo Show in London's East End

It was also held in London at the same time as all the art school graduation shows, so although I didn’t go to art school myself, and don’t have an on-paper qualification for my art (apart from my GCSE in 2D Art at school), it did still feel like my Coloured-in-Doodles and I had somehow graduated in our own way that day which was a very satisfying feeling :)

After the exhibition, my life went in a bit of a different direction, and although I was still creating, I wasn’t focusing quite as much attention on creating art - although I did come back to creating much more a few years later which I will soon write about in another post…

More Pieces Coming Soon...

At the time of writing this post (Jan 2025) I’m currently planning to create a new collection of such pieces, and to exhibit them both online and offline in various locations...

New Work in Progress...

If you’d like to follow the progress of the new pieces and would like to receive an email when the new collection is ready then click below subscribe to the newsletter and I’ll keep you up-to-date:

Click for New Collection Updates

Hope you’ve enjoyed this post!

Speak soon,

Michael :)

See More "Coloured-In Doodles"

If you’d like to see more of the pieces I mentioned above then check out the "Drawings" Gallery…

"Phantasmagoria"

…and there is also a album of these pieces on my Facebook Page too!

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Brushwipe Paintings

1/29/2025

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"Brushwipe Paintings"

Brushwipe Paintings are one of the first styles of painting I started working with on my painting journey…

The only painting style that came before that was the Stripe, and before that I was trying to create a similar style of painting to my “Coloured-in-Doodles”, which I felt I was having limited success with :/

A crucial thing I learned at that time was that the pieces would come out much better and more naturally if they followed the flow of the medium being using - i.e. letting the medium itself have a strong impact on how the piece should turn out…

I called this the Brushwipe Painting Style because it came about from the patterns and textures that were created on the paper I would use to wipe my brushes clean on (I only like to clean my brushes once I’ve got as much of the paint out of them as I can so as not to waste any paint :D )

I would then take the paper with the brush wipes on it and add some more details to balance the colour scheme and composition, and then put my signature on it when I felt it was ready…

The first brushwipe painting I created was back in 2011 and I called it “Blue Box” (above)...

…and to me it represents stepping outside of the box of expectation and to allow the creativity to flow in a natural and spontaneous way!

Since that first piece back in 2011 I’ve created about 40 or so paintings in a similar style, with some of my favourite ones shown below:

Larger Sizes for 2025..

So far most of these paintings have all been reasonably small - most have been about A4-sized, but this year (2025) I’m going to see if I can create the same effect in a variety of much larger sizes, so hopefully that will be a success!

More Brushwipe Paintings On The Way...

There will almost certainly be some new Brushwipe Paintings featured in my next collection, which will be coming soon - if you’d like to receive an email when the collection is ready then click below to subscribe to the Newsletter:

Michael Carlton Newsletter

Hope you enjoyed this post!

Speak soon,

Michael

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Paintings of Inspirational Landscapes

1/29/2025

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Paintings of Inspirational Landscapes

Over the last fews years I’ve visited places with some great landscapes, and it’s got me inspired to try and capture some of that inspiration into some paintings and works of art…

For the last year or so I’ve also been working as a tour guide in both the Van Gogh Museum and the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and the beautiful landscape paintings in the museums have also got me inspired to try my hand at the genre ;)

Not sure what form the creations will take yet, whether they’ll be more realistic or more abstract but either way it should be a fun and interesting project :)

Anyway I’ll be sending out some updates in my newsletter as the project develops - if you’re already a subscriber then keep an eye-open for those, and if not click below to join the mailing list:

Michael Carlton Newsletter

Speak soon,

Michael

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Nintendo Character Paintings

1/27/2025

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Nintendo Character Paintings

One of the most glorious moments from my childhood was when my dad walked through the living room door and presented my brothers and I with a brand new Nintendo set :)

This was a dream come true for me at the time because I really wanted one, and even if I’d saved up all my pocket money it still would have taken me about 5 years or more to buy one :D

Anyway from that point on until I was about 15 or so one of my favourite hobbies was playing Nintendo games, and I’m pretty sure this has had quite an influence on the way I paint and create today!

So as way of celebrating and commemorating all the fun I had playing those games back then I recently started working on a series of paintings of the characters from all the games I liked :)

First painting I did was, not surprisingly, of Super Mario himself:

…and here he is in all his jumping glory!

Next was a character called Kirby - a cute, pink, cloud sort of thing:

I never actually played the Kirby game, but my brother used to play it on the Game Boy and I remember enjoying the music a lot too!

One of my favourite games was the original Super Mario Kart on the SNES, so I also painted Mario in one of his go-karts:

...and the most recent painting is of Mario’s brother, Luigi:

So that’s the Nintendo character painting collection so far, and this year (2025) I’m planning to expand the collection to include some more characters, so watch this space!

P.S. For copyright reasons these paintings are not currently available for sale and have only been created for my own personal pleasure/enjoyment.

However…

…there may come a point in the future where I have permission or a license to sell them.

If you would like me to let you know if they ever become available for sale then drop me an email to let me know and I’ll keep you updated ;)

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New Art Projects and Inspirations for 2025

1/27/2025

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New Art Projects and Inspirations
for 2025

Welcome to the first blog post of 2025!

Below I’ve made a list of all the projects and inspirations I’m looking to work on and create this year…

I’ve put a little bit of information about each one here and there’s also a link to a separate page about each one if you wanted to find out more.

I hope you enjoy the post and feel free to leave any comments below or reply to the mailing list email, as I’m always interested to hear any suggestions or feedback you may have :)

So for this year I have planned:

More existing Michael Carlton creations including:

"Coloured-In Doodles"

More pieces in my signature/trademark style - when I first started out back in 2005 this was the very first style of work I exhibited, so am looking forward to going back to my original roots with these:

More "Coloured-In Doodles" coming this year...

I’ve also had quite a few requests recently to create more pieces in this style and will be creating a new collection of these this year for sure, so watch this space ;)

"Coloured-In Doodle" In Progess...

If you’d like to find out more about the story behind this style of art check out the following article on my blog:

Blog Post - Story Behind My "Coloured-In Doodles"

"Brushwipe Paintings"

More "Brushwipe Paintings"…

I always love creating what I call Brushwipe Paintings, and this year I’m intending to create quite a few more of these :

So far most of the paintings I’ve created in this style have been reasonably small (mostly the size of a piece of A4 paper) so this year I’m aiming to be able to create some in a variety of much larger sizes…

To find out more about this style of art click here:

More Info - Brushwipe Paintings

"Bits of Wood"

Have also had some requests to create more of my “Bits of Wood” ornaments…

More "Bits of Wood" Ornaments Coming This Year...

They’re fun, tactile and are half-way between a painting and an ornament and this year I’m looking to create quite a few more of these ;)

To find out more about this style of art click here:

More Info -"Bits of Wood"

New Styles/Genres for 2025

As well as expanding my body of work in some of my existing styles and media I’m also looking to branch out a bit with some new ranges of paintings including:

Paintings and Artwork of Inspirational
Landscapes

Over the last few years I’ve been to some places with very beautiful and inspirational landscapes and I’m looking to try my hand this year at capturing that inspiration in some works of art…

Last year I also started working as a tour guide in Amsterdam and whenever I do tours of the city’s museums I get inspired by all the beautiful landscape paintings there :)

So this year I’m going to be aiming to develop an interesting and inspirational landscape artwork style…

To find out more about this project click here:

More Info - Art Inspired by Beautiful Landscapes

Interpretations of Famous Paintings

This is a project I’ve wanted to experiment with for quite some time…

After doing tours of the famous museums in Amsterdam I’ve been feeling extra inspired to create a collection of my own interpretations of some of the world’s most famous works of art :)

Should be a fun and interesting project I think!

To find out more about this project click here:

More Info: Art Inspired by Famous Paintings

Nintendo Character Paintings

You may or may not have seen these already, and it’s more likely that you haven’t as it isn’t something I’ve listed on my website or posted on social media that much (mainly for copyright reasons these have only been created for my own personal use…)

Anyway, a couple of years ago I started creating a series of pixel-art paintings of some of my favourite Nintendo characters because when I was a child I used to love playing Nintendo games…

… and I’m sure some of the graphics in those games have had an influence on the way I create my work today :0

So am looking to expand my Nintendo character painting family a bit more this year as well ;)

More Info - Nintendo Character Paintings

Creations and Blog Articles Inspired by You!

As well as creating from my own ideas and inspirations this year I’m also looking to create a bit more of an interactive creative experience for those following my work including:

Creations Inspired by Email Subscriber
Suggestions and Requests

This is where you can get involved and participate in the creative process!

What I’m planning to do this year is send out an email every so often asking for requests and suggestions of things people would like to see in a piece of art or in a collection of pieces…

Then once I’ve received everyone’s suggestions I create the art based around the responses I’ve received - so a bit like creating a commission only for a group rather than an individual

If you’re already subscribed to the newsletter then I’ll be sending an email at some point with some more information…

…if you haven’t subscribed yet and would like to take part then you can subscribe here:

Michael Carlton Art Newsletter

“About Me” Series of Blog Posts

If you’ve ever visited my website you may have noticed that I don’t have an About Page on it (at the moment at least)…

One of the reasons for that is because I never really know what to write or what people want to know about

So as a result what I’m looking to do this year is create a series of blog posts based around peoples’ various questions and turn the About Page into an organic series of questions and answers blog posts…

If you’re already subscribed to the newsletter then I’ll be sending an email at some point with some more information…

…if you haven’t subscribed yet and would like to submit some questions then you can subscribe here:

Michael Carlton Art Newsletter

Behind-the-Scenes Facebook Group for Mailing List Subscribers

And the final new idea for 2025 is to digitally open the doors to my studio to members of my mailing list with a private behind-the-scenes Facebook group

This is where I’ll be posting photos of pieces as they progress, and giving some insights into some of the processes I use as I’m creating in my studio, so you’ll be able to see step-by-step how the creations come to life...

If you’re already subscribed to the newsletter and would like to join the group then send a request to join on the group page (Michael Carlton Art Studio)…

…and if you haven’t subscribed yet and would like to join the group then you can subscribe here:

Michael Carlton Art Newsletter

So that’s what I have in the pipe-line for 2025 - will be interesting to see how it all unfolds!

Am looking forward to a year of creativity and hope you will enjoy joining me on this creative journey with any inspirations and suggestions you may have… :)

Best wishes,

Michael

Follow the Progress…

If you’d like to keep up-to-date with this year’s projects as they unfold then click on the link below to subscribe to the newsletter:

Michael Carlton Art Newsletter

…and you can also find me on the usual social media platforms at:

Michael Carlton Social Media

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"Bits of Wood"

Story Behind My "Coloured-In Doodles"

Brushwipe Paintings

Paintings of Inspirational Landscapes

Nintendo Character Paintings

New Art Projects and Inspirations for 2025

MICHAEL CARLTON

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