1st November. For two years now, I’ve made paintings for the porch or the front window in contribution to our lane’s Advent window collaboration. Twenty six displays, one being unveiled each night at 6.30pm until Christmas Eve. I made a village scene the first time with lots of sky, and a Santa and a Christmas fairy last year. Each was AR-enabled and it was very early days for the village on that first occasion but they came out, they scanned, and they liked, which is how the pumpkin went down so well last night.

So right – follow that! How many different fairies can you make? Variations on the Santa and sleigh thing anyone?

I’ve started by reversing the pumpkin, plugging the holes with putty rubber, and drawing out a Santa in a sleigh, leaving a trail of magic where the holes will be once again, this time filled with white LED lights, and following a cheery chaos of reindeer hooves, backsides, and those fluffy white rudders that pass for tails. I can see it, I just have to make it visible to everyone else!

What I could also see, suddenly, was that two of the holes for lights originating in the pumpkin are, well, unfortunately located!

The sleigh now is looking rather like a leaf and I’m wondering about going down a magical ecological route. Fish in the sky, maybe.

3rd November and the fish-in-the-sky idea is taking off so to help with fluidity, I’ve sealed the surface with transparent primer and added a layer of gloss varnish. Santa also has his boots out of what’s probably the fish’s head.

November 4th. The gloss layer has worked its magic by letting me slide paint across it with a palette knife and create waves and ribbons in the density of it. I’m losing track of his mode of transport though!

5th November. Editing text is one thing, editing a painting is quite another, especially when you have remnants of two ideas bang in the middle of the space! But I’ve found a similar process can apply – print out, try out, go back and implement. Drawing on prints lets me see how an idea fits with what is already there, reducing the risk of editorial creep.

This was the eventual choice – a sleigh. Unoriginal when compared with a fish, a meteor, and the moon but much easier to find a logical seating arrangement. This first one (above) looked like a pan and needed the depth it had in the first place but with a different shape.

Here, the sleigh is more capacious and, while it looks at the moment to be filled with ice cubes, it at least gives Santa somewhere to sit, to throw out his legs from and to wave his arms. He has pink cheeks and blue eyes now.

The reindeer are also back, using a kind of cave painting outline technique. White charcoal sealed in place picks out the body shapes and highlights the antlers, ears, and eyes. I’ll use prints to figure out where the reins go and which one of the more defined reindeer will have the red nose. My plan is to raise the level of the presents so I can push lights into the access points that would have led to sniggers amongst some. Well, I sniggered so ..! I’ve used coloured pencil to make lines in the hands and the face.

Mindful that this is for children, I need it to be bright and colourful, so I expect to bring in some neon paint, possibly in the sky, and on the ground where there will also be indications of a village.

9th November. Progress. Planets are emerging and the sleigh is beginning to take shape in terms of its colours. I think the sky needs another wash of deep blue though, or Santa’s not going to stand out. The reindeer have gold tracery now, to pick them out.

Next, I need to insert the lights through the holes and respond to what that does.

11th November. Delaying the lights while I sort out my scenario.

Hello Santa Super Nova! The baubles are proliferating and falling off to form a trail amongst the local planets. I’ve drawn these out a little now using soft pastel. The presents on the sleigh have become baubles too, and the big box, now with no anchor, has become a sack which is currently weird having presented initially as the poo emoji. It’s a micro work in progress within the macro. The reindeer have better-formed eyes which will be further improved now I know what I’m doing.

I’ve also used soft pastel to scrub a halo around the planets and this will be softenened tomorrow. Further notes to self: seal the pastel with gloss to allow baubles to present in the foreground of planets; bring out the infinity signs on the sleigh; also the ‘heart’ on Pluto – kids should be able to see that; maybe add more baubles to the front of the sleigh; tackle the, erm, turd; deal with Santa’s nostrils without knocking anything else there out of whack; raise the vibrancy of the red suit by repainting over a white base (see trouser leg on the left); and imagine some sort of vavoomery for the sleigh’s runners. Does he need reins or are the reindeer so magical they don’t need any?

12th November and that pile of poo is beginning to look more like a Christmas tree, so maybe the small one next to it can be the Christmas Fairy. Or not! This has become completely riotous and might be taking its lead from Diwali! I added a layer of gloss to the planets when they had been sealed to prevent movement of the pastels. Tomorrow, I’ll add some baubles to show where they sit in relation to the foreground elements. I see I’ve missed an eye down the bottom.

13th November.

There’s a lot going on here, and I can see a directional draw from bottom left to lower right, to centre, to top left. Follow the eyes and the baubles.

19th November after a vaccine-fog hiatus. A friend suggested a black hole for the sleigh and I liked the sound of that. But when I thought about it a bit more, I realised it could be more of a star nursery, throwing out tiny stars that, as they emerge, get bigger and turn into baubles/planetary objects.

20th November and here we have [drum roll] Santa Supernova!

I’ll do some refining tomorrow; lines where they might help with definition – this is for children* – and some additional neon where that might add to the riot. Santa Supernova gives me licence to use music with a thump to it, riffing as it is on Jamz Supernova of BBC 6 Music.

21st November.

Here we are then, as always the photo is marred by reflection but it will be fine in the window. For the AR though, I’ve taken it into Paintshop Pro and used the clone tool to drop in clots of unaffected areas to mask the shine. In the process, this has shown me a different picture which will become the base of the AR so please flash your Artivive app at it.

I’ve also cropped some details with the aim of turning these into baubles I can ‘hang’ in 3D space just beyond the base.

Tiny in-app video of the baubles in situ. Always gratifying to see them ‘hovering’ in virtual space although the spin effect I’d tried to achieve with the transitions facility didn’t materialise so I abandoned it.

*Just heard we’re not doing Advent windows this year because it’s a bit stressful and a big commitment for many. A rest might be wise then – just put stuff up as we’d all do anyway and maybe invite people.

Suzanne Conboy-Hill 2023