Don't all look at once!

You know when you are trying to show a friend someone but you don't want them to overtly all turn and stare at the same time so it becomes obvious that you are talking about the poor sod? These guys didn't get the " don't all look at once" memo.

61x61cm
Acrylic on canvas

Absence explained.

The last few weeks have been thrown into turmoil by an injury sustained by my youngest son ,Julius. It started off as a sprain and ended up in a weeks stay in hospital and a few operations. All this from a pillow fight . Being a kid is a dangerous occupation!

Obviously, a children's ward is no place to paint , but in these last few hours I have found peace if mind in the reassurance of the doctors that he will make a full recovery , and allowed myself to pull out the iPad and fiddle with one of the paint applications I downloaded.
This, believe it or not, is the sanitized view from the 6th floor of Waikato Hospital across the lake . I painted the hospital from the other side of this same lake not long ago.
So, whilst I have not had an opportunity paint ( nor the headspace) I have a renewed respect for the medical profession ( which is funny, given my husband is a doctor!) and enormous admiration for those who have chronically ill children.

I owe a great debt of gratitude to my very good friends who have supplied me with meals, housed my other child and puppy, collected my post and brought me coffee, tea and sympathy all week.

I will start painting again once I have caught up on some sleep or those psycho cows really will be psycho!!!

A closer look

What a week! But let us speak of it no more.

I am excited. I painted!!!!! No ground breaking new stuff, I am afraid, but I am very happy to have opened the tubes and thrown the paint around.I might have even used a brush or two. This was just so much fun.

Listening to Interpol album, Antic. Very enjoyable.


" a closer look"
Acrylic
30x60 cm
Stretched canvas

Enforced downtime

The forces of chaos seem to have decided to hold a frat party at my house and I am in about day 5 of a series of events that have not allowed me time to paint.At all. Nada. Nothing. Niet. Niks.Nutting.


A quick recap of events has seen me visit A&E,  breakdown and call the AA( for the car, not me, but i did earn a funny look), placate the security firm regarding the alarm activations by the new puppy,THE NEW PUPPY,  host a birthday party( my own!), attend a soccer competition  and endure 4 successive nights of broken sleep and comfort an 8 year old who had the worst birthday ever, at home , in pain and absolutely devastated about being off his foot for 3 weeks.

• I am exhausted.
• I am also doing this solo.
•  
• ..............................................................I want a medal!!

As with all house parties, the clean up is a nastiness that seems to extend longer than the party. Also, I would make a terrible nurse. but a fabulous doctor.

So, I have used my short bursts of downtime to think about direction, look at some other artists on the web and gather some reference material for future work. I  feel like those times have been taken in the eye of the storms and they have been most welcome and quite useful.

This is an excerpt from a fellow artist and blogger, Jeff Mahorney, from his blog .

http://jmahorney.blogspot.co.nz/2008/01/what-ive-learned-after-120-paintings.html

He talks about  what he learned painting his first 120 paintings. .....and i like it because it rings true.

So, no painting, I am afraid.
I know, I also wanted there to be a painting........

Wild blue horses

I thought it would interest you to see the process of painting these horses.

The weather outside is wild! The westerly spring winds are giving my garden a real blasting and I have had to rescue the kids soccer goals from the fence( an electric fence!! A most exciting exercise!). The reason I am playing weather reporter girl with you is to explain the glare on the photos. I usually take my photos outside in natural light. Today, my canvas would have swiftly become a sail, so I had to photograph inside, with lights. Glary.

This is the 30x60cm acrylic on boxed canvas.

Raglan beach and itchy legs

This was a interesting day. I tried to paint on the beach but was attacked by too many sand flies and way to much self consciousness , so I packed up and trekked up( it is a bloody steep walk!) to the capark. As I stopped for a breather (My old Grumbarcher easel is beautifully but heavy) I turned back towards the beach and saw this vista. But I was too buggered to paint, too itchy to concentrate and the path is narrow and not ideal to set up an easel, so I took a photo and worked from that and some notes I made at the scene( first note : bring insect repellant next time).

Oil on canvas board
25 x 35 cm