Lets blow stuff up!

I love fireworks. My kids love fireworks. Hell, who doesn't love fireworks.?!  ...oh yes, animals. And where do we live but surrounded by farms with horses, cows , sheep, dogs and other firework hating beings and I have to respect that. So, no fireworks for us and that has disappointed my kids when it comes to the one day a year ( the anachronistic holiday of the commonwealth, Guy Fawkes day) when we may legally purchase gunpowder and blow stuff up.

Sparklers, I am told, suck. Not too sucky to actually be ignored, but not as cool as things that shoot into the air and explode with a great shower of light and a satisfyingly noisy boom.

So, I decided to paint a fireworks painting for the boys and I enjoyed it so much I am turning it into a series. Oil on board and then an acrylic resin layer on top to add glossy depth to the already fantastical image. This is quite over the top but they love it and , you know, if they love it and they have it on their wall, I am happy. They will remember their mother who painted things specifically for them when I am old or gone.

oil on board, 60 x 40 cm

Fangirl moment

I post a lot of my progress paintings on Instagram. Instagram is crack cocaine for visual artists. There, I said it, I am an IG junkie.  Anyways, confessions aside, I follow some pretty amazing , world famous artists on IG and love seeing their work. But when one of them comments or likes one of MY paintings, I freak out. And , dear readers, it is beginning to happen more often and no, I have yet to stop squealing when it happens.

So, oh famous ones, thank you for the validation.

The start

the middle

The end

A group exhibition and a floor talk.

I am exhibiting at the Te Awamutu museum with a number of very talented local artists ( they have awards to prove it) ,in an exhibition titled, Re-Imaginings.

Reimaginings will open in the Gavin Gifford Gallery on Friday 12 December. This exhibition showcases artworks by nine local artists who have each chosen an object from the collection to draw inspiration from for their own contemporary works. The works are fantastic, and it is a unique way for the community to engage with our collection. The artists featuring inReimaginings are:  Di Tocker, Lynn Nunn, Hilary Ramage, Carole Shepheard, Debra Powell, Nynke Piebenga, Heather Bramwell, and Jane Siddall....oh, and me.
On Saturday 13 December, starting at 11.30am, the artists will be hosting floor talks in the gallery to discuss their works. This is a fantastic opportunity to hear from the artists directly about their creative processes and how they get from an idea to a finished object.

Unfortunately, it coincides with the Santa parade! I know, because my kid is on one of the floats! The other kid will have to sit with me and learn all he can.....artist as parent is hard work. My husband will be somewhere south, terrifying himself on an off road motorbike course.  You do what you must.

So, if you find yourself at a loose end and want to come listen to me blather on about the circumstances surrounding the creation on my painting, please do. Julius will keep you company and laugh if you roll your eyes.

The piece in the collection that resonated with me was a glass washboard.

Big brush moment

I bought myself a big- assed mop brush. ( Look, there were bigger ones, but I am not THAT flush) I decided I needed to make faster starts. So, start to where I walked away , 1 hour. Now remember, this is the FIRST phase.

Well hello, sexy brush. You will never be this clean again.

First stage...

ok, step away while this still looks ok. 

Grass heads next to the kid's bus-stop.

So, Hawthorne is right. Swing a bigger brush. It feels good. 

The people have spoken!

What great news! I won the Peoples choice award at the Waikato Sociaty of Arts 80th Celebrations exhibition with my painting " Eternal Celebration" Oil on board with resin.

I am so pleased . There are no other words.

But I am going to change the title. Suggestions?

It's a weird photo because of the resin finish. I am no photographer, so I have not worked out how to photograph shiny surfaces yet, but trust me, even I am impressed by this painting!

How funny is THIS effort!

 Can you see how shiny the resin is(and smooooooooth) how reflective it is? And yes, that view reflected is my view. And yes, I am grateful.

Thank you, People. I appreciate the vote of support.

My adventures with planning film

Planning film, the stuff architects used to use (when architects still hand drew plans), translucent ,  frosted,  plasticy paper that came in rolls.Whatevere the name, I like it! I want some rolls of it. It was a constant in my childhood as my father is just that kind of architect. On a recent trip home I was gifted some off the smaller pieces and brought them home with me. I have wanted to paint on them ever since I realised that one COULD paint on it. It apparels to my need to paint on smooth surfaces. I am eyeing out aluminium as we speak, but that's another story.......
I need a smooth surface because I push paint around on the surface...quite a lot. I smear and pull and use those marks to , well, create other marks and under marks and all sorts of effects to get the painting to where I want it to be. I am not a "places paint down in precise manner" kinda painter. I am a "lets see where this takes me" kinda painter. Exciting!

Anyways, I decided to use it and see what I could achieve. Here are the results:

Tidal pool surge

the large painting

detail from large painting

detail from large painting

aerial perspective of african landscape

So now I am trawling the internet looking for rolls of this stuff. Wish me luck.

Workshop with Peter Griffen

I attended a workshop run by Australian abstract artists, Peter Griffen.  My work is far from abstract, but I wanted to attend to stretch myself a little and enjoy the dialogue that goes with these sorts of things. Get 15 artists in a room and SOMEONE is going to say something interesting! Well, stretch I did. I felt like I was primed to twang off on a tangent!

I drove up to Tairua on the Coromandel peninsula early on Thursday morning and we met at the Tairua Rugby club. The juxtaposition of sporting memorabilia vs artists and life model was quite fun. Anyways, the agenda was to draw the figure and then the face for 2 days  after which we moved onto landscape, ALL within the parameters of abstract art. It was challenging (thats the nice way of putting it). I only cried once.

I still have a headache. I tried really hard to just "go for it" as Peter encouraged, but I could not get my Francis Bacon on. But I did learn some truths about the way I work and think and I don't think there is any "One Way" to work . I have a renewed interest in acrylic paints( Especially the chalky nature of the Matisse heavy body paints) and watched the technique of many of the artists and learned some clever tricks.

I enjoyed meeting the other artists, hearing how they work, witnessing some great work and sharing some abysmal defeats. But 4 days is a long time to concentrate as hard as I did and I was exhausted on the last day. I am still not recovered and have taken today off to fold laundry and caught up on my emails etc.

This was the best of the weekend's work.

Artists shoes and landscape