Oh Christmas tree!
Ok - so it is probably a little too early to get in the festive spirit - but the Christmas trees just needed to be painted.
We haven't done too much decorating but the table at the entry to our house is always being updated to match the season. With the Halloween decorations put away the table looked a little bare ... so it must be time to move from orange and black to red, white and green!
A simple negative painting of Christmas trees - with some simple decorations - just enough to finish the space I think!
Punk rocker super hero
I think everyone should have a punk rocker super hero in their life ... don't you? I am having so much fun painting my super hero series. There seems to be a new hero to be found in every painting I do!
This guy reminds me of a punk rocker - or maybe just a super dude. At any rate, he is part of the gang of heroes I have been painting. His super power? Something that involves icy coolness I think ... I can't imagine he'd get his hands dirty while fighting crime ;-)
Anyway, I am clearly having a great time with my negative painting exercise - what (or more likely, who) do I see in the canvas? Such fun!
A hippy, kaftan-wearing, super hero duck
I'm not sure what it is about this painting, but it is one of my favourites. I just set out to play with colour. I had three boards and they were all at different stages of painting and all in different colour palettes. So I put them side by side and just played. Bright colours, drips of paint, splashes and splots - anything that made me happy.
From that mish-mash of colour my friend the duck just emerged. In my mind at least, he is a duck in a hippy caftan channelling his super powers ... maybe everyone won't see that though :-)
This painting was fun to paint and makes me happy when I look at it. I don't think I could ask for anything more! Thank you hippy, kaftan wearing, super-hero duck!
A brilliant magenta unicorn with super powers
After painting flowers for the last 3 months, I was feeling time for a change. I am not sure I set out to paint a brilliant magenta unicorn with super powers - but sometimes a painting just can't be anything else! ;-)
This is my second "superhero" painting. This guy below was the first in the series.
What do you think? I think they make a formidable team! Lucky they are wearing their masks - otherwise you might know who they are ...
So much fun just to paint. No plan. No stress. Just time out for play!
Hello Byron!
We finally made it to the end of a particularly long and challenging school term. Hooray! To celebrate the end of term we enjoyed a few days away at Byron Bay. Byron is such an incredibly beautiful part of the world. It's such a mix of people. The food was fabulous and the beach was perfect (well a bit cold for my liking but I am only likely to swim when it is REALLY hot!).
We only managed to escape for a few days but it was enough to help bring some calm to the household. We have all been on edge and very argumentative as the term came to a close.
So, while it means I haven't painted this week, I am feeling more relaxed than I have in ages. I have taken the rest of this week off too - and have planned to do some painting later this week. A few days at Byron Bay followed by some time at home and getting some painting done. Uhuh, close to my definition of a perfect week ;-) ...
Conversing
It is easy to let time just slip away and to get caught up in the busy-ness of the everyday. The last few weeks have been very busy - in a good way - with lots of family activities and commitments mixed in with work as well.
What I didn't;t do in that time is carve out some moments for creativity ... and I need creativity to keep me balanced. Thankfully, I got wiser and dug out my journal and just created. Maybe the guys in the painting are also pondering the joys of just stopping, contemplating and creating ... or maybe they are just chatting about sport!
This was a mixed media exercise - acrylic paints, India ink pens and coloured pencils.Super fun. I'm ready to do some more.
Say hello to number 3
I like working in a series. It somehow makes each painting in itself less important but together the whole is better that the parts. At least that is the way I view it ... that and the fact that I just like painting more paintings!
Painting number 3 in this series is not yet finished - but as you can see - the initial layer is done. This is my meditative series - primarily black and white - with only hints (or tints) of colour added at the end. I like doing these paintings when I want to turn inwards and reflect rather than create.
Painting small and with minimal colours was just what I needed after a series of very busy weeks. I have had lots of time watching kids' sport and chatting with parents and friends. But now, I need to regroup. The introverted me just craved some time to paint tiny mushrooms and flowers and bendy vines. Ah, so therapeutic!
A sidewalk guy
I have been following the work of Carla Sonheim for a while. I love her art work - so much fun and Carla is so inspiring. That said, I have only just signed up to her newsletter group.
In each newsletter there is a prompt - a sidewalk crack - and the task is to find the animal, picture, image in the crack and use it to inspire the drawing. It is so cool that other people see sidewalk cracks they same way I do ... I can always see an image (almost always a face or a person) in the sidewalk!
In this prompt, the little devil guy was just waiting to be found! I think he was trying to blend in and not be noticed ...
I wonder who/what else in hiding in that crack in the sidewalk?
Travelling Tasmania
Every holiday needs a theme or a word to sum it up. Our visit to Tasmania last week was no exception. Somehow the word of the holiday was "oof". I have no idea how the word first came into our conversation but it did. By the end of the week everything was referenced by the term.
OOF.
A good word. Somehow eminently suitable for a family trip to Tasmania. It could be used in many contexts and in many ways.
Tasmania was fantastic. There is so much to see and enjoy: from farms to distilleries to the ocean and history. We ate oysters by the ocean and visited MONA (very interesting art!). We visited Lake St Clair and Port Arthur and many points in between. What a great way to start our summer holidays.
A rainy afternoon and Christmas houses
It's been raining ... and raining and raining (or so it seems at least). Actually it probably isn't been that bad; it just feels that way.
The rain meant our weekend full of sport became a weekend with absolutely no sport being played at all. It did mean I found myself with more free time than I expected. So what to do?
Start some Christmas projects of course. I enjoyed making the little Halloween manor houses and so I was looking for a reason to make some more. Hello Christmas village! Actually hello Christmas-advent-calendar-village ...
I'm working on a way of weaving my Christmas village together with my love of advent calendars. I think I have figured out how to combine them ... it just means, of course, I need to get started on making quite a few houses ... an excellent plan for a rainy Saturday afternoon that was originally going to be spent watching multiple games of baseball ...