Two Nudes, A Drawing Tutor and The Peruvian Soap Decorator

I haven't had much time to blog this past fortnight as the days are full of activity and the evenings I fall asleep on the sofa with one of the cats! I've enjoyed a few firsts in art starting with life drawing on the 14th where we had two models. We often have this in portraiture but with the life class it's tough enough finding one person willing to pose in the buff let alone two. Fortunately this married couple were old hands at sitting as they'd posed for art students in Christchurch. The lady was quite bemused by the fact that I described drawing them lying down in a very awkward position (and I don't know a better way to write that) as drawing a human landscape. After we finished they came over to look at what I'd done and the husband pointed out that they looked like the Ruahine Ranges...

Two days later on the 16th Nov Glenys and I went to Otane to attend a drawing workshop tutored by Tom Williams. He brought along many of his own sketch books and portfolios so that we could see what sort of work he did. I was impressed with the range and quality of his work- especially his old buildings as he really captured their soul. He had us working hard at drawing an old Bentwood chair all morning and after a lovely alfresco lunch held under the century old trees outside we sat and drew a tree for two hours. At the end of this I was more convinced than ever that I need to spend time learning to draw trees as my picture just looked like a tree having a quiet nervous breakdown.

Wednesday Blanca, a Peruvian lady who is here visiting her neice in Waipukurau, modelled for our portraiture class. Fortunately Jacqueline is fluent in Spanish (as she was born in Argentina) so she translated all our extremelly witty and insightful repartee. After lunch Blanca taught us how to paint on soap. I had bought a packet of six "budget" cakes which we shared and she demonstrated (with Jacqueline translating) how to smooth the soap, varnish and then paint on it. I painted a bunny but because it's so dark it looks like something nasty has died on the soap so I may have to rethink my colour scheme!


It is now a week since the Christmas Sale at Creative Hastings began and for the first time in all the years I have entered I have not sold one thing! Whether it's the slowing economy or my stuff just doesn't gel I don't know. I finished another three pendants and a brooch over the past week and dropped these off today with the fervent hope that everyone is just leaving their Christmas shopping to the last moment this year.