Lily

My entry for this year's Art Hawkes Bay Exhibition was the first under new group I began last year- the Tuki Tuki Art Collective. As usual there was the tough decision of what to paint as there was a category for horse paintings and there's nothing I like painting more than a good horse. Unless it's a portrait of a pretty red head.

"Lily" by Jen Longshaw
Acrylic

I first coated the 20" by 10" canvas in a mixture of Payne's Grey/Burnt Umber/Cadmium Red/Ultramarine with a touch of white before pencilling in the outline of the girl in white charcoal pencil. I worked on her off and on for a fortnight before rushing to deliver her on the receiving day (a 45 minute drive to the Cheval Room at the Hastings Racing Centre). 

"Lily" was entered in the Faces category and was chosen by this year's selector fellow Learning Connexion graduate Freeman White. I didn't make the exhibition unfortunately but apparently there was a good turn out as it was held during the Horse of the Year Show which held a few events at the racing centre. This year there was also a scheme by which people could leave offers for the paintings if they didn't want to pay full price. Which is how, at 9pm on 23rd March I received a phone call from Art Hawkes Bay Chairman Hans Doevendans with an offer of $100.

Flier for the 2014 Art Hawkes Bay Exhibition

Not the first nor the last time my work has been lowly valued but as the painting took well over thirty hours to complete without adding in the cost of the canvas, paints etc. this would mean I was working for roughly $3 an hour. Unfortunately I cannot sell my work at such a level- I am a Kiwi and not a Chinese sweat shop. So until Lily finds her forever home she'll hang on my wall staring off into space. A bit like her creator.