Poultry Paintings

I seem to have gone to the chickens lately with regard to my paintings. For my entry for The Art Extravaganza at The Festival at Pukeora, Waipukurau I painted this little black hen in acrylics onto watercolour paper. I was thrilled when this sold.

"Chook"

When it came time to paint an entry for Art Hawkes Bay's annual exhibition I was still in a poultry state of mind so took a great many shots of my own flock before settling on my big Rhode Island Red rooster "Jock". With such a poser it was going to be an enjoyable experience translating him into art.

"Jock"

Using acrylics again this time I painted on linen paper. At one point I decided painting chicken wattles was a bit like doing a Sudoku puzzle. The more you do the easier it is. Unfortunately Jock didn't sell at the exhibition but hopefully he will soon find a new home.

Mini Mandalas.

I've been having fun painting tiny mandalas for the past few months. The very action of painting them is calming and a form of meditation compared to the constant over thinking I need to do on some of my other creations.

Mandala pendants before stringing.

As a change from working on such small surfaces I have also been making meditation stones which can be held in the palm of the hand when someone is, um...well meditating. Some are quite small like these examples which sold at the Christmas Market at the Hastings Community Arts Centre last December.

Small meditation rocks that can be held in the palm of the hand.

Then moving up to paperweight sizes which means I can add much more detail. These have been selling well at the CAN in Napier. It is fun to see what designs and colour combinations people like the most although it really does come down to personal taste.

An Art Deco themed stone in pinks and greens.

As I am constantly working on these you can check out my year-old Facebook page for new work for sale. There is also a price list for commissioned work and a way to message me if you would like to know more.

Circling Nature.

I have been engrossed in my studies for the Advanced Diploma of Art and Creativity (Level Seven) with The Learning Connexion since last year. This has led to me completing some very different art from what I usually do including "Land Art" with items lying about my back yard.

A mandala made from acorns.

I have in particular become fascinated with mandalas making them with stones, flowers, and painting them on pendants and rocks. Of all the pictures that I put up on my new Facebook Arts Page these get the most reactions.

A wreath woven from prunings.

I was pruning a huge shrub which had overgrown to the extent that it had gone seriously woody underneath. There was enough flexible material left over to weave into a wreath.

A spring mandala.

As the seasons passed so did the amount of natural material I had to work from. Here is a mandala composed of variegated periwinkle interspersed with lawn daisies.

Although these works are ephemeral and have either rotted away or been eaten by farm animals the inspiration I gained from doing them has provided directions I can go in with my art in the future.

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. 

Solo Exhibition 2013

In a recession the first thing to go are "luxuries" like the arts. People are trying to cover their bills and don't have extra cash to buy a painting or three. For the artist this means slim pickings financially but also a chance to try things that you wouldn't usually. While working on a small scale or developing a bread and butter line of cheaper work to keep things ticking over while the economy tries to kick start itself again you could also experiment with different techniques or subject matter that you never had a chance to while you were on the treadmill of painting what sold.

Alongside trying to extend my bread and butter range over the last few years I've been studying with The Learning Connexion completing my Arts and Creativity Diploma (Honours) with them in 2013. Studying gave me the freedom to try new things and break away from my usual pet portraits. I could try collage, charcoal nude studies, mixed media- in other words without the constraint of painting what I thought I could sell I could just have fun. It's important creative people recapture that pure joy we had as children when we finger painted without a care in the world before we were told it didn't look like anything and wasn't good enough.

It's difficult to allow yourself the freedom of having fun as an adult. There's always something that needs to be done urgently on the housework front or there's the feeling that you should be out there in the big wide world doing something important like saving pandas. That art is a somewhat selfish pursuit. And as for putting your work out there... Who the hell do you think you are? You're no Monet (or as a picture framer once said to me "You're no Ralph Hotere". To move past this, to try something new and put it up for everyone to see was why last year I had my first solo exhibition at Electra Gallery in Waipukurau. I knew I was unlikely to sell anything, especially as this area is still reeling from the 2013 drought and a downturn in the economy. Instead it would be my chance to showcase the different art styles I've been learning over the past few years as well as demonstrating how my artwork has moved on and developed.

"Fem" a mixed media work on a re purposed gold leafed frame

I had six months to prepare new work but soon discovered that this was still not long enough, even for a "mini" exhibition. I was still working on my largest painting to date the day before it opened ending up pulling my first all nighter painting until an hour before I was due to deliver the paintings.

Paintings and my "Kitty Bling" sculpture displayed in the gallery's front window

Kevin Annand who manages Electra was waiting patiently as I turned up over half an hour late and was encouraging about the different work that I was hanging although he warned me that gallery sales were down to what they had been in previous years. When I returned the next day I discovered what a great job he'd done in displaying my "Mini Exhibition" at the front of the gallery.

Some examples of my work including "The Committee" the painting that resulted in my first all nighter

The exhibition last two weeks and I had some good feedback from people who went along to view it. Everyone differed in their opinion as to which piece was their favourite. The CHB Mail ran an article Kevin wrote about me (accompanied by two photos) which was reproduced in the Electra Newsletter the following month. Unfortunately all this publicity didn't translate into sales.

"Arabian Knight" in oils

Well not immediately anyway. Kevin kept back two small bunny paintings and one was sold early in January 2014. Would I have another solo exhibition? Definitely. Perhaps in a couple of years and goodness knows what I'll be creating by then.

Feel The fear And Do It Anyway

I have many creative ideas to the point that I'll need, as a friend once told me, to live forever to finish even a portion of them. Having a block is never a problem with me but anxiety is. Not beginning a project because I think it's beyond my capabilities has meant I will often put off work till tomorrow deluding myself that I will magically become Leonardo De Vinci while I sleep. Another day means another bout of procrastination and then a week turns into a month with very little of worth done in the art line.

Deadlines always helped me to paint something. Entering an exhibition means I have to complete work although I might not begin painting until the last minute, sometimes working until 3am and sending the painting in barely dry. Not only does this mean that I can convince myself that I can't do any better because of the time issues it's also stopped me endlessly reworking a picture which in a way is a good thing.

I have learned to embrace these foibles of mine. I know the panic I feel in the middle of painting will pass, that I can only do the best I can do at the time. Instead of looking at the entire work and thinking "I can't do this, it's too much" I'll tell myself I have half an hour spare and I should try to finish the eyes or the hair or slop in some background. Working in small bites of time really helps although discovering what times of day I work best has been a major development for me recently. For example I enjoy working late morning and mid afternoon plus some of my best work has been done late at night. If I need a nap I'll take one so that I can come back fresh. Tiredness just feeds anxiety.

In late May I attended "The Art Of Innovation" workshop run by Alice and Jonathan Milne of The Learning Connexion which pointed out many of my hang ups and worries plus encouraging me to find solutions to overcoming them. Listening to the other participants I realized I was not on my own in feeling inadequate whether it was having a messy house in one case to having health issues in another. My solution was to constantly have a goal or deadline before me and to feel the fear and do it anyway.

My first fearful deadline was to enter two 4" x 4" paintings into Electra Gallery's "Small Works" exhibition in early June. I didn't step too far out of my box and stuck with my tried and true animal portraiture. The first work is of a mini lop bunny called "Loppy". I gessoed the canvas black and then spent some time building up fur in glazed layers of acrylic.

"Loppy" an acrylic painting on 4" x 4" boxed canvas

Everything is better in pairs so I teamed Loppy up with another popular breed, a Dutch bunny called "Lapin". I have kept rabbits since 1986 so it was with some amusement in my family that when I searched for my biological mother we discovered her maiden name was Lappin. I was truly a bunny girl born and bred.

"Lapin" another acrylic painting on 4" x 4" boxed canvas

The next exhibition of note in the area was the annual "Art Extravaganza" at the Pukeora Estate in Waipukurau. This is probably the biggest exhibition in Hawkes Bay these days with entries coming in from around New Zealand. I have entered six times, been accepted five and sold twice so it's something I always try to paint towards. For two years I have intended to complete a huge painting developing a drawing I did several years ago. I even bought a 20" by 40" canvas (the largest I would have ever attempted) which leaned against the easel reproachfully for months before I gave up and opted for safety completing a small cat painting instead.

"Kitteh" an acrylic painting on 8" x 8" boxed canvas

Of course I knew they'd think I'd mistyped the title so the painting was displayed as "Kitten" but I had some positive feedback from those who saw it although no sales (well we've been through a severe drought here this year so all the farmers are broke and not buying art).

My next goal is to finally complete that huge canvas. I've gessoed it and chalked in the outlines and it's staring at me from an armchair in the sitting room. I've got my first solo exhibition in November this year and I have no choice but to get it done. Plus I have a website to complete and two markets to prepare for. So now I am feeling the fear big time but picking up a brush nevertheless.

Fun With Collage

I look forward to Tuesdays now since our TukiTuki Art Collective mornings are about having fun and learning something new. Last week we met at a member's home in Waipukurau where Marie Neilson introduced us to the craft of embossing. My favourite part of the craft was that it involves "Sparkly Stuff".

Busy having a ball!

Marie and Pam had also brought along items to demonstrate stamping. After eeewing and ahhing over a Neapolitan ice cream style ink pad in pinks and mauves we watched as she taught our other Marie how to make a bunch of pansies. I have one stamp which I bought for 50c on a sales table at our local scrapbooking shop so I may actually get this out and use it now.

Two Maries sharing stamping tips

I began a collage which I managed to finish yesterday. Firstly I painted an A3 size piece of watercolour paper with purple, alizarin crimson and cerulean blue acrylic paints. I then leafed through some old glossy magazines (NZ House and Garden are my favourites) for images that jumped off the page at me. I positioned these before gluing with Mod Podge. I had also painted tissue paper with watercolours and these were shredded and added to the mix. Later in the week I applied impasto gel with a palette knife, nearly asphyxiating myself in the process (safety note- make sure the room you're working in has a window open) before adding more tissue and overlaying with paper lace. I also added some tiny gold hearts with a gel pen but these aren't easily seen in the photograph.

"Airs and Graces" collage

I realize some people look down their nose at collage but when you consider that Picasso was one of the first artists to employ it in his work I think they should begin to lighten up and smell the Mod Podge. I probably won't be able to sell this collage but it was a bit of fun and I inspired myself with some new ideas which I can put in my future work. Following the example of one of my friends I will now devote a visual diary to collage and feed that inner child. I think I will have to live and extra fifty years to fit in all the new things I want to learn plus find a rich sugar Daddy to fund them all.

TukiTuki Art Collective

I don't cope well with change but sometimes it is time to move on from situations and to begin new things which is why I started an art collective two weeks ago. I invited seven people from my previous art group, five have committed to joining although one will only be attending once a month. There are only two rules- one is that we're serious about having fun with our creativity and the other is "No Committees"! Each Tuesday we will meet at a different home to do something enjoyable, bring along our latest work for feedback and generally have a laugh. After some discussion we decided on the TukiTuki Art Collective as a name as that encompasses a large area although at the moment the group is by invitation only.

My small visual diary exclusively devoted to Zentangle

I haven't painted in the past few weeks although that doesn't mean I haven't been creating. I bought a small 21cm x 14.5cm visual diary which could comfortably fit two Zentangles on each page. I enjoy working in graphic black and white and these works have been a relaxing change for me as I leave the workbook beside the sofa so I can pick it up when I'm in the mood. I have challenged myself to use one element from each tangle in the following one to allow some sense of continuity. If I really wanted to challenge myself I would complete one Zentangle per day but I am one of the slowest workers in the world and a girl can only cope with so many changes in one month!

Rush Munro

Had another trip to the big smoke with the occasional Stud Muffin yesterday so I could spend time with my sis in law on her birthday during her lunch break. After a lovely vegetarian meal Mike and I finished our day with a visit to Rush Munro's for ice cream.

The pond at the entrance to the shop holds one of the most obese goldfish I've ever seen

When I was a kid if we headed Hastings way on our weekly Sunday drive we'd sometimes stop into Rush Munro's as a treat. I didn't realise at the time the unique taste was due to them making their ice cream from natural ingredients which they've done since the shop opened in the 1920s. But my parents always had ice cream to go so I never got to sit in the lovely courtyard garden and enjoy the atmosphere.

In the courtyard is another pond with some fresh water crayfish fighting it out with the goldies

We were able to forget the drought and all our other concerns as we sat under the trees eating a passionfruit cone each, watching the sparrows fight over the few crumbs that came their way. Anyone else who entered the garden also seemed to magically mellow in mood striking up conversations.

This little fountain was the scene of some major fights as sparrows fought over showering rights.

My favourite items in the garden were feature ceramic tiles popped amongst the pavers, a mosaic drinking fountain and giant terracotta pots filled with plants. I know that taking even just one of these ideas and implementing them in my garden would make it a better space. But after leaving this leafy sanctuary in the middle of the city I realized something much more important: it really is all about the ice cream!

Napier and the Sea Princess

Since giving up my art group Wednesdays I have been having trips out to unexpected places and found myself in Napier last week. I lived in and around Napier for twenty eight years from age four. Growing up on the seafront at Breakwater Road was a relaxed upbringing with hot evenings spent walking on the oil pipes that once ran along the beach holding my Dad's hand so I didn't fall off. Or else we'd wander down Harding Road which was lined with cute but slightly worn old cottages, many with sofas on the verandah so people could sit in comfort watching the waves.

Then after years of pulling down Art Deco buildings someone discovered this whole thing could be big business. Suddenly everywhere had a paint job, many of the cute cottages were pulled down to make way for faux Art Deco houses, and the Art Deco Weekend became an annual event where people thought that dressing up in flappers' evening dresses in the middle of the day would make them appear authentic.

The old T&G building used to house an x-ray department & doctors' offices

I didn't realize how majorly Napier had changed until my visit last week which also coincided with a visit by the Sea Princess cruise ship. The streets where filled with bewildered looking tourists touting cameras and bum bags getting their fill of the Art Deco experience before being shunted back on board. Their few hours were spent ferried around in tour buses from shop to winery safe from interacting with any "real" people ensuring they only saw a sanitized version of Hawkes Bay. Even the shops got in the act with their windows filled with Art Deco dressed mannequins and expensive NZ themed items made in China.

The Sea Princess moored at Napier Harbour

Even around the Iron Pot inner harbour where my brother once had his succession of fishing boats moored has changed from a working class area surrounded by warehouses to boutique cafes and upmarket apartments where you have to ask your neighbours' permission to have a couple of people round for dinner.

The Iron Pot Inner Harbour

After channeling my frustration at how Napier has changed into a Disney Art Deco theme park into a passion fruit ice cream I saw something that gave me hope. Amongst all the upmarket faux houses along Harding Road snuggled one small battered cottage. And on its verandah nestled two weather beaten pink sofas for sea gazing of an evening.

Zentangles

I am clearing my life of much of its negativity at the moment leaving toxic situations and giving up pastimes which have brought me no joy. This has left extra time for new ventures including Zentangles. As usual it began with a library book as I am an inveterate doodler and the concept of transforming the scribbles I make while on the telephone into a finished artwork was intriguing. 

Zentangle Inspired Work In My Visual Diary

In a nutshell Zentangles are miniature (3.5" square) abstract works of art usually in black and white. The concept was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas who train CZT® tutors although you can pick it up yourself via sites such as the marvellous Tangle Patterns. As a beginner I am winging it so not using the official tiles or recommended pens so probably I have to qualify my work as Zentangle inspired. But I have to say it is relaxing even if I did spend far longer than the recommended 15 minutes on my creations. A very addictive new pastime!

Watercolour Nude

I am trying to move out of my comfort zone so when my tutor suggested I take my watercolour paints to life drawing I decided to have a go. I am trying a looser way of painting which fits with in with the short poses we attempt in our Friday class.

This is one of my favourite models and is painted in red cadmium and raw sienna with a size 12 brush over a charcoal pencil drawing. I have tried realistic shades but am much happier with more dramatic colours. I keep reminding myself that if I don't like my paintings I can always save them to light the fire with!

A Return To Watercolour

I used to be a watercolour painter when I first began painting. I started with flora then moved onto fauna before the price of framing my work became too exorbitant which is when I shifted to acrylics and the ubiquitous gallery wrapped canvas. But in my honour's year with The Learning Connexion I am lucky enough to have a tutor who specializes in watercolour so I am not going to waste the opportunity to learn some new techniques.

In the portrait group I attend each Friday in Otane we're lucky enough to have an excellent watercolourist who agreed to teach a workshop in early December 2012. Heather Dennison also works in oils but we had more interest in the watercolours and ended up with eight people wanting to attend. Heather's style is reminiscent of Nancy Tichbourne and in many cases this meant a step out of our comfort zones- especially those of us who try to avoid putting in backgrounds!

We all worked from the same photo Heather had taken of an iris in her garden. We learned how to mask the edge of the flower so we could put in the background before floating in the petals and it seemed no time at all until the six hours were over. A few had completed their paintings but as usual I only touched the surface of mine.

For me the highlight of the workshop was discovering that you can work from dark to light with watercolours as well as finding new colours to use: Indigo, New Gamboge (yellow), Winsor Violet and Winsor Blue. Will I finish the painting? Who knows. But I know I have been inspired to look at different styles of watercolour art and in some cases, to try them myself.

I'm Dreaming Of A Rich Christmas

Every year I promise myself that I'll begin preparing for the Hastings Community Arts Centre Christmas Sale from January. Then suddenly we're into June and by the time I get anything half done it's October. This year I knew I definitely needed to repaint my wooden jewellery stand as it was looking scruffy and the cream paint wasn't setting off my work so black it became!

I have found wolf pendants to be extremely popular so I've always made sure that there's at least one for sale but tigers are also well liked. Lions, not so much. And as for warthogs...

This year I have also begun painting more abstract colourful pendants which I sell more cheaply as an alternative for non animal loving buyers.

I am also selling my hand painted brooches, cards, soaps and all the small ephemera which seems to be better selling than the larger work. If I'm to get more outlets (which I intend to try to do in the New Year) I will need to keep working regularly as despite their size these small items do require quite some work.

If you happen to be in Hastings pop into the gallery and take a look at the massive range of gifts that are available there. It's a great way to support your local artists and to find a unique gift that hasn't been mass produced in China.

Trenrose Gardens & Birdwood Gallery

Not often I'm double booked but the weekend of 17th/18th November was going to be a busy one as my friend Marie and I had a stall at Trenrose Gardens in Tikokino. Every year during the second weekend in November several established/historic gardens in the Tikokino/Onga Onga area open to the public and Trenrose opens while the peonies are in bloom.

Marie did all the hard yards arranging the booking, finding tables plus borrowing a marquee for the weekend since we would be outside. And as the 17th was my birthday and I'd been invited to lunch with the occasional stud muffin and my sister in law she offered to man it on the Saturday as well.

Of course by the time I'd fed the latest clutch of chicks, the goat, rounded up the cats and piled all my stuff in the car I was running late but when I arrived at Trenrose there weren't too many visitors so we were able to set up in peace. We didn't realize it at the time but this quiet start did not bode well for the day.

Then we were off to Birdwoods Gallery which is situated in the relocated old St Peter's Church Hall from Waipawa (my father taught Sunday School there back in the day I think) on Middle Road near Havelock North. There we saw an amazing range of African and ethnic inspired ceramics, sculptures, textiles etc. but the real highlight for me were the amazing African sculptures out the back.

There was a group of hippos nestled on the lawn while a dodo perched on the old wooden fence that bordered a wild piece of field with mown paths meandering amongst warthogs, giraffes and stone figures. A flock of topiary sheep with metal heads stood near the entrance to the sculpture garden while little metal birds were dotted about on the fences or in the trees.

By this stage the weather was cool, breezy and drizzly so we went into the cafe which was featuring an exhibition of paintings by mother and son Vicki and George Williams. Vicki paints birds and draws animals while George paints large acrylics of black labradors. Although the exhibition had only just begun ten works already had red stickers on them. By this time my sister in law had arrived so we enjoyed a leisurely lunch before investigating the nearby sweet shop (a relocated pioneer cottage) before returning to the sculpture garden once more. In total we spent three hours there which would account for my longest visit to a gallery. Ever.

When we returned to Trenrose however it was a different story. The weather had been so awful with pouring rain that visitor numbers were down three quarters on the previous year. Marie had sold a few cards for me in the morning but that was all. We packed up early hoping that the next day would improve.

When I woke up at 7am the rain was hammering down. Once again I was running late but Marie and I set up quickly and waited for the weather to improve. Then the gales arrived. The tent began to disintergrate so there were running repairs that continued throughout the day. However the sun broke out inbetween the downpours so more visitors began to come through the garden although they were more interested in buying plants than our work. However during Marie's lunch break I managed to sell one of my pendants and cards so by the end of the day we had come out of the weekend with a small profit. One of the stallholders who had been coming for nine years it was the worst year at Trenrose they'd ever experienced. I felt it was official- I was a jinx.

During one of the sunny spells in the afternoon we explored fields of flowering peonies and on the way back I bought a huge jar with two goldfish from a lady selling pickles. As you do.

As the day wound down the owner of the gardens went round every stall owner and gave us all a bunch of white peonies in bud which brightened up the house for many days. Enthusiastically I've ordered a few bushes which will be ready to plant in March so the memory of that soggy weekend will live on in my own garden.

The Year That Was

In the eight months since my brother's death I have been going through the motions of keeping busy and trying to be cheerful but my health told a different story with two major illnesses over the winter months. However I kept plodding away with my artwork if not with any writing of merit. Two weeks after his passing in April I attended a workshop on Goethe's Theory Of Colour with Bettie Huibers at Otane. I never imagined the poet to have investigated this subject so thoroughly or to have inspired so many artists. One major inspiration I came away with was that we should practice with colour every day in the same way we're meant to draw. It is a huge subject that we only touched briefly on during the day workshop but I hope that I can explore it further. Before long it was June and the Arts and Crafts Corner Otane Inc annual exhibition. Every year a corner of the Herb and Garden room is given over to guest artists from one of the other groups at the centre and this year it was the turn of the Art Group. Donna Dahm and myself held a retrospective of our work and Donna enjoyed several sales of her landscapes while I sold a cat painting. Most of my work was behind the door as I had an oil nude displayed which counts as offensive in this area although I received some rave reviews from the male population.

Other works I included were animal paintings and I received a commission for a dog portrait from a visitor. Many people who weren't interested in buying a larger work did make their way into the art room and bought cards I had made from my paintings as well as some of my stoned jewellery.

For the past few years the Art Group has had a Theme wall during the exhibition and this year it was "Carnival" time. Work ranged from masks to circus and resulted in a very colourful display. I had been working on a major collage piece which I called "The Fortune Teller". This mixed media lady was fairly large and consisted of magazine paper, glitter, paper lace and paint. I have no idea why some art lovers turn their noses up at collage as this work took me as long to complete as a conventional painting. She now hangs at the back of my TV and her eyes follow me about the room.

In August I worked on a rushed job for a work colleague of my aunt's who wanted two doorstops made of her deceased cats. She had lost most of her photos due to her hard drive crashing so there were only three to work from so some imagination was used.

"Smudge"(above) was painted on a large river stone which had natural cat-like bumps and lumps. The photos were taken from a distance so I had to imagine what the eyes looked like close up.

"Pixel" had blue colourings which gave me an opportunity to mix in beautiful rich grays and siennas and the eyes were full of colour and reflection.

September is time for the Art Extravaganza which is held as part of The Festival at Pukeora Estate, Waipukurau. My entry was "Meeting of the Lop Society" a work I had begun last year and which has been sitting on a chair in my kitchen while I tried to work out what was wrong with it. In the end I decided the middle rabbit (originally a small lop huddled down) was the problem so one night I covered it with black gesso (and the rest of the canvas) just leaving the two other bunnies sticking out of the darkness. I also changed the right hand lop to a ginger. Although this work didn't sell at the Arts and Crafts Corner Otane Open Weekend over 3/4th November it had so many comments that if I'd charged 50c for every "oh you can almost feel the fur" comment I'd have earned a good $25! Goes to show that if you leave a painting to gestate long enough and have the courage to paint out a good proportion of it you can still turn it round.

Eulogy For A Brother

Richard Longshaw 5.7.1954- 31.3.2012

I hope that during these past few months Richard finally realized how deeply he was loved and by how many people. I don’t think he ever truly knew how much we all needed and valued him. Whenever someone had a crisis or needed something done Richie would be there. Sometimes just the fact he was in the room would make you feel better, safer, as if everything was going to turn out alright. He always put others first before himself and constantly thought of how to make their lives easier. I have lost count of all the times he came to my rescue; repairing computers, helping get a sick animal to the vet and helping me move house on too many occasions.

When we moved the pony and donkey in a horse float Rich would insist on riding in with them so they wouldn’t be stressed. When I had to have my old pony put to sleep Richie drove all the way out to where I was living at the time to keep me company while the vet did the deed before lying on top of Toby the goat so the vet could trim his hooves.

I have happy memories of Richie and I going shopping and having long philosophical conversations about science, quantum physics and Top Gear. He would go into in-depth descriptions of how he fixed someone’s computer or the reason why a car wasn’t running properly and I would nod my head as if I actually knew what he was talking about.

Dad always said Rich was the “luckiest unlucky bugger” he’d ever met. His boat La Paloma blew up with him on board but he only suffered a flash burn on his chest. His trawler “Trojan” sank off Mahia although fortunately he wasn’t on board. We would always joke about the Longshaw luck. Just as well the other part of being a Longshaw was having a robust black sense of humour.

Richard tolerated the intolerable and suffered fools. Whereas I would get angry about someone’s actions Richie would shrug his shoulders and say “oh well that’s just them”. But under that seemingly strong calm exterior there was a sensitive soul who could be so easily hurt by people. He was truly a gentle giant and for me he was a wonderfully kind and caring brother.

Last Friday as I watched Richard lie on the verge of his last voyage into the next world a few lines kept continually running through my head. They were from Robert Louis Stevenson’s “Requiem”

''This be the verse you grave for me:
Here he lies where he longed to be;
Home is the sailor, home from the sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.''

Drawing Upside Down And Inside Out

We recently held an all day drawing session at the Otane Portrait Group beginning with a discussion on how each of us would begin a drawing working from this great shot of tennis player Rafael Nadal.

Each person explained how they would work and it turned out that everyone would begin in a different way. Some would sketch out a faint oval with indications where the features would go, a couple of us would begin with one facial feature and work our way out intuitively from there. The conclusion was that there wasn't one "right" way to begin a drawing. But then to throw a spanner in the works a couple of us mentioned how much easier it is to draw upside down. When you work from a reference photo turned the wrong way suddenly your brain has to work from its right side. A face becomes a series of simple shapes which you reproduce. Often for beginners the results can be extremely satisfying. Even for veteran pencillists it is handy to forget what you think you see and return to drawing simply what is there.

We spent a good thirty minutes facing Rafa's rotated photo on an easel and when we finally turned our drawings right way up we had a good laugh at the distorted features. But over the following half an hour when we drew from the righted photo it was fairly obvious that these pictures were no more interesting artistically than the so called "wrong" ones. It just felt as if it were easier to draw this way when in reality our brains were busy telling us "well an ear should be placed here, a chin should be there" rather than allowing us to reproduce what we saw.

I would honestly recommend everyone to try drawing wrong side up on occasion. Not only can you pick out your weaknesses but it's fun not being in control. With our little group it was a great leveler. Working upside down we were all equal in our sudden drop in confidence and in our ability to laugh at the results. Sometimes though something wonderful would result as in this lovely pastel.

And where is my finished masterpiece? Ah well both my upside down, inside out and round the right way sketches are like me- a work in progress.