Mountains

It's been so fearfully hot here recently that it's been almost impossible to paint. I've got back to my studies early as I am going to run out of time since I'm meant to shift near when my assessment is due. This study is from a photo, taking the colours down to basics and making the painting very simple. My scanner is too small to take in the full work so it's in two parts and also you don't see the bottom of the painting.

I took my donkey painting into my framer this week. Fortunately he remembered what mounting board and frame we'd used last time. I go back to collect the work in just over a week. Have caught up with all my orders now which is a relief but a worry as well.

Pendants have gone to the dogs

I've finished the last of my orders at the present time- two dog pendants which have gone to Canada. The Jack Russell marks the first time I've used a 3/0 brush. These really lay in fine detail so I'll be using them more in the future.

Donkey Painting

Briar has served as inspiration for several paintings and last year I did a small one for the Mystic Mermaids and Fantabulous Felines exhibition a friend and I held in Hastings. It sold to a UK buyer who was visiting New Zealand but not before someone else saw it and asked me to paint another version for them. They've waited patiently while I got on with other projects but finally this week I finished their order. This is unsigned as yet but will be heading off to the framers next week. I always feel that another brush stroke could improve a work but there is a stage where you realize that if you do any more to the painting you'll wreck what you've already done.

Back to writing

I had a break from painting this week and returned to writing completing a newsletter for the EDFNZ on Thursday which I spent all day (till 9.45pm) copying. Yesterday morning I began addressing envelopes at 7.30am and finished at 9am and spent the remainder of the day stapling newsletters and stuffing envelopes. The mailman found a large box full of letters sitting on the front fence late afternoon.

Also updated Nature of Animals with a couple of new articles including one on Toyah Willcox, a British actress who is now involved with rabbit welfare.

I emailed all previous Trademe buyers of my artwork Wednesday with a link to the pendants I have for sale there. The next morning the tiger one sold and there are bids on a couple of other items which I'm happy about. It's having to constantly push for sales which I find tough- I'm not a marketer.

Christmas Presents

Well Christmas is over for another year thank goodness. I spent a quiet day on my own and my brother and his wife called in late afternoon. Home made gifts this year- I usually give my brother money and decided to personalize this with an original card so drew this sketch of Tobermory my goat whom my brother absolutely loves. Unfortunately the scan doesn't show the drawing too well as I tend to be rather gentle when sketching.


My sister in law had admired the picture frame I did as part of my art course so I made a smaller version for her on a wooden photo frame. The base I painted with blue with a slight touch of yellow ochre before rag rolling gold paint over the top. Diane features blue in nearly every room in her house so hopefully it will fit in somewhere.

They also brought back the last of my stock from the Creative Hastings Christmas sale. This year was the best yet for me as I sold thirteen pendants and seven brooches, ten cards and one ladybird stone! Diane bought another three pendants for gifts since she has been unable to get out shopping since a bad car accident three weeks ago. I sold nearly 50% of what I sent in this year so it was definitely worth entering.

Last Items at Gallery Sale

Only six days of the Christmas sale left at Creative Hastings and today I will take in my last batch of items. I have been painting busily the past few days as I want to achieve my target of $1,000 worth of stock for sale in there. There has been a glitch as they rang me Saturday to say that they've lost the phone number of the lady who ordered all the wolf pendants. We're hoping that she will turn up on the off chance but it's frustrating as I had set aside other work to complete the pendants last week as I knew she wanted to give them as Christmas gifts.

I am enjoying painting fish so have decided to do a large canvas painting of goldfish sometime next year. In Feng Shui they're meant to bring wealth if situated in the money section of the house- I think I may need a large aquarium then!

Hippy Cat Sold

Monday I received an email from a tutor called Cat from The Learning Connexion to say that she had seen my small Hippy Cat painting at the end of year exhibition and had bought it! Really thrilled as I thought it would get lost amongst all the other works.

Over the past few days I finished the last of the wolf pendants for the gallery order (six wolves in a week and a half is a record for me). I took these in yesterday morning along with another small canvas painting and alpaca, tiger and monarch butterfly pendants. I was really happy to see that only four pendants were left hanging on the stand. The ginger cat face and Jack Russell Terrier ones had sold as well as two cat brooches. A few cards also sold but not as many as in previous years. There is immense competition with cards at the sale. I am very pleased at how my work has been displayed this year as they've kept everything together which will also make it easier to pick up on Christmas Eve.

Monarch Butterfly Pendant

Head down and finishing off the wolf pendant order at the moment. Two more still to complete before Wednesday. I've also finished a monarch butterfly one on paua to take to the gallery.

Today is the last day of the student's end of year exhibition at The Learning Connexion so fingers crossed my little painting sold. I've taken part in four exhibitions this year- the most ever- selling two paintings and with an order for a donkey painting so that isn't too bad a beginning.

Heard this week that my large pop art painting arrived safely in the US taking only seven days to get there. It cost NZ$47.08 to send airmail (only $7 more than economy) and I worked out that once I paid costs I came out of the experience with NZ $77.00 for 21.5 hours work!

Wolves, donkeys and weird shaped cottages

I had a phone call from Creative Hastings on Friday to say that there was a lady wanting six Husky pendants painted as she liked the one displayed. The only dog painting I had sent in was a Jack Russell Terrier so I was at a loss to know what she was talking about until I realised she was discussing the wolf pendant I had there for sale. I agreed to do the six within a fortnight and ten minutes later Bev rang back to say that the lady had bought the wolf pendant already there and asking if I could paint two more by this week as the buyer is sending them away for gifts. She then told me this could be an ongoing source of work for me as the lady keeps huskies and has photos of her dogs she wants painted. Very good news! So I have two husky/wolves ready to take into the gallery this morning along with a donkey painted with a blue background to make it stand out a wee bit.

Over the years I have accumulated some weird shaped stones that I am saving up for a rainy day. I have this cottage shaped rock put aside for a while- it's the little witchy place I would like to live in (in an ideal world).



This is the view of the back of the house. If you look carefully you'll see my cat Peaches posing in the bottom window and also a red light burning in the bedroom window upstairs. This is an ongoing joke I have with my friend John who is always suggesting I set up in business if the starving artist thing doesn't work out.

This is a side view of the cottage with lacy curtains like the ones I actually have in my kitchen. The decorated window sills were originally going to be window boxes but I felt they would make the finished rock look too busy and cluttered. I would like to have a go at more cottages- just a matter of finding more weird rocks as all the ones I come across at the river and on the beach are smooth and round.

And an aside- an English teacher from Canterbury University contacted me asking if he could use one of my articles in his class. This is the one about the 1931 Napier Earthquake. He is teaching foreign students and encouraging them to write about natural disasters that may have occurred in their own country.

Frida!

Up to ten years ago I had never heard of Frida Kahlo. Then in December 1996 I was browsing the art section of the library when I came upon a book of her paintings. The first page that fell open showed an exotically dressed woman sitting in a wheelchair. Fascinated I took the book home and from then began a ten year obsession with this complex woman who fought through tragedy to express her creativity while retaining her sense of humour.

A couple of weeks ago a friend gave me some DVDs for my birthday and the one I most wanted to watch was "Frida" starring Selma Hayek with Alfred Molina as her husband Diego Rivera. I loved this movie. Beautifully filmed the story opens when Frida was in her teens, a wild child of the 1920s, whose life was turned upside down when she was involved in terrible accident while riding the bus with her boyfriend. Basically she spent the next thirty years slowly dying while enduring many painful operations which allowed her to keep painting.

There is no way that a film can hope to capture all the light and shade of a woman like Frida but I do think Selma did an excellent job portraying this Hungarian/German/Mexican Indian/Spanish charmeleon. A great part of the movie was devoted to her relationship with the muralist Diego Rivera (when they married her mother said it was like a dove marrying an elephant) and really showed all the love they shared although neither was able to be totally faithful to the other. Another theme in the film was her relationship with Trotsky played by Geoffrey Rush. I don't know why so much was made of this affair but I guess it was a chance to say "Yes Frida had an affair with a really famous man" or else to show her devotion to the principles of socialism.

Personally the most important theme of Frida's life was that she survived despite all the problems life threw at her. Not only that but she gave something beautiful back to humanity- not only in her strange compelling paintings but also in her vibrant, larger than life persona.

Whirlwind Painting

Been quite a week here what with one thing and another. Once I calmed down from the news and began sleeping again I got back on track with my painting and completed the pop art painting to go to the US. Packaging a 20" square work to mail was quite a feat involving copious bubblewrap, lots of tape and two coke boxes. I will increase the price of these in future as I have worked out that once I pay for airmail postage there won't be a lot left for the 22 hours of work involved. I also finished another small 4" square cat painting for the end of year exhibition at The Learning Connexion. It's the first in my hippy Cat series and I'm hoping as I'm working in very bold colours for me that it'll catch someone's eye amongst all the larger works. It is on gallery wrapped canvas so the flowers and stripes continue round the edge. Would have liked to do a couple more paintings to send but this is a good way to test the waters.

Blue

Finally got a few spare minutes to scan in two of my favourite pieces from my last TLC folder. One exercise was to take an Old Master's painting and then translate it into a pastel drawing. I had very little enthusiasm for this as I am not a big fan of pastels but something amazing happened and I was able to copy this section of a Cezanne painting in only an hour. It was interesting to see what colours he uses in painting skin tone- green, purple, blue etc.



We also had to buy a $5 frame from a second hand or thrift shop and renovate it. I really enjoyed this task and spent six hours working on this frame. Originally turquoise with gold stars I applied two layers of High Build (a type of runny plaster), embedding blue glass into it while wet, then painted it a wedgewood blue before rag rolling gold over the top. I found some thick cord to hang it with and painted it a matching blue. I've hung it in my kitchen where it looks ok empty but I'd eventually like to do a portrait of the five cats.

In her assessment of this folder's work Irene said I have a strong design sense and should perhaps think of illustration or portraiture work. Considering I had enrolled at The Learning Connexion to learn illustration and portraiture I was happy to learn I'm developing in that direction.

Christmas Sale

For the past two weeks I've been incredibly busy trying to finish the pop art painting I began a while back for an order, plus doing my course work and preparing stock for the Creative Hastings Christmas Sale. Today was one of the receiving days for this so headed down to town with cards, jewellery and some of my small cat paintings. Recently I have begun putting a patch of blue sky behind the subjects on some of my pendants to make them pop. The picture to the left features some of the ones I entered at the sale including a painting of Tobermory my goat (sans horns). Just wish the scan would show up more of the detail in the painting.


I also painted several cat brooches this week but ended up taking a couple plus a pendant into The Craftsman which has just shifted premises. This meant I only had three ready to take down to the sale but will get onto painting more this week. The ginger cat on the left is based on my girl Peaches. She's not quite that round yet but give her time as she loves her kai!

Girl With A Pearl Earring

Yesterday I watched "Girl With A Pearl Earring" starring Colin Firth and Scarlett Johansson. What a wonderful movie although I am sure many people would consider it slow in pace. However it effortlessly captured the atmosphere of 17th Century Delft and the minutiae of daily life in a Dutch bourgeois household.

Based on a novel by Tracy Chevalier the story concentrates on Griete, a young illiterate servant girl who goes to work for the Vermeer household when her family falls on hard times. Her daily life is full of drudgery and sadness but the film also captures the unhappiness of Vermeer's wife who although fashionably attired and spoilt is also condemned to a life of endless pregnancies (the couple had 12 surviving children) while treated like a mindless doll by her husband. Ruling over the household is Vermeer's mother in law whose meanness probably covers an underlying terror of debt and penury. In the film she is portrayed as someone who sees Vermeer as their chief source of income, frustrated by his slow output (he only painted 36 works in his lifetime) while flattering his leaguers patron in order to gain more commissions.

The main story concentrates on Vermeer's friendship with the servant girl Griete. At first she is permitted to clean his studio, then to watch him painting before finally being taught to mix his paints. When she captures the fancy of Vermeer's patron she become a model in one of his group paintings before he paints his famous portrait "Girl With A Pearl Earring". This favouritism (plus the intimate nature of the portrait) leads to her dismissal from the house as Vermeer's wife is eventually consumed with jealousy at the closeness of their relationship.

The acting in the film is superb. The sexual frission of the main protagonists is palpable throughout without anyone undressing. It is interesting to consider who was the real Girl With A Pearl Earring. Certainly the movie will kindle interest in Vermeer's work. As for me I'm going to read the novel it was based on.

NZ Idol ends and Ihug Implodes

NZ Idol finished on Sunday evening- thankfully. The producers need to put this programme to rest now as we are definitely scraping the bottom of the talent barrel. Also the judges this year were abysmal. I've uploaded a piece on the series for Kiwi Herald called NZ Idol 2006 Ends On Sour Note which is a mild version of what I originally wrote. This old horse needs to be put down.

I've finished a couple of pieces of jewelry for the Creative Hastings Christmas sale only to realize they haven't sent me the entry form. As it's due to start in little over two weeks this is a bit of a worry. I am hoping they're just running late.

At the moment I'm having major problems with receiving and sending emails. Apparently there was an influx of viruses into Ihug over the weekend which resulted in a backlog of email. I was receiving them over twelve hours late. Yesterday I couldn't send any myself and when I rang the helpline I kept getting put on hold. I swear if I'd had to hear "Counting the Beat" one more time I was going to do something drastic. Finally I went to their homepage and they had posted an explanation of what was happening. Apparently not only had their servers gone down but the influx of phonecalls complaining about it had overloaded their system as well. They really need to get their act together as it's not the first time this year we've had outages and unlike Telecom which gives you a month's rent if you're without a phone for twenty four hours Ihug doesn't compensate its clients.

Three Shelties

I've just finished one of my orders for three cartoon Sheltie paperweights which are going to be donated as prizes to the South Island Sheltie Club show this month. Very unlike my usual type of work.

Three cheers for daylight savings!

I've just realised how much work I have to get through before the end of year. I have two jewelry orders (pendants and a cat brooch) plus two for paintings (a donkey and a pop art Elvis painting) as well as trying to keep stock in the two shops and prepare for the Christmas sale at Creative Hastings. Thank goodness for St John's Wort pills- I can feel the little me in my head running around in panic mode but can't feel the stress anywhere else. I will just have to work more hours and so three cheers for daylight savings!

Fish and Abstracts

Whenever I receive a folder of work back from my tutor she photographs works that are too large to scan which proves very helpful. In the last folio I'd included a fish collage I had done(my first). The exercise was to find a magazine photo and break it down into basic colours and then paint pieces of paper to match. She has suggested I can develop this fishy theme in other aspects of my work including my jewellery.

The other work Irene featured was an abstract from an exercise earlier in my course. Recently we were taught to mount paintings on card and then frame them cheaply with corrugated cardboard so I decided to do this with the red painting. Funnily enough this work is a favourite of a visitor who has asked to buy it.

Otherwise I have been busy sending out the Spring issue of Loosely Speaking for the EDFNZ and revamping The Menagerie website. It was the first site I ever built way back in 1999 and is a good example of all the mistakes you first make when you start in web design. I am turning it into a basic bread and butter site with a clean look (I hope) and cohesive theme.

Unexpected Advertising

Two pieces of mail of interest arrived yesterday. Firstly "Country Scene" the free rural newspaper that is distributed throughout Hawkes Bay published a piece on Kim Priest and Waddle Inn in Otane. Good photo of her alpacas and also shows the shop where my work is being sold. Hopefully it will drum up alot of business for her.



Secondly "Paw Print" the newsletter of the Central Shetland Sheepdog Club must have got hold of a copy of the South Island newsletter that reprinted one of my articles. Embarrassingly they have given me a free advertisement with a link to one of my websites.

ATCs Versus ACEOs

I had no idea that there was some controversy over artists selling ATCs (Artists Trading Cards) as ACEOs (Art Cards Editions and Originals) on Ebay. These small cards are 2.5" by 3.5" in size and were originally conceived as small original works of art artists could swap with each other. However a few took it further and began selling them albeit under another name as ACEOs. It now seems a few ATC purists resent this and feel these artists are cashing in on the growing trend.

It's really sad when artists begin bashing each other, even saying that art should not be sold. How would the rest of us get on if we couldn't sell our work? I for one don't want to be a starving artist. A better overview of the situation can be found on Emily Dimov-Gottshall's blog.

I've sold a couple of ACEOs on Ebay and swapped a couple with artists on Zen After Hours which is one of my favourite Yahoo groups. I honestly feel people appreciate your art a lot more if they have to pay for it. Whenever I've given work away there's been either a deafening silence or else a luke warm reaction which is why I don't like doing it anymore. Plus I have to eat!