The cards are here!

A bit of excitement as my cards for Christmas are here! I did them on the computer and then they were printed off at Apple. Originally, I decided to do the sunflowers on the front - but I couldn't have a vertical card and also pictures on the inside- and I didn't like it really chopped horizontally - so I ended up with it being one of four pictures on the front. The others are the dahlia bouquet, Isabella, and Nicola Valley. It looks quite good - if not terribly "Christmas-y". I don't do really overly "seasonal" paintings anyway.  So there is Isabella on the front- but Digby made it at the top of the left-hand column inside. It is fun choosing a selection of paintings and drawings. I put two pastels in too. I guess it will get harder to choose another year- unless I really produce a lot. Who knows? I can include pastel drawings again another time too.  Right now I'm working on a different "Lanterns" painting. I used one a few years back and it was a good painting of the miner's lantern but the lantern "flowers" were too much on one plane. This time, the miner's lantern is more obscured - and there is even another lantern there too, not too visible - and many more of the lantern plant going back in depth. I think it is a more interesting and complex painting- even if, currently,  not completely finished.  I think I will take it to the critique at our Christmas meeting and see what the verdict there is.  The Sunflowers, above,  are 40 inches by 30 inches. As a tribute to Van Gogh, I signed my name on the vase, as he did on his painting. They were painted from life- only the vase has been changed a bit. I painted it for myself and have it over my desk downstairs. I suppose I would sell it - but then I think I'd have to get more sunflowers next year and paint a different picture for myself. Cross that bridge when I get to it.... I think I am getting more into a floral mood again - although I keep looking at mandarins and thinking I'd like to paint another mandarin picture. Maybe I am in an orange-colour mood as I recently did a small pumpkin and some gourds. Those are too recent to be on this card. On the card, inside- Digby, a Roman street scene, floats hanging at Finn slough, a section of the "pots" painting, pastel of Wanda as a '30's singer, pastel of Ariel in a costume--right hand column, my Grand Prix painting, a small Terra Nova painting recently re-done and recently sold, the Danish Danish pastry picture, seedheads -alliums, Helene in costume, pomegranates, "22 Owls" from the GuessWho? sale. Definitely a variety of subjects! No card shark or rum runner as those paintings are still down at Phoenix art store and haven't been photographed. So maybe next year there will be the rum runner- there is a certain seasonality to that!

One for sale-

This is the third painting from GuessWho? I have it back at home and will sell it to the first bidder at $100 with $50 going to the Food Bank - just the same as at the GuessWho? sale. While we made over $2000 for the Food Bank and had some fun and even excitement, I think we would have done even better if we had not had the horrible rainstorm. Anyway, we'll give the fuschia a chance to add to the good. This 10" x 10" painting is in acrylic with some added collage for more drama. Acrylics are good in a kitchen as they can be wiped off if necessary - so are very durable.  However, this also might be what a powder room needs to brighten it up. Fuschia flowers are a bit like exotic dancers. The tender ones that you see in pots are more like ballerinas. This kind is perennial on a shrub-like plant. It was another of my "taking risks" pieces of art.

Cat from the GuessWho? sale

There was only one cat painting  in the GuessWho? sale - and this is the one.  (Yes, I painted it) It sold and has gone on to a good home.  I couldn't part with the paintings of Digby and Isabella so I found another cat to paint. "Chi" is Mike Hughes cat - and a very handsome one. The lady that bought the painting especially liked his blue eyes. The sale was a lot of fun with a lot of excitement and, hopefully, hooked people on the joys of owning original art. The weather, however, did not cooperate. There was an absolutely horrible rainstorm which interfered with some people coming out. However, we sold 44 paintings and one photograph and made over $2000 for Richmond Food Bank.  One quote  I once read, from a collector, said "What does it matter if my children inherit a few digits less if I leave them the art that touched my soul? What was important to me will remain in their homes all their lives. I know of no greater gift."   ....and with Christmas not that far away, maybe some of the paintings will be gifts now ..one size fits all....

Digby and Hallowe'en 2013

Hallowe'en Greetings from Digby - who declined to actually sit in the pumpkin to duplicate the Real Simple magazine cover. Digby is just wearing his usual collar and is not in a costume. Somebody commented that they like how the cats are "dressed".  However, it is not a fashion statement but collars to warn the birds and impede hunting prowess.  Collars are available from BirdsBeSafe and definitely seem  to work. Digby looks a bit critical - perhaps he thinks he could have done a better job if only I had handed over the knife.  ...Reminder... the GuessWho? sale is on November 2nd in the Pioneer Church at South Arm United, #3 and Steveston Highway.... lots of terrific paintings at only $100 each. None of Digby but there is another cat, several dogs, sea otters, various birds and other animals as well as landscapes, flowers, abstracts.... a great variety. One day only - 10 to 4

Playing with sticks

Yesterday a group of us were drawing and painting with a model. I had decided to just play. Adrienne Moore has done some terrific work using sticks dipped in ink. I tried it once and thought it seemed like fun because you just don't have quite the same control.  The sticks are pieces of dowelling that you break -preferably with holding your hands not too close together so you get a more jagged break. I also took some pieces of dried daylily stems to try as well. I wanted to work with sticks again- not to copy Adrienne, but to use the tools in my own way. I planned to use diluted ink with a Chinese brush as well.  I played around on some cheap paper - even for the one-minute quick poses. I did one on brown wrapping-type paper and put some white gouache on it as well- a bit different.   Then I  decided to try the back of a "failed" watercolour. What a difference good paper makes! On the cheap paper, the lines pretty well stayed put, but on the watercolour paper, coming back in with diluted ink on a Chinese brush, made the lines bleed in an interesting way. I like the bleeding lines in the hair and the drapery at the lower right, especially. I like the face although it is not a good portrait since the tools don't give enough control for real precision.  - but I felt that it was a successful experiment and made for an interesting morning.

More playing with colour

After doing two black cats in a more colourful way, I decided to do Adrienne's bird.  A white (mostly) creature but also done with lots of colour. The actual painting is a little more pastel - somehow it has darkened from I-photo to desktop to here.... Strange.... I did a little printing with a piece of mesh -for texture but also because this is a pet bird, not a free and wild native. I have a couple of "creature" paintings for GuessWho? but I can't show them yet as they have to remain a surprise for November 2nd!

Risk

I'm thinking about risk today as, yesterday, I saw "The Highest Step in the World" at Gateway Theatre. The theme was said to be "risk" and, while I enjoyed it, I'm not so sure that came across as the main idea. The centre story was about Captain Joseph Kittinger and Project Excelsior but it also told the story of Icarus and the air stewardess who survived a plane crash with a long fall- Vesna Vulovic. The staging was very well done - I enjoyed all the  projected visual effects and the actual "flight" out over the audience. The acting was very good too. Mainly, it was the story.   I question whether Icarus - although interestingly portrayed as a bit of a young punk- belonged in a "real" story, since that is a myth. And, if we were to have him in the story - the grief of the father was a touching bit- there should have been, in my opinion more made of *why* he flew too high. Then we have Vesna, whose story has since been discredited by Guinness. (Not that it is *her* story since she has no memory of the crash- it may have been Soviet propaganda.)  However, even if it was really that high a fall, it was an accident and not planned. It was interesting how the incident made her a "heroine" -- a role she felt she did not deserve .  Instead, I would have liked to have more made of the motivation behind Kittinger's decision to take part in three parachute falls, especially to continue with the third when the compression glove on his right had failed. In fact- maybe I missed something- but I wasn't sure it was the third flight until I looked him up. I also wanted to know more about how his hand was- hands being a bit of an obsession with artists! Anyway, it was an interesting play and it did provoke some thinking about it afterward. I've also been thinking about more "risk" in art - as in -"why the heck not try this..."  Friday, we had a model and I decided to really push the colours. It seemed extreme and risky at the time, but the results, as seen above, don't seem that far out. So, I think more "risk" is what I'll be pursuing for the next while.