The weekend in Cairns

Ive had a most productive weekend in Cairns. Started with a trip to town Saturday for a slow start, breakfast and a wander, then shopping to stock up for the next week or so which will be very busy. 

This is a work on Linen I've been working on today. Approx 140 cm x 80 cm I worked on the large table out on the verandah all day... the edge is frayed and stitching in brown linen thread contans the fabric. I've used a clear gesso so it is archivally prepared and will be finished with a similar layer of clear glaze. It could be framed or simply mounted on the wall. I like how portable this kind of work is...highly suitable for working on the move!

I posted at the Studio blog about it and added other images so you can skip over there to see if time permits!

 Saturday morning...
     at the lagoon by the sea in Cairns. Its a free public pool and isn't fenced off, is surrounded by parkland and BBQ's and people enjoying this space! And it overlooks the Ocean. Love that there are places under cover where you can sit in the shade and loll about in the pool!

There's a Saturday market down at the shore. A wonderful person I spoke with was Helen, originally from papua New Guinea. This bag, called a billum, was very special. It deserved several photos just to show the amount of industry involved in a piece like this.

She has a stall at Rusty's, a wonderful fresh food market I have been to once a week. Saturdays are very lively at the market and surrounding street full of cafes.

I was in awe of the work in this billum... Helen shrugged off the work,,, but did admit to it taking months using a similar technique to that used in net-making for fishing in Papua New Guinea.

The pattern is also stunning and the dyes are from plants.

The price tag was $150... worth considerably more I am sure you will agree.

I was sorry not to be able to make that purchase I can tell you!

I have a very small billum given to me when I was about 20 ... it contains small shells and is one of the most precious things I own.

Breakfast today... Papaya, which I love, and Biodynamic yoghurt with a most unusual ingredient... Davidson's Plum, an indigenous fruit that is edible and known for its excellent nutritional qualities.

I also met farmers at the Tanks Market at the Botanic Gardens

 

on Sunday who grow Vanilla Beans and produce products for market.

So much around here to explore. I've got a lot of painting to do in the next week, now that I have settled in and found my stride...  but will hire a car to make a trip to Mossman Gorge to visit a lovely indigenous artist I met on my last trip.

Bye for now. Have a good week wont you!

'Colours of Nature' workshops at Percolator Gallery

I'm still getting used to this new blogger post set up...I must have been pretty preoccupied of late... it crept up on me .... didn't see it coming at all!
Busy time... I even forgot an appointment this morning with a lovely person who forgave me ...thats the down side of getting too busy... mistakes like that. On the other hand I'm finding great people to connect with at the moment ...I guess this is the time of year here when a lot of things happen... winter is not tough on us here ... summer can be... so everyone really gets busy in the cooler months!

The recent workshops are a perfect example... there's been great interest ... and two sessions down have been very stimulating and a lot of fun! They're providing a great opportunity to reflect on the ideas I wish to share and place value on ... then afterwards to take in all that has occurred in the space of a day with a new group of people.  Its interesting to have the opportunity to engage in a way that allows one to offer and receive in return ideas and enthusiasm.

I have posted on my studio blog more at length about the grid works
and the value of doing these kinds of exercises to get started.

plenty of material that was collected and brought into use as subjects.

this magnifying light works really well ... even more so if your eyesight is challenged at all...
those of us getting on know all about this. I found it recently at the Australian Geographic
Store and have been delighted with how useful it is.

a lot of the work was experimental... pushing the boundaries... trying new ideas. 

loved this combination of a mono-printed ground with an ink drawing over it.
Can you see the pomegranate form? And the red juice like inky lines!

These images above were from the June 25th session ...read much more at this post.

The images below are from the July 9th workshop last weekend which you can read more on here at this post.

We started with music in this session and drawing with the non-dominant hand...  you can see those pics at the blog post here. Its a great strategy for getting people relaxed and there's ben plenty of times when it some in useful in my studio if I wanted to stop thinking and just  chill out a bit. 

I could write pages about how I've seen it work for many people actually. I used to use this process when teaching music and I wanted to get students really listening... thats a whole other story!

In the afternoon session we got onto painting... first the grounds and then the natural objects... paying particular attention to the subtleties of colour.  These are a few of those works.

This one has the most fascinating ground ... the white ink drawing just started
works into this ground beautifully and then the black seaweed skeleton
lying on the left is perfectly placed

these leaves have a really interesting ground of paint and oil pastel

something quite magical in this one... the layers... the colours and that loosely worked drawing

Workshops have a way of ending just when you're really getting started. Still... as long as participants experience some new possibilities for their work ... see how they feel about trying different things... and have the pleasure of working alongside others... then I guess its been a productive time.

I can certainly say that it worked brilliantly for me to be discussing ideas with others ... experiencing that pleasure of shared time creating... a few laughs ... stories being exchanged. And of course that wonderful surprise from seeing the magic that others make with often the simplest of tools and media!!
Fertile ground!

New works ... a productive day!

acrylic on paper

acrylic on paper

acrylic on canvas, 30 x30 cm

acrylic on canvas, 60 x 60 cm

acrylic on canvas, 60 x 60 cm

Generally works on paper I do without too much thinking ... they are simple exercises in colour, form and so on. Often they get painted over or maybe adapted or developed somehow. I like to do plenty of this unself-conscious work on order to feel my way into ideas for larger works.

acrylic on paper

acrylic and ink on paper

acrylic and ink on paper

acrylic and ink on paper

love this Indian cloth ... and the way the book merges into it!

small canvas board, 25 x 25 cm - painted a while ago...finished maybe on sunday.

Its a good feeling to get paint onto  canvas again after things have been so hectic of late. I just went for it today ... nothing was going to stand in my way!

Sun was shining and all was well... I was feeling inspired from a great week and the wonderful group that came together yesterday for the latest workshop at Percolator gallery.

untitled, 60 x 60 cm - this was meant to be the background for an idea I had but now I will leave it be.

This was a great canvas to work on. Somehow I think I need to leave this as is... I can spend ages on a work a times... so when something just comes together quickly I have learnt to leave it ... then time passes and it becomes clearer what is needed ... or not!

More photos this week... I've downloaded them tonight... a major exercise with my so-called new camera... months on I'm figuring it out! Have a good week all!
S x

Discovering Painting Blogs

This week was pretty intense... trying to learn new tools, facilities on my computer... all day, every day... I felt as if I was wearing my "L" plates. I kept crashing into problems. BUT there was no instructor sitting next to me... I was in the driver's seat on my lonesome getting headaches and scratching my head!

Like this one: Bought a new camera weeks ago. Took photos here and there ... especially on trip to Noosa over Easter + photos of some paintings! Hard to remember what I'd taken really.


So... having located the CD-disc and bits that came with the camera I tried to download photos Friday. Tried .... and tried! Did other things in between attempts. The Royal Wedding was unfolding so I ducked into the Living room to distract myself with some serious right-Royal Pagentry, sublime choral singing and the delicious heart-shaped scones my mother had gone to the trouble of baking for the occasion.
Then ... my mood lightened somewhat I came back to try and fathom this camera download issue.


No Photos yet ... instead  ... having just cleared my in-tray of saved links found via Twitter these painting blogs were among the finds ... in no particular order:


(fundamental) PAINTING is a "catalogue of essential painting (and a bit of opinion)" from someone in London. The most recent post features artist Damien Flood whose work is shown below. 

A brief excerpt from text posted with this work: 

"At first glance the most striking thing about Damien Flood’s recent paintings (and the theme that connects them,) is a feeling of other-worldliness. Much of the imagery has something of the sci-fi about it; bleak unpopulated environments (land, space and sky); unclear and often ominous. They are depictions of curious places that don’t throw up conclusive answers." Read more.

STUDIO CRITICAL: A behind the scenes approach to contemporary Painting is a relatively new blog but provides studio images as well where possible. Here's a post on artist Ky Anderson whom I posted on early last year... Read the brief interview there.

Sewn, 22'' x 22'', acrylic and ink on paper, 2011

2010 studio

future studio

'Pushing up'

THE BONE DRY BLOGSPOT : This one contains images from artists ranging from the likes of 'BALTHUS"

Balthus



TO WOELFI

Adolf Woelfi ( 1864-1930)

To

Emily Noelle Lambert

Werner Mannaers

Wannes Lecompte

To Lecompte ... no text... simply paintings posted with artist's name.

PAINTTUBE .... read about this blog here  

About painttube 

- established by a research group of staff and post grad students at the national College of Art and Design in Dublin. 

Provisional Painting

March 11, 2011

Painting by Richard Aldrich. Click on image for more about Richard Aldrich

An article by Raphael Rubenstein entitled Provisional Painting from Art in America 5/4/09 explores unfinishedness in contemporary painting practice. Read it here.
Posted by Robert Armstrong

PAINT CLUB: not a blog, but a website link for a newly established research network for staff and research students at the University of the Arts London.

Paula Kane - Studio wall

on a bit of a tangent... (you know I like tangents)

At Paint Club I found my way to the blog of the Central Saint Martin's College of Art & Design ... to this post which caught my eye!

First Time Out: never displayed before

Livingstone’s Medicine Chest. Courtesy of Wellcome Library, London

We are excited to announce First Time Out, a new collaboration across five London art institutes – the Horniman Museum, the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Natural History Museum, Science Museum and Wellcome Collection, coordinated by Caterina Albano at Artakt, Central Saint Martins.

Each organization was asked to select one previously unseen artefact from their archives and display it for the first time. After six weeks each object moves around to a different institution and is displayed with a new label, written by the curatorial team at its host venue, allowing millions of visitors across the five institutions to see how different experts interpret the same object.

First Time Out runs until 21 August 2011.

Visit:
- First Time Out
- Artakt

VISUAL INVENTORY blog

Jean-Piere Roy

a long list of artists and their images to trawl through...

Till Rabus

I found artist Elizabeth Heppell on twitter but had found her blog before that.
She posts her own work as below... and features many different painters as well. Her blogroll lists many painter blogs as well.

Studio View

E Sheppell ESP 48x48 mixed media on canvas

This is a new piece in the studio. This is a quick picture of it. Lots of layers and textures. It's a bit electric.

Margaret Neill "Scout" 2010 oil on canvas 36x40

Neil's work is featured in Heppell's latest post.From Heppell to 




Drooel.com - Contemporary painting from around the web ... where I noted Ryan Humphrey's 'Lost in the Woods'

                                                       Ryan Humphrey‘s “Lost in the Woods“.

Jaq Chartier

And as its getting late now...I'll close with the blog of Lorraine Glessner which I found my way to some months ago and liked the diversity of painters she posts ... a visit to this blog is an invitation to open one's mind to perhaps some of the possibilities to be found in one's studio that are being overlooked... to think again about new departures, fresh seeing. There's something about trawling through the trail of visual explorations ...coming across the unexpected or simply appreciating the unique seeing, interpreting and ways people work with visual elements to bring such a cornucopia of offerings to life.
  


Tom Burckhardt

phlip-phlop, 2001, enamel on wood, 60x48, wake the town, 2001, enamel on wood, 48x36, i have overeaten my snack, 1997, enamel on wood, 48x40, gong jr, 1999, enamel on wood, 60x48

bold form, delicate pattern, vibrant color....see more here.

Toby Sisson

Timeline of Seemingly Unrelated Events II, 2010, Encaustic, Oil, Charcoal, Graphite, 

Pastel on Wood, 24 x 48, Everything Is Happening All The Time, I, 2010, 

Encaustic and Oil on Wood, 12 x 12, Timeline of Seemingly Unrelated Events I, 2010, 

Encaustic, Oil, Charcoal, Graphite, Pastel on Wood, 24 x 48

bold, sensitive marks...see more here.

This post could go on and on linking excellent blogs with diverse styles of painting to view and muse on. Don't know about you...but its not always the work I find really comfortable or strongly  appealing that speaks to me... or arrests my attention.
At different times, in different moods, I will look at things very differently... and it's for this reason I relish the multiple pathways avialable to us for investigation.


What are your thought on this?


As for me... its late... good night!
S