Yellow Sun
I was born under a yellow sun in the earliest hour of a Sunday in the middle of Winter. Being the youngest of four kids, I was never alone and never without someone to play with. Sundays were simple back then, waking up to a bedroom bathed in yellow sunlight. There was the sound of lawnmowers buzzing in the neighborhood, shops were closed, cafes and the funds to visit such places did not exist but from what I remember, we were happy kids. My childhood wasn’t remarkable—nor was anyone’s, really. There was the obligatory church on Sundays until our parents got smart and switched us to the Saturday evening vigil, ticking that off the list and freeing those glorious Sabbath days for rest. About the most exciting news in the neighbourhood was a family going on a snow holiday or getting a new car, but that was rare and as thrilling as it got. There was the odd child who went on a rotary exchange to a distant country but apart from that, no one travelled much beyond the holiday shacks of the Yorke Peninsula or the local beaches.
Saturdays meant Calisthenics—until Mum tired of sequinning ‘jiffies’ for three girls, a labour I only now appreciate. Summers brought tennis; I wasn’t great, but the whole family played and my Dad helped run the local tennis club, so I learned it was more fun to play than to sit on the sidelines. I could at least get a serve in some of the time, and that gave me a shot at a point here and there.
School was mostly uneventful—I tried hard in subjects I liked, and no doubt day-dreamed through the rest. We were taught to study hard to one day secure a good job, but it didn’t feel all that competitive. Some kids were just good at different things and that’s how it was. Competition was saved for Sport’s Days and tennis tournaments, but being a gentle creature that moves slowly, I had no luck there. The odd medal in Calisthenics satisfied the childhood yearning to be good at something but generally we were content with our ordinary lives.
Summer holidays meant watching cricket and tennis on the TV, reading or re-reading my sister’s entire collection of Trixie Belden books, playing some kind of board game or building something from the odd assortment of Lego blocks. There was always some craft activity with my sister before Christmas as we made our own advent calendars or attempted Christmas decorations. Lucky for us, our parents inherited a small swimming pool which became our haven on the hot days. I remember laying out under the sun enjoying the burning heat until finally cooling off in the pool. These were the days before Slip, Slop, Slap became a thing and we wore our tan lines as evidence of a well-spent Summer.
Our other great source of entertainment was the record player in the corner of the loungeroom. I don’t remember the collection being huge – there was my Dad’s Roger Whittaker and Andy Williams albums that we didn’t play and the John Denver Christmas album that was reserved solely for Christmas Eve. But the ABBA collection was our top choice and there was much singing and loungeroom choreography to be derived from those several vinyls. At some point the record player was updated to a CD player and I remember having the luxury of my own personal cassette player at some point in between. A blank tape was just gold for recording off the radio and access to my brother’s growing collection of tapes was worth as much to me as any Spotify playlist. Songs had simple themes but I still carry many of the lyrics, themes and titles in my head from all those years ago.
This past Summer, I’ve been taking early morning walks, watching the birds and enjoying the early morning sunshine before it gets too hot. It got me thinking: as the world races into tech overload, I lean back toward childhood’s simple joys. Kids today have more stuff—but more happiness? With all the overwhelm and depression, and less time in nature, I’m not so sure. Those walks outside always lift my spirits and remind me to enjoy the simple things in life, like sipping a cup of tea in the sun. People often tell me that my art makes them feel happy, which is the nicest compliment. When creating new paintings or illustrations, I often move between having an image in my head or words that need a picture. This time, it was a simple sketch I made—a bird flying against a round sun—that sparked a flurry of titles, idioms, lyrics, and sunny phrases. I created these little pieces to make people feel happy, to remind them of brighter days ahead and that there is always sunshine above the clouds. Growing up, every kid I knew coloured the sun yellow here in Australia. It wasn’t until I lived in Japan that I discovered a sun could be coloured red or orange. I hope these happy, sunny illustrations bring you a little light and impart the joy I had creating them.
Teaching an old dog new tricks!
Trying different tools and techniques to challenge myself and spark new ideas!
I recently made a huge investment for myself: an $8.50 crochet hook and some balls of organic cotton yarn to accompany it! Now of course it wasn’t a huge financial investment but it is rare to veer away from the usual paint and paper purchases to try something a little bit different. While at least half of my working week as a small business owner is taken up with admin tasks, accounting, postage, delivery, printing, packaging and so on, at the end of the day, the thing I love to do most is simply to make things.
I remember as a child attempting a few knitting projects. There was definitely a homemade jumper or two that got completed and the odd scarf here and there. My family weren’t knitting professionals by any means but Winter often signalled a visit to the haberdashery department for the purchase of a new pattern and wool and there was always a big bag of various sized knitting needles and leftover yarn if we ever felt the urge to get creative. My sisters and I all had sewing baskets and the prized contents of these were a variety of sequins collected from leftover calisthenics costumes my mum had made for us or the ones collected from the floor of the dressing rooms after a concert.
In recent years between family and work it has felt that there is zero time for extra curricula creative endeavours. Before our son was born, I knitted a blanket made from squares of plain knitted wool in shades of blue, mint, pink, lemon and white but it was really just a nesting activity and I wasn’t very happy with the result and eventually gave it away I think. My sister had taught me a simple crochet stitch to edge the blanket but this was the only time I had ever done any crochet and it was one round and I was finished.
I’m not entirely sure what inspired me to go in search of a crochet hook recently but I think it was the desire to make something functional and a couple of you-tube videos that made it look like any beginner could have a go! The first week was a rather frustrating attempt at trying to get beyond a simple chain – who knew that it would be all so technical with yarn tension and the fact that cotton yarn doesn’t have much stretch and splits easily meaning some parts of the yarn end up on the wrong side of the hook.
But like most things in life, persistence is key and by the second week, I was practicing little 5cm square swatches of single stitch crochet and had even managed a stuffed crochet star keyring that our daughter liked enough to hang on her school bag. Yes, it is progress slow progress but I have also found it to be a lovely meditative activity to do at the end of the day. It’s encouraging to see the work slowly grow, the pattern of the repetitive stitches and choosing colours to sit next to each other. As life and processes become faster and more and more automated, I find myself gravitating to more traditional techniques and handmade processes.
I will see where this crochet journey takes me. For now, I have a goal to make one cushion cover and currently, at a rate of 3cm per hour, it is going to take me a while to complete that goal! It is always good to explore new techniques and think about how that might cross over into my usual work and it is always a challenge for the brain to try something new. I’m interested to know if you have tried anything yourself recently or taken up a new hobby. Please let me know in the comments. Back to crocheting for me.
Dipping into Digital Paint
I feel lucky that I remember a time when every house didn’t have a computer and when life wasn’t dependent upon digital technology. I remember in primary school, being marched off to the ‘computer room’ once a week for some kind of lesson and high school invariably involved some Maths games of sorts in the designated computer room but I don’t remember being overly excited by the possibilities these machines promised and I have largely kept their use for practical applications in my work such as making edits in Photoshop or colour correcting files for print as well as the admin side of business.
An opportunity arose last year for me to work on a design for a greeting card for Earth Greetings. There was actually a design that we were working from that I had painted in gouache that we were re-imagining into a heart shape. There was no doubt that this was easy enough to do in Photoshop with a little cutting and pasting and tweaking but I didn’t feel like it was completely perfect and I was uneasy about cutting up and re-purposing the original painting in this way. With limited time before the card was to go to print, I didn’t think it would be possible to paint a new original and have it photographed in time so it led me to think about the possibility of using Procreate to finish this project.
And so began a crash course in understanding the tools and tricks to using this app on the i-Pad. I had only ever briefly played with the brushes and colours before but hadn’t really explored further or created anything near to a finished artwork. I am ever grateful to my You-Tube teachers who share their knowledge in easy-to-follow online tutorials (inparticular a shout out to Bardot Brush) that eliminate the frustrations associated with learning any unfamiliar software; before long I was happily ‘painting away’ with my digital pen. In the back of my mind, I knew I had the original gouache painting to fall back on so it was really just a case of giving it my best shot and seeing what we thought about the end result.
I think there is always the assumption that working digitally is somehow faster or easier(and I am sure this is reality for some experienced creators of digital content) but for me I found myself using the digital pen in quite a similar way to a normal paint brush and with the ability to zoom in on a work, there is potential to work on even smaller details. The advantages I found were of course the ability to ‘undo’ paint strokes, cut and paste parts, change colours as needed and work in layers which makes changing background colours a whole lot easier. It is also an advantage to be able to work from original hand drawn sketches imported into the app and then again be able to export the design back to Photoshop where I am more familiar with making final edits.
Heart of FLowers
This is the result from this very first project I completed and I am happy to report that this one was chosen for the print run so it felt like a very successful ‘experiment’. I have added Procreate to my list of tools that I will continue to use for the right projects. I am still very much in the ‘beginner’ phase of discovering all the possibilities that this digital painting style offers but I am enjoying the convenience of having a portable painting studio to take with me when I am out and about. On the down side, I need to remember to charge the apple pen and I have also found the apple pen to be not particularly ergonomic, so am looking at the various covers and grips to alleviate the discomfort of using this tool for more than an hour or two at a time.
I set myself another challenge to compete 3 more digital paintings this year. The very first, ‘Australian Native Flora’, I recently released as a limited-edition print and have just completed this second piece titled, Native Gems’. I have enjoyed seeing these new pieces come to life and the challenge of working with a different tool. I don’t think it will ever replace my love for painting with gouache but it is always good to try new things and work in different ways and I am looking forward to seeing where I can go with this process. I would love to know your thoughts on digital painting and what software or apps you have experimented with.
Lively Bunch
Finally, I am excited to be able to share with you a little project I had a hand in working on last year. I always say the hardest thing about working on client projects, is not being able to share them as they progress as I usually do with my personal projects but it is always great when I get to see the final product and can then show you where it began.
Now, when I say little project, it was really only little in artwork size but big on the amount of hours and care that went into it. I was approached by Emma (a Senior Account Manager) at Co-Partnership to make an illustration for a young, chilled red wine they were engaged to create the branding for under the Jacob’s Creek label. Of course the first thing I did was look at the impressive portfolio of work that Co-Partnership has on their website and was suitably nervous to think how I could contribute to this project. But then it was time to just put my head down and do the work. And these creative wonders at Co-Partnership are true professionals with most excellent art direction so I had no need to worry as they provided lots of guidance and feedback along the way.
When I choose a bottle of wine in a wine store, I have to say I really do just pick the label I like the most within the price range I am looking for but before stumbling into the area of illustration for labels , I had never really stopped to think just how much time and thought goes into creating one single design. And when I came into this project, so much had already been done in terms of creating the brand name and the font and placement of the ‘Lively Bunch’ logo. This left a carefully defined space within which I could work which can feel quite restrictive and yet the constraints help to narrow down the endless options.
I began working on sketch outlines with the text layered beneath to see how to make the shapes work in with the lettering and where the leaf branches and grapes would go. The client had seen another leafy artwork of mine that became a guideline and starting point for this illustration but I had never actually drawn grapevine leaves before and well, that opened up a whole myriad of interpretations and possibilities. From the initial sketches, I then worked on refining the linework to a more precise version. It was very helpful to have the team at Co-Partnership layout the illustration and text framework so I could work around that rather than coming up with some drawing that they then had to try and fit in that space.
I’m just including a small snippet here of some of the sketches and colour roughs that I completed during this process. Co-Partnership and the client also had a fairly strong sense of the colour palette they wanted to use - also inspired in part from another painting of mine, but I still had fun looking at different colour combinations and options which is always my favourite part.
The final painting was completed in gouache and then photographed (with much gratitude to my hubby, Hiro) to deliver the digital data. I think it’s interesting to note that this design could have very much been produced digitally, so I am really happy to know that Co-Partnership and the client valued the time that it took to create the artwork in this way. And I like to think there is some kind of warmth and depth included from the touch of a human hand that comes across in the end product.
And it is wonderful to see the final result and how it all came together. I was a little disappointed my little curly flourish of gold vine didn’t make it into the final version but looking now at the finish of the label and the gold elements, I’m quite sure it didn’t need it! Many thanks to Co-Partnership for asking me to work on this with them and also a huge thanks to Guy Davies ( @guydaviesphotographer ) for his beautiful photography of the final product and allowing me to share it with you here.
Little Bird Paintings
It has been so nice to see the sun shining in Adelaide over the last few days and the blossoms are finally bursting open to announce the start of Spring. It always feels like a hopeful time of year as the days get longer and brighter. It is also a great time to feel inspired to make new work as it becomes easier to go outside and take walks amongst the flowering natives. A recent drive to the Adelaide Hills was a visual feast of yellow wattle on the roadside with rolling hills beyond. This led me to dreaming up these three new paintings which also feature little groups of native birds
.In 2020, I spent a lot of time in our backyard watching a little family of magpie-larks diligently build their nest and care for their chick when it eventually arrived. One of the silver linings that many of us recognized at this time, was the opportunity to slow down and spend more time with our immediate families observing and appreciating the small things in life. In many ways this little bird family was not so different from us - going out to find food and returning home to care for our children.
The last few years have magnified the importance of our health and as a family we have been making more effort to get out in the mornings to our local oval to use the outdoor gym equipment or jog a lap or two of the circumference. I always enjoy watching the birds in the gum trees during this time as they flitter around from branch to branch and busy their beaks in the gum blossoms. I was thinking to call one of these paintings ‘morning exercise’ to remind me of this time but in the end I went with ‘Sunrise’ as this title reminded me of some of the early mornings we had spent outside sipping green tea and watching the birds flying about.
‘Sunrise’
Even now, I try to keep my focus on the small moments of joy - the time spent with loved ones, a colourful sunrise or sunset, the change in seasons - things we sometimes miss when life is so busy.. Life really is the journey and not the destination so we have to remember to cherish each snapshot as we go along.
Enjoy the Journey
Keeping Creativity Flowing
Overcoming creative block and tips to stay inspired.
Keeping Creativity Flowing
Overcoming creative block and tips to stay inspired.
Creating artwork for clients is usually the most challenging work for me but I think collaborating with other artists and companies has resulted in some of my best work. I studied Design at university so the process is familiar to me. There is a client. a brief, parameters, a timeline of due dates and feedback along the way until the delivery of the final artwork. And while it comes with more pressure when you feel responsible for the outcome and sales of the final product, there are also people to provide direction and suggestions, to share ideas with and to provide feedback and guidance along the way. During this time I am completely focused on making the best work I can but I also imagine all the personal projects I would love to work on when the client’s project is finished.
And then that time comes when I am free to work on whatever I want and suddenly I feel stuck, a little drained and perhaps a touch burnt out. It’s not that I don’t have any ideas but more that the ideas need to be sorted and prioritized and it’s not so much a creative block but more a state of creative procrastination. The brain starts to overthink everything and the questions crowd in until you become paralyzed and unable to make a start. Will anyone like the new idea? Will anyone buy it? This idea is very different to other work I have made - is it too different? Is it good enough? How could it be better? The list of questions goes on. I love the work I get to do every day but it is not without its challenges. I am writing this journal entry as a sort of go-to guide for myself but hope that it might also help anyone else in a creative field who might be feeling a bit lost in direction or overwhelmed by the next step to take. These are some of the things I do that work to keep me inspired or to spark new ideas and enable me to stay creative.
1.Travel Somewhere
Most of us haven’t been doing too much of this in recent years but it is inspiring to see people’s travel photos popping up again. There is no doubt that traveling to a different city or, if you are lucky enough a different country, fills you with inspiration as your senses are exposed to new sights and sounds, a different culture and different energy in the air. And if the travel is purely for holiday, then you are generally in a more relaxed state and ready to take it all in without the feeling of having to have results on a page at the end of the week. After working in the jewellery industry mostly designing engagement rings for a few years after university, I really didn’t want to look at jewellery anymore. I took a job teaching English in Japan for a chance to travel and then a good few years later on a holiday to Europe, I remember stumbling across a contemporary jewellery gallery in Frankfurt that reignited my desire to make jewellery and set me back on a creative pathway when I returned to Japan.
2 Take a Walk or go for a Drive
Of course travel is fantastic but not all of us have the time or funds to just take off at the moment so my next tip is just to physically leave the house (if you work from home) or studio. Sometimes just being a tourist in your own city feels uplifting or taking a drive to the beach or the hills feels like a mini holiday. I like to go for walks and just observe the changes in the gardens from season to season or visit the Botanic gardens and take photos of the flowers and plants that catch my eye. I’m not necessarily looking for anything in particular but I know that at least I will have new visual material in my brain to process and that just might lead to a new idea or new direction.
3 Be Inspired by other Creative Fields
I love to visit art galleries and of course I love to follow other artist’s work that I admire but often I feel inspired by reading stories about creative individuals in other fields like dancers or musicians or seeing interesting architecture, ceramics or interior design. Reading about other people’s commitment to their craft makes me feel motivated to work harder and explore other ideas in my own work.
4 Stop Scrolling and put your phone is a different room
This has been some of the best advice my hubby gave me and a more recent practice that I work at which has helped with productivity. My phone used to be the last thing I would see at night and the first thing I would look at in the morning when my alarm rang but for the last year or so I now use an old fashioned alarm clock and follow the rule that you shouldn’t look at your phone for the first hour in the morning and no longer have my phone in the bedroom overnight. If you look at the stats on how many hours you spend on each app and how many times you pick up your phone an hour you will likely be shocked. It’s a time vacuum! So I try to leave my phone is a different room while I work and only check in on messages when I’m on a break. And while I enjoy Instagram, I limit the amount of time I spend on there and have no other social media apps on my phone. There are thousands of creatives on Instagram who are way more talented and creative than me and it’s not helpful to overwhelm myself when I need to focus on what I want to contribute creatively to this world.
5 Chat with other Creatives
One of the things I enjoy about doing design markets, is the opportunity to catch up with other creatives and hear about their work and share our successes and struggles. This always leaves me feeling positive about future projects and keeps me inspired to generate new ideas. A shared studio space with a group of designers/makers probably wouldn’t work for me as I would spend too much time chatting and not get enough work done but it might be ideal for you. It definitely helps to have people around that understand what it’s like to run a small creative business and to be able to ask for advice and share tips or get feedback. And while I just advised spending less time on social media it can be a great place to connect with other designers and makers and also a way to have feedback from people who follow and buy your work.
6 Open a Book
Yes, a real book with pages! I have a collection of treasured books I have bought in gallery bookshops that often sit on my shelf unopened for months but in times where I feel stuck I like to flick through them and look at the pictures and remind myself of the feelings I had when I saw the original pieces.
7 Study Something
I wish I could prioritize more time for this. There is always something to learn and the older I get, the less I feel that I know. Formal courses can be expensive but there are so many options to learn and many people willing to share their knowledge with online tutorials or short, in person workshops. I enrolled in the Lila Rogers ‘Make Art that Sells’ course 4 or 5 years ago and while I didn’t complete every project, it did make me try new techniques and push myself to finish artwork by a certain date. It also provided a community of like minded souls to support and inspire each other. Learning a new skill just might lead to a whole new way of working or at least push you out of your comfort zone.
8 Go Back over Old Sketches
This one really helps me a lot. I keep pages and pages of sketches and colour roughs and keep them in boxes separated by themes for example patterns, Australian natives, client projects, imaginary flowers etc. Whenever I feel really stuck I just look through these and pull out the pages that I see something that I might be able to work with or develop further. It always leads me to the next step.
9 Just Begin
As I mentioned before I think we aren’t really creatively blocked, we just procrastinate and find it hard to begin. My solution for this is to draw on loose sheets of recycled A4 paper and just start doodling anything. I like the sheets of paper as I don’t feel precious about them and can also spread them out so if there is one idea on a page I can use it to develop on the next page and if I really don’t like anything on the page I can just remove that page from the collection and add the others to my box of sketches. It helps to just draw or doodle with no expectation and I find that eventually I discover something in a sketch that I can work with. I often like to doodle later in the evenings and since it’s not possible to go outdoors for inspiration in the dark, I sometimes search online for photos of rare flowers or photographs of native Australian plants that I may use as a starting point for a sketch.
10 Listen to Music
Music is incredibly motivating and inspiring and I find it helps me to stay focused for longer amounts of time while I am working. I also try to draw the sounds and shapes I visualize when I hear different instruments so this might work for you too as a starting point.
11 Take a Nap and Dream
It’s not something I often get a chance to do but sometimes a restful afternoon nap somewhere between wake and sleep is a lovely place where ideas can enter the mind freely. I also try to remember my dreams in the morning as sometimes I have seen whole jewellery collections and even designed fashion in my dream state which I think is fascinating.
I’m always interested to hear how other creator’s work. I know for some people the ideas flow freely and their problem is they don’t have enough hours in a day to get all their ideas out. I would love to hear what inspires you and sparks your creativity.
Handwriting
Handwriting
Lamenting the Loss of the Handwritten Word.
Our son recently completed his mid-year exams at school. On the eve of his English and History exam, he came to me in search of a humble pen. With all the fancy technologies the schools promote nowadays and laptops packed in school bags along with the school lunch each day, I was surprised to think our child was without the most basic of learning tools. ‘But what have you been writing with at school?’ I questioned as I rummaged around my own desk in search of a suitable pen to give him. To which he replied that he used a pencil for Mathematics and everything else was pretty much typed on his laptop.
It shouldn’t really have surprised me. Our kid’s school handed them individual i-Pads to use halfway through primary school and if I go back before that I remember when the kindergarten proudly purchased a couple of electronic devices for the class to share. Presentations for our children have often been in the form of PowerPoint slideshows and the last time I really saw their handwriting was when they were making story books back in junior primary days before the i-Pads took over their lives. I remember one mum proudly telling me how quickly her child got her homework done because she could just speak into her device and the computer would turn it into a written document for her.
It bothers me. And I question why it bothers me. Part of me wonders if I am just being old-fashioned and showing my age by clinging to the way I learned and not embracing the technology as I perhaps should. But then I question why our children don’t write as well as they perhaps could or why spelling seems to be more of a challenge or why with all the jolly phonics apps and reading eggs apps or whatever the latest app is, that apparently our literacy abilities are not the best in the world. Are our children missing something because they aren’t writing by hand?
I’m an advocate for everything done by hand. I love all things hand-sewn, hand-thrown, hand-knitted, hand-made and definitely handwritten. Of course everything I do is mostly painted or drawn by hand and while software has a place in my work, particularly for reproductions and client work, there is something unique in the originals and works that are created with our hands. And I feel it is the same for pieces that we write by hand as our brain works to form the individual letters and words and sentences there is a more direct connection between what we are thinking and expressing on the page. I still have trouble typing thoughts directly into the computer and feel the need to write on paper first; it’s s the place where I can organize my ideas and make little notes in the margins as I think of things and scribble out sentences but leave them there for just in case I change my mind. I am also very much a visual learner and it helps me to remember things when I have written them down in my own writing rather than just reading something that is typed.
Last weekend I had a pop-up stall at Gathered Design market. One of the lovely people who visited my stall was admiring the Earth Greetings writing pads with my art on them. She said it reminded her of beautiful letter sets that she used to have when she was younger and we both chatted about how there is nothing quite like receiving a handwritten letter or card in the post. There is something special about holding a letter from far away that you know someone has taken the time to write. When I lived in Japan , it was always a highlight to receive mail from home and I often stayed up late to write long letters about what I had been up to. These were the days when the internet was still in it’s early years and you would have to go down the road to find the local internet provider to book a 30 minute session on a computer or visit an internet cafe!
We are encouraging our children to write or draw as much as they can by hand and I always take the time to write short messages of thanks to people who purchase my work online. It is my hope that we can keep the art of handwriting alive. Many times I hear people tell me that they don’t have neat writing or that they can’t even draw a stick figure. I always disagree. Everyone can draw. it is more about the mindful process than the end result and the important part is that everyone’s marks or letters on the page will be different to the next person’s and that’s what makes us human and that’s what makes it special.
‘The Art of Simple Living’ by Japanese Zen Monk Shunmyo Masuno describes it best in his 8th daily practice when he suggests we ‘put pen to paper with care’ because ‘your true self can be seen in your handwriting’ and it allows us to express ourselves mindfully.
For the record, I did write this piece by hand as a draft. Oh and I did find our son a couple of pens he could use for his exam!
Gouache Painting - Top Eleven TIps
I will preface this journal entry by saying that I am no expert on gouache and feel like I will forever be a student of this medium. I sometimes get asked if I run workshops or classes teaching painting techniques but unfortunately I just don’t have time for this and also don’t feel qualified; maybe ask me in another 10 years. That being said, I am always happy to share what I have learned and often post painting process pics on my Instagram feed. I remember experimenting with gouache as a high school art student and was later reintroduced to the medium at university when one of my lecturers taught us to render jewellery using gouache - yes these were the days before Procreate when all out work was done by hand. For the last 10 years or more, I have worked predominantly in gouache as I love the vibrancy of the colours and it suits my style of working relatively small on a desk. The following tips are just some of the questions I get asked and the observations I have made along the way. I would love to hear your tips in the comments.
1. Paint Quality and Brushes
I still remember one of my first rendering classes at uni where our lecturer introduced us to the materials we would need to purchase for the work we would be doing. He encouraged us to buy the best brand of brushes and paint that we could afford. In those days, all my dollars were spent on buying silver for jewellery making experiments but I diligently went off to the art shop and spent the rest of my money on Winsor and Newton gouache and brushes. To this day, I still mostly use Winsor and Newton and also love the Holbein brand as well. I find these paints to be consistent and I stick mainly to the Series 1 or 2 paints in the lower price range and occasionally add a different colour to my collection. You really only need very small amounts so don’t squeeze out too much paint - a little goes a long way. At the same time, if you have a larger area to cover, make sure you mix enough as it will be almost impossible to match that colour if you are mixing different paints together.
With regard to brushes, I don’t think you necessarily need to buy the most expensive, but if you want to paint fine lines, then you are going to need a brush with a good point on it and it is necessary to replace brushes as they wear out. My old brushes get recycled to paint mixing brushes so keep a separate pile for mixing and painting. I like to buy my brushes in store so I can check the tips - nothing worse than buying a brush and finding a bristle bent backwards in the protective plastic tube; I can never fix that one stray hair and it will forever annoy me. Art shops are usually happy to wet the brushes for you if you want to check that they have a good tip. Also it’s good to have a few different sizes depending on what size area you need to paint or how neat it needs to be.
2. Paint Consistency
One of the questions I am often asked is how I get the paint so smooth. Well firstly I should say that this doesn’t always happen but mostly it is dependent on how much water you add. Gouache needs to be mixed with water to thin it down to a creamy consistency. Using the paint straight out of the tube will give you a lumpy bumpy finish. If you add too much water, it will become a wash (which might be the desired effect) but for an opaque finish, you need to add just enough water to make it flow freely without sticking.
3. Opacity
Closely related to the previous tip, if you want an opaque finish then check the paint you are starting with. On the back of the Winsor and Newton gouache tubes there is a little square that is either coloured black to indicate the paint is opaque or it is left blank to show the paint is translucent or it has a diagonal line indicating a semi-opaque paint. If it is a translucent or semi-opaque paint, then it will be difficult to achieve a finish that isn’t streaky even if you try to apply a few layers. However, if you mix a translucent paint with an opaque paint, of course it will change the colour but you have a better chance of it applying smoothly. And word of warning, some colours just don’t like to mix together so it is always good to paint a test patch to see what the results will be like.
4. Layering Goauche.
Gouache is quite similar to water colour. It can be thinned right down to a watery wash or used thicker for an opaque finish. It is easy to layer gouache over a thin wash but much harder to paint over an opaque layer. I have tried this on occasion when I have really needed to change the colour but the finish is never as smooth and there is the danger of the paint mixing with the colour beneath making a muddy finish.
5. Colour Shift
One of the slightly annoying qualities of gouache which takes time to get used to, is the colour shift from wet to dry paint. Generally it will dry much darker than the colour it appears in the palette. I always have a test sheet of paper and have to be very patient to see what the final colour is once it has dried. I literally spend a lot of time watching paint dry!
6. Mix your Colours.
It would be a rare moment when I have ever used a gouache paint straight out of the tube maybe with the exception of black or white. White paint is my most used colour (titanium white) and I mix a little with just about every colour I use as well as mixing various colours to create different hues. As I mentioned before, there are some colours that just don’t want to mix well but most seem to be friendly with each other. And mix the colours well if you want a flat, even finish.
7 Painting an Area.
Keep the edges of the paint wet when filling in an area and work quickly to cover the surface before it dries. You can put down a thin layer of water on the surface first if you a looking to create an even wash or spread the colour from dark to light using your brush to drag the paint over the watery surface. There are so many washes and blending techniques possible and a myriad of you-tube tutorials that will happily guide you.
8 Keep your brushes clean.
I always have two containers of water on my desk for washing out brushes. One for a first rinse and the second for a final rinse and to add clean water to the gouache. It’s important to change the rinse water frequently to keep the colours clean. Oh and keep a separate place for your tea or coffee cup! Too many stories of painters using their tea as rinse water or worse when the reverse happens.
9.Framing
I guess one of the downsides of using gouache is that being water soluble, the final piece needs to be framed behind glass so this is something that needs to be factored into your costings for presenting an artwork for sale or exhibition.
10. Don’t throw out that paint!
One of the advantages of using gouache is that you can keep using the paint once it has dried up by just adding clean water again. I have many palettes and just keep adding to the colours or tweaking them as I need. This way their isn’t any paint wasted and I feel like one palette of colours gives birth to the next painting so they are all related in a way. Also, make sure to secure the lids carefully after use. If the lids become stuck, just run them under hot water and if the whole paint tube dries up, it might be time to cut the end off and add some water. There is no way I am throwing out any of that paint!
11. Surface
I like to paint on illustration board but you can also choose a surface like water colour paper that is designed to take the watery paint otherwise you will just end up with a wrinkly painting!
I am sure I will think of more things after I finish typing this and I will come back to edit this if I do but for now that’s my top ten tips (plus one!) if you are just starting out with the medium and I would love to hear your advice in the comments if there is anything you have to share.
Happy Painting!
Circle of Art
Last year I began reading a little book called ‘The Art of Simple Living’ by Shunmyo Masuno who is a Buddhist Monk. The book outlines 100 simple changes you can make in your life to achieve a happier and less stressful life. Although it is a small book, it is one that you have to read and digest over time and return to re-read again. Some of the ideas are as simple as taking time to watch the sunset, planting a seed and watching it grow or lining up your shoes neatly when you come inside. I’m quite sure I have barely adopted 2 or 3 of the steps in the book but even if that is all I achieve then it is still a positive change.
One of the suggestions in the book is to join your hands together to calm your mind. Your left hand represents you and your right hand represents others. When they are joined together, the two become one and can not be in conflict. It is a feeling of respect for those outside yourself and an offering of humility. Masuno says that when your hands are joined together, you can not attack someone and there is a feeling of gratitude. He suggests creating a place in your home to put your hands together each day. In a traditional Japanese home this might be a small shrine but Masuno says it need not be so formal but just a corner or space where you can silently put your hands together.
My reflection on this led me to thinking about creating some artwork to hang in a quiet space as a reminder to join our hands together and be a place to focus for a moment and calm our busy minds. I initially worked only in black and white but decided to complete the series in colour as well. People have sometimes commented that they prefer my colour roughs to my final gouache paintings. So these are created with colour pencil which reveals the texture of the illustration board and a softness of colour with all the imperfections of the graphite pencil lines showing through. I will leave you here with the final artworks and some of the progress photos from the colour pencil versions. Limited edition prints of the artworks can be found here.
Peace on Earth
Circle of Life
Living in Harmony
Circle of Life, Peace on Earth, Living in Harmony - Colour versions
Art and Chocolate!
Nakamura Chicolates Packaging
The cooler weather here today in Adelaide reminded me of chocolate which reminded me of this project that I have been meaning to share with you for a while. I used to joke with some of my friends, that I had worked on a wine label and a gin label and the next perfect job would be perhaps a chocolate label! Well, you know how they say your thoughts can become your reality - well that is exactly what happened. I was approached by Yuki and Marlon from Nakamura Chocolates a couple of years ago regarding the possibility of using my art as part of their website and packaging refresh. Nakamura Chocolates is a Perth-based Chocolatier hand making exquisite chocolates which are themselves tiny works of art. After a few emails and telephone conversations, Yuki and Marlon decided to commission 4 original artworks that would be used for their new packaging as well as feature on their website. Many of the chocolates that Yuki creates are flavoured with native Australian plants and with names including ‘Strawberry Gum’, ‘Quandong and Blood Peach’ and ‘Roasted Wattleseed’, it is easy to imagine how native Australian flora might also feature as inspiration for their packaging. I will share here some of the painting progress photos as well as the final packaging photos that Yuki and Marlon shared with me. Oh and yes, they kindly sent me samples of the chocolates which were indeed almost too pretty to eat but after much admiration, I confess they are all gone!
You can visit Nakamura Chocolates website here or check out their Instagram feed for all the delicious photos!
DUSK
Dusk Australia
Last year, I had the opportunity to work with Dusk Australia on some artworks for their packaging for Mother’s Day 2020 and a range of botanical fragrances and candles. It is always lovely to be asked to collaborate on a project and always so much to be learned during the process. One of the hardest parts for me is not being able to share the work until it is released - I usually always post photos of works in progress as I go so at these times, I continue to take snaps as i work but have to save them all up until the project is finished.
Finally, I have gathered together a selection of phone snaps of the paintings in progress as well as some of the colour roughs and product shots from Dusk. Credit must be given to the stylist and photographer for the professional images and to the graphic designer from Dusk who worked all my paintings and individual flowers together to create these final works.
I was given a brief for four different botanically inspired designs with a different range of flowers and colours for each. Perhaps one of the most challenging parts for me was working within a defined colour palette. Of course there was certainly room to add my own thoughts and ideas on colours but knowing that the pieces needed to be able to work together as a collection was always in my mind. I am generally not good at sticking to a limited number of colours and always want to add a few more! The best part of course is getting to see the final products and how it all comes together. Products can be viewed on the Dusk website here.
Flower Fields
Coastal Forest
Hillside Native
Sunday Market
Friday Feature - Four Seeds
The Best Chocolate Brownies in the World!
Okay, so I confess, my intentions for weekly features of local businesses I love might have faltered but I am back this week with one of my very favourites: Four Seeds! Since I last wrote in my journal it has officially become Winter here in Adelaide. I am not a fan of the cold but I try to find the beauty in each season and I do love the gentle light it brings. I managed one early morning walk after school drop off this week and it was probably the chilliest morning of the week but the sun was shining and there is always something to inspire me in someone’s front garden. The other good thing about Winter, is eating chocolate - and yes of course this is not a seasonal food but I just prefer to eat it when it’s not melting in my hand. But of course the ultimate year round chocolate I love to eat is the Chocolate Brownie. Apologies to those living further afield that can’t visit here right now but the best chocolate brownies in the world I think are baked right here in the Adelaide Hills!
While focusing on trying to keep my own business alive during the last couple of months, I have also been in great admiration of others and how they have so quickly adapted their businesses to keep going in the face of such sudden change.
Meet Mim and Jesse the beautiful people in the Four Seeds kitchen. If you have attended one of our Adelaide festivals or events such as Womad, Adelaide Vegan Festival, Fork on the Road etc you might have already stopped by their happy yellow pop-up kitchen. Or perhaps you have stopped in at one of our local cafes and wondered where that amazing chocolate brownie you tasted was made. I first discovered Four Seeds at Bowerbird Design market some years back and I have been a loyal fan since - yes these are the only brownies I will eat!
So what does a business do when most of the cafes have to close and events are cancelled? Well these clever people set up an online ordering system with contactless pick-up from their mini kitchen under an oak tree in the hills.
So if you are feeling the need for a brownie fix, you can order online and take a drive to pick them up. One of the best things we can do right now is support our local businesses. This year, I have spent more time thinking about where our food comes from and buying locally made products. It is so good to buy foods that actually have real ingredients in them and even better when you can meet the lovely folk that make them. Four Seeds make a variety of brownies including Gluten Free and Vegan so there is something for everyone.
It’s really overwhelming to think how many people and businesses are effected by COVID 19 but watching the people around me think of new ways to deliver their product or service and to witness their spirit to keep going, makes me smile and focus on the positives. It’s been hopeful to see restrictions easing and shops re-opening and I am definitely looking forward to seeing Mim and Jesse in person at an event hopefully in the not-too-distant future.
You can follow Four Seeds on Instagram or contact Mim through the website
All photos from Four Seeds used with permission.
23rd Street Distillery - Violet Gin
Back in February this year, I began work on a new project for 23rd Street Distillery. The brief was an illustration for a new colour-change gin taking inspiration from the Butterfly Pea Flower, Finger Limes, Wattle Seed, Juniper berries, Blood Limes, Pepper Berries and Lemon Myrtle. I don’t take on many commissions in a year and it is always hard working on projects that I can’t share straight away. A lot of my Instagram feed is filled with pics of daily progress photos as I work and if I can’t share any of these for over a month, it leaves a huge gap in images to share.
The Violet Gin officially launched yesterday so now I can happily share with you all the work in progress snaps from concept sketches through to the finished painting. It is always exciting to see the finished product and have my art used in this way.
It can be daunting to know where to start on a project like this but the Butterfly Pea Flower gave me a strong graphic element to begin with.
I always begin with the linework first before I think about colour.
Colour roughs are always the fun part!
So many possibilities for colour. I knew the colour of the gin would be a violet/blue colour so we needed something that would either harmonize or contrast with that. I was also thinking about the colour change properties of the gin - how the violet would change to pink with the addition of tonic or acidic mixers. I also thought about the appearance of a cocktail with ice at the top making the colour lighter and deeper tones at the bottom of a drink. The choice came down to the pink or yellow. I really liked the idea of the yellow and how brightly that would appear on the label but in the end, I think we knew the pink was the right choice given the nature of the drink.
And then the painting began…
A lot of time was spent mixing and planning those pinks to make a gradual blend from pale to dark.
Adding some yellow…
And some blues for the juniper berries
Some subtle wattleseed to contrast with the bright colours
Close up on the berries
Green leaves
Starting on the Butterfly Pea Flowers.
Almost there… just need to outline the flowers.
The finished painting. Sometimes I paint the flowers first and the background last but in this case I needed to make sure the background was right before proceeding. Painting in gouache, you don’t really get a second chance as it’s difficult to paint over so there is a lot of holding my breath doing the fine lines but always good to get to the completion stage.
Friday Feature - Fleeci
How are the little people in your life going? There is so much happening in the world right now it is difficult for most adults to process and comprehend but I am wondering what our children are thinking about as they lay in bed at night pondering how life is different and why they can’t see their friends and be at school. Our ten year old is attached to her soft toys more than ever right now. The comfort of a soft and friendly face that is safe to hug and hold is something we can all use a bit more of at the moment. Which brings me to feature the work of my beautiful friend Lisa, of Fleeci
Welcome to the colourful world of Fleeci created by Lisa Butler. With a background in Visual Art and Design, Lisa loves to draw and dream up unique characters that are then handmade in her home-studio in South Australia. Each little face is stitched and hand-drawn to bring each character to life and ready to be loved and give comfort to its new owner. The happy rosy cheeks are my favourite feature of these little characters and you will find bunnies and bears, foxes and sloths as well as unique interpretations of classic characters from children’s books like Little Red Riding Hood. The Fleeci softies make perfect presents for little people to treasure and collect and inspire their own creative stories.
Lisa creates her characters with much love and attention to detail. She uses new and recycled fabrics and focuses on using Eco felt and Innergreen filling which are both made from 100% recycled plastic bottles. You can usually meet Lisa in person at local design events such as Bowerbird and the Makers and Shakers market and she also sells her creations through local and interstate shops and galleries. Due to the closure and cancellation of many of these shops and events right now, the best place to purchase is online through the Fleeci website or you can check with her stockists for updates.
These ‘Australian Softies’ are a recent addition to the range and make perfect little companions or souvenirs to send. Lenny the Llama is also a much loved favourite and I am always looking forward to seeing what new and clever creations Lisa will dream up next.
I have been a long time admirer of Fleeci and am privileged to have Lisa as one of my closest friends after getting to know her through design markets and through the community of makers at Brick + Mortar. There is an incredible amount of work and time that goes into making these products and each one tells the story of a devoted creative sharing her passion and talent with the world.
You can visit the Fleeci website here: http://www.fleeci.com/
Or follow the Fleeci story on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/fleeci/
Friday Feature - Kitty Came Home
I confess I missed a week in my Friday Feature blog posts. It’s amazing how even when your schedule should be vastly reduced with nowhere to go, the days and hours keep flying past. Each day I hope is a step closer to seeing the light at the end of this COVID-19 tunnel. You know that news is bad when no one comments on the weather anymore. The weather has actually been glorious here in Adelaide the last couple of months - true we could always use some more rain but I am holding on to these mild days before I find myself continually hunched with the cold of Winter. The sunny weather, is also making me remember brighter days which leads me to my featured makers this week: Kitty Came Home
Katrina and Farley are the magical team behind the Kitty Came Home brand. I can’t remember how I first found their work but I believe it was at Urban Cow Studio many years ago and also at Bowerbird. I have followed them on Instagram and am always in awe of their busy schedule and admit to obsessing over photos of their beautiful cat before he sadly passed. They are undoubtedly the Queen and King of design events in Australia and set the standard for product quality and stall design way back when the rest of us were still barely managing a trestle table with a tablecloth. This multi-talented duo have an incredible work ethic and a skill set that ensures they achieve exceptional standards in everything they set out to do.
Their range of work includes handmade wallets, journal covers, diaries and their famous clutches as well as a colourful range of jewellery and accessories. Everything is meticulously made by them in their home studio with attention to every detail, Their wallets bring new life to colourful vintage fabric finds and they also create their own fabric designs as well as collaborating with other artists such as the talented Dana Kinter and the clever Jess from Birds Nests For Hair.
In 2018, I had the honour of collaborating with Katrina and Farley on four designs to be used in their wallets that we launched at Bowerbird in the November of that year. It is true that collaborating with other people, often produces your best work maybe because you feel the need to work harder to not let the other side down but also because you have the power of more minds working together. It really was a whole year process from start to finish with many a meeting in a coffee shop to discuss designs, colours and purse linings and progress updates and I think we were all super proud of the final products.
The best place to see the work of Kitty Came Home is usually at design market events where you can meet the Kitties in person and see their amazing display of goodies. Unfortunately since all markets are cancelled for the foreseeable future, the best place to shop for their beautiful products is through their website or follow their Instagram or Facebook accounts. Send them a friendly hello if you would love them to make something unique just for you.
I am looking forward to the day when I can catch up again with Farley and Katrina in person. Their website will show you all their wonderful work but what it might not tell you is how amazingly beautiful and generous these two humans are. They have a wealth of knowledge and stories they are always willing to share and are well loved in the Australian design community by all. The cleverest most inspirational Kitties I know!
All photos copyright Kitty Came Home and shared with permission.
Friday Feature - Green Door Decor
It is hard to believe another week has gone by. Everything still feels a bit surreal when I read the news each day about the continued spread of COVID-19 and it’s effects all over the world. What has hit close to home this week is learning that many of my stockists have had to close their doors or will be unable to trade in the same way they have been used to. It is easy to worry about yourself in these uncertain times but when I look around me, I realize just how many of the people I know are being similarly effected. Everyone has a story and each week I will continue to introduce you to the people and artists that I love and admire.
This week I would like you to meet Annie of Green Door Décor. I have known Annie since 2015 when she began her business selling art from local Artists and got in touch with me about the possibility of stocking my prints. i have only met Annie in person a few times but we have shared many a late night email or text and she is just such a beautiful and genuine person with a clear love for the work she does. Annie is passionate about home décor and helping people find the right art for their homes. Sometimes people ask me for advice on their interiors and this is completely not my area of expertise - I can only advise you to choose pieces of art you love but Annie has an eye for choosing pieces that will go together and be a good match for you and your home.
Annie is based in Mt Gambier in the South East of South Australia but attends many of the local markets and travels many kilometres to events interstate along the coast of Victoria to share the work of more than 30 Australian artists. For anyone who has ever had a stall at a market, they will understand this is not an easy job. Ridiculously early starts, carefully packing and unpacking all the stock and setting up a mini shop for the day or weekend is a full day’s work before you have even greeted the first customer. On a sunny day this can be a lot of fun but many of the events Annie attends are outdoors and I always think she is incredibly brave when she has had to fight the wind and rain.
For now unfortunately there will be no markets which is really hard for those people who rely on the income from these events. But Annie has an online shop that is full of a wonderful variety of fun and affordable prints from many different artists, illustrators and graphic designers. Might be a great time to update your interior with something happy and colourful for your wall.
I am incredibly grateful for the support Annie has given my small business and for sharing my work with customers in places I wouldn’t be able to easily visit. I am looking forward to creating more work for her and her customers. Thanks also to Annie for allowing me to share her photos here.
You can find Annie here online at Green Door Décor and hopefully at a market in the not too distant future.
Friday Feature
It’s Friday night and I have to say I feel pretty happy about that. The week has felt long and these are surreal times we are living in with the effects of the COVID-19 virus starting to be felt by everyone. Just more than a couple of months ago, we turned over he page to the New Year surrounded by news of bushfires. The mood was on the sombre side of things but we were all making plans for the year ahead thinking things would be looking up soon enough. News of a coronavirus felt far away and something that was a worry but not an immediate threat to our way of life. Well, as viruses like to do, it has spread quickly and in Australia we too have begun watching graphs and numbers of new cases rise and washing our hands like never before. While the beginning of the year saw so many people reaching out to help each other and raise funds for those effected by the fires, it now seems we are on a different mission to hoard toilet paper, pasta and tin food all for ourselves. A trip to the supermarket is like watching ants before a major thunderstorm as everyone scurries about collecting all they think they will need and more ; I’m pretty sure the only difference is that ants are working together whereas some people here have been having punch-ups over the loo rolls. But while the news is full of all the negative stories, I know there are also stories emerging of people’s selflessness and dedication to helping others and these are the stories that should be heard. My thoughts are with everyone effected by this and particularly those in the medical industry who are working hard to save lives and minimize the spread of this disease. We are all in this together and we all have our part to play.
As a small business owner, I am immediately aware of the financial impact this will have on so many people. I have been planning for a long time to feature some of the many talented people who I have met or whose work I follow and this current situation has motivated me to start. I hope that by sharing the work of other designers and makers that I love, you will be introduced to some new favourites too. There are a lot of creative people in Australia whose income relies heavily on direct sales at large market events. Many of these events take months of preparation and thousands of dollars spent upfront on stall fees and travel plans. The news that these upcoming events are now cancelled is devastating for these small businesses and I am hoping we can continue to support our local community with online sales and takeaway purchases.
After a rather long introduction, for my first feature I would love to share with you the work of One Thousand Lines.
One Thousand Lines is the collaborative business of partners Irena and Alen. I first discovered their work at a market we were involved in a few years back. I have participated in many markets and design events for over ten years both in Japan and Australia so it’s fair to say I have seen a lot of work but their work was memorable from the first time I saw it and I have loved watching how it has changed and developed over time.
Irena and Alen are a multi talented duo who make a variety of products including bags, tea-towels, scarves, jewellery and more. I love their restrained colour palettes and simple designs yet incredible attention to detail in every step of their production process. Their bags begin with sketches from which they make their own screens and screen print their own fabrics to then sew their bags. Their designs take inspiration from the natural environment and they also use natural fabrics such as organic cotton, hemp and linen. Their pieces are thoughtful and I love they way the off-cuts from their bags will turn up as beads in their jewellery. Truly a handmade process right down to the screen-printed packaging.
One Thousand Lines has become one of my favourites for buying gifts especially to send to family overseas or finding a unique birthday present. Irena and Alen are two of the loveliest, most humble people you will ever meet and their work is so genuine and authentic. I admire their business because I love the detail that goes into creating each piece and because their quality is consistent from their products to their website, photography and branding. They have so many unique pieces and if you scroll down their Instagram page you will find tiny macrame treasures and handwoven wall hangings - if you look carefully you might even spy these beautiful people modelling their scarves and bags.
You can see more of their work on their website here: https://www.onethousandlines.com/
Or click on any of the images or links to take you straight to their shop.
Thank you Irena and Alen for your beautiful work and allowing me to share it here. I look forward to seeing what you create next and hopefully catching up in person soon!
All work and photographs copyright One Thousand Lines 2020 and shared with permission.
On the Desk
This week I have been finishing up a couple of tiny paintings I started before Christmas last year. But in actual fact the original sketches for these have been sitting on my desk for much longer. I keep a pile of thumbnails that sometimes make it to paint and other times just get buried under new ideas. When I am looking for new things to paint, I often sift through my old ideas and these two little drawings kept asking me to paint them. The problem is that if I plan to paint them on a large scale, then I have to have a large block of time and time is the one thing we never seem to have enough of. So sometimes I just have to scale down to make things happen and even then the tiny ones take time.
I started these two in December last year working on them side by side. As it became apparent that they would take longer than expected (they always do) I decided to focus on the one with the pale purple/greyish background.
Sometimes when I post these thumbnail sketches on Instagram, people ask me what the grid is for and if I draw to a grid. Essentially I just use the grid to scale up the sketch to a larger size - I somehow work better on a smaller scale and once I have a larger canvas I get a bit lost without some reference to the proportions of the original sketch.
I often take photos while waiting for the paint to dry so I don’t drag my hand through it.
I often get asked how I get the paint so smooth and opaque. Firstly I always say don’t look too close! Gouache by its nature is an opaque medium but it really depends on what colour you are using as some are translucent and you need to add water to get it to the right consistency. A tip for the translucent colours is that I often add permanent white to these - yes it will make the colour lighter but then you can add some darkness back by adding another colour. I do spend a lot of time mixing colours and I would rarely use any colour straight out of the tube except maybe black and white.
‘Full of Joy’
The last couple of weeks I have finally found some time to finish off the second small painting. I usually work closely to my colour rough but this one I changed a fair bit as I went along. It’s a happy little illustration which I have titled ‘Full of Hope’ Next week I will be working on a challenging piece for a client. I am always more nervous when I am painting for someone but it also makes me find my best work I think. It is drawn up and ready to go and I can’t wait to be able to show you the finished piece!
Back on a Bike
When I lived in Japan, my main mode of transport, other than riding the the subway, was a bicycle. There is a great feeling of freedom to hop on a bike and cycle with the wind on your face and your troubles blowing away in the breeze behind you. It also reminds me of the feeling of childhood when riding up and down the street felt like a daring adventure away from home. When I first returned to Adelaide, it was hard to get used to the speed of traveling by car - everything whizzes by in a blur and there isn’t time to take in the details of your surroundings or easily stop to get a closer look at the plants and trees. But the lifestyle here with a couple of kids demands us to be constantly behind the wheel of our vehicles as we taxi them to schools and activities too far to cycle to. And so I have driven past many a tree full of gum blossoms that I wished I had stopped to photograph and many a garden full of plants that were missed.
But over the Summer holidays, I finally got myself a bike again - a belated birthday combined with Christmas present of sorts and a means to keep up with the kids who left me behind a few years ago when I was no longer able to jog alongside them to keep up as they learned to cycle. And now a new way to get around the neighbourhood in search of some local botanic inspiration.
I made a short escape after lunch today to see what inspiration I could find. It’s not the best timing for all the colourful gum blossoms in our area but when you look, there is always something to see. Below are some of the gems I discovered and the picture above taken when I cycled down a random street and looked up to be rewarded by these yellow beauties. As an added bonus, I am also getting some exercise!
Making a Start
A new year is somehow supposed to signal a re-start in life where you jump into it with enthusiasm and a new found energy that you magically pick up as the clock strikes midnight on New Year’s Eve. Well, I am not sure this is the reality for many of us. I just managed to pack away the Christmas tree yesterday and the 2020 wall planner is up but not exactly planned; the desk got cleaned but could already do with another de-cluttering session. It’s been a slow time but I think it needed to be and maybe that is okay.
While I have been pottering away in January on some admin tasks, it’s now time to think about creating a new body of work. I know some artists who say the work comes easily for them. For me, not so. While I love nothing more than to paint, I spend way too long deliberating over what to paint next. Drawing is hard, self doubt sets in and I wonder if I can ever make another artwork that I will feel proud of and want to share. Procrastination is one of my greatest talents - I had a lecturer way back who used to joke about needing to put a bomb under me and perhaps not much has changed.
But maybe for me, it just needs to take time. As hours and days rush past me, I am seeking ways to slow it down. Taking time to notice details helps and there is so much beauty to be found in the often overlooked everyday things that surround us.
When I get stuck, I will often flick through pages of old sketches - nothing developed or finished and sometimes just a few lines or colours on a page but there will always be something there to pursue. And so I begin, with more doodles, sometimes some colours and re-drawing old ideas. Sometimes even the new page of lines don’t lead anywhere significant but it’s a small step or in many ways a big leap forward as beginning is often the hardest part.
And sometimes I need to throw out the planning and just do something with no expectations. These lines began as a doodle of leaves. I had found a small primed wood panel when I was cleaning out a shelf and just decided to draw freehand on it and colour in with pencil and marker. For someone who loves to work out every colour and line before I start the final image, it is hard to work this way. But I had fun making this little piece and it’s a start.
