Saturday 7 January 2012

at Picasso exhibition today, Sydney

Me outside of Picasso exhibition at Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, this afternoon.

Some comments on a couple of the spontaneous aspects to this photo!...it was the one Rodney accidentally took when lifting the camera into position and is the best one of the subsequently posed snaps. I  like the strong diagonal lines created by the road, the zebra crossing, the pillars of the building and the triangulation of the roofline of the building. One aspect of spontaneity I found a little disconcerting was looking a bit like I was sniffing the lady in the backgrounds armpit...but at least she was wearing black and white.

I liked the exhibition. It was a good overview of Picassos long career, spanning some 70 years. There were some phases of his aesthetic and practice which seem to be less known and publicised that were a bit of revelation to me.

Wednesday 4 January 2012

one of my cloth art dolls

Today I thought I might show a picture of one of my cloth art dolls. This one was made about 7 years ago and is called "Binta", which is an African word meaning "woman". The body and headdress are cloth and fibre, the face was sculpted from polymer clay and painted. The freestanding figure was about 60cm high.The doll was sold to one of my students during one of my trips to the USA.

I was very passionate about cloth doll making from the mid 90s until about 2 years ago when I returned to making 2 dimensional images.

After an extremely cool December - apparently the coolest on record for 50 years with an average daily high temp of only 22.6C - we are finally getting a taste of the more customary weather for this time of year. Today was 33C. I am 52 years old so have now spent exactly half my life in Australia, as I emigrated  here when I was 26 years old from my native New Zealand, and it is the only year I have had still had 2 blankets on the bed right through to New Year day!!

Monday 2 January 2012

a bit more art today



 

I worked on Abigail again today and here are some pictures of where the work is up to. The felting fibre which will become the hair is just plonked on the surface at the moment. I might have been able to finish the whole thing but I have awful hayfever these last few days and felt too tired to do much more than 4 hours in the studio. Early to bed this evening and hope I feel a bit more energetic tomorrow....especially as I have to work tomorrow....




Sunday 1 January 2012

Gold Hair, another work from 2011



This is "Gold Hair" a mixed media work from 2011. About 35cm x 1m on the stretcher.
Acrylic paint, fabric, fiber, yarn. The blouse is fabric stiffened with Paverpol and painted with gesso, acrylic paint with gold metallic paint highlighting.

The first day of 2012 has been delightfully warm and sunny all day. Rodney and I were invited out for a complimentary New Year breakfast this morning at the local "Telegraph Cafe", where we also had our wedding reception 6 weeks ago. In a lovely ambient atmosphere of relaxation and laughter we shared scrambled eggs and bacon and fruit salad and fresh coffee with about 40 other guests. Rodney has put some photos on his blog which can be seen at  www.swansborough.info

I have spent the rest of the afternoon down in my studio working on Abigail which is coming along pleasingly...