New Work - A Retrospective Piece

I've begun a new piece based on an old piece of work.  Years ago, I painted a vase of Melting Flowers that were sitting on my parent's kitchen table over a weekend as they wilted in the heat.  In my eyes, they were truly melting as each flower drooped in the Summer Heat and the petals fell to the table.  It wasn't hard to get the right feel for the heat in the painting.  However, my Mum hates the painting itself as she thinks it's creepy, to me it's just a vase of flowers with the colour of them melting onto the tabletop. 
This new painting it along the same lines, but it's a close-up of a couple of the flowers I painted all that time ago.  I only started it a few days ago; and I'm happy with the results so far.

Bribie Island - Full of Artworks and History

Yesterday, I went out with the other volunteers of the Logan Art Gallery for our annual Christmas Party to Bribie Island where we visited some great arty places.  The first was the Matthew Flinders Art Centre and an arts market which was next to it.  As we disembarked from the bus, we found the carpark was a lot cooler than the bus itself... how bad is that to know that we had been sweating it out even worse than the people outside?  

Well, I gave the art centre a miss and hit the market as I hadn't been to one in over a year; and I scored some Byron Bay coffee ($8.00), a cake of Neem soap and some Lemon and Myrtle soap as well - both $2.00.  There were wood-turners, people who turned a piece of wire into a bracelet, gems, knitters, gardeners... all kinds of people who did all kinds of arts.  I didn't get to see them all.

Too soon, we were back on the bus and off to the Bribie Island Bowls Club to have a lovely roast lunch.  The beautiful air conditioning made it hard for us to go back out into the heat of the day; but we did after we received our gifts of a wood-spun pen in a matching wooden case!  Beautiful and it writes well too!

The next place was a Seaside Museum which housed many things about Matthew Flinders, Bongaree and Ian Fairweather (who lived in a hut on Bribie Island for many years).  There was a lot of different exhibitions in this museum - traveling as well as permanent ones - and it was a great place to visit.  The only thing the pulled it down was that the place had only one toilet to service the whole building.  I bought a money box resembling Nemo (from the movie 'Finding Nemo'; as he was my favourite from the film); but found out today that I couldn't put in 50c pieces as they'll go in but won't come out - damn!

The whole day went by at a steamy, slow pace and we all bundled on board the hot bus where the air-conditioning didn't work and tried to have a bit of a siesta (and failed) even with the windows open.  I was so grateful to arrive home and have a nice cool shower to get the sweat and sunscreen off me.

John Hancock... and that's it!

Well, after a few weeks' work, I've finished up 'Lost Pages'.  Now, that makes it two paintings awaiting my signature because I'm on a roll with getting onto the next one!  Yesterday, I sanded down the next piece of Masonite, painted it green and it's currently waiting for me to begin an outline on it... of what I'm not sure.  This will be my 6th painting this year if I finish it before the year's out.

Lost Pages Update

I've been working hard on 'Lost Pages'.  However, recently, I had to stop and wait for my pay to come around and buy some blue paint.  The problem with this is that the paint I wanted - and needed - for the background didn't come in the bottle I wanted.  So, I have had to compromise and use a darker colour.  This is something I thought this was going to ruin the way the painting looked, however, it hasn't.

 I think the darker blue brings out the colours better and I'm now happy I bought it instead of trying to get the lighter colour exactly right.  I am still going to put the white where it originally was, and update all the other colours as well.  I hope this painting ends up looking better and fresher than it did before.

Photography

There's a few people out there who know I love to photograph pretty much anything that's out there; even if some people don't like it.  I'm often not without my camera and it's amazing what you can photograph when you're out and about these days; especially when you're not looking for anything specific.  I thought to share with you a few of my favourite photos I've taken in the last few months - and years - since I moved from film camera to a digital.  

Me meeting Sir James Galway and his wife Lady Jeanne 2010

A garden art piece outside the Con in Brisbane take last week or so.

A Temple given to Brisbane by the people of Nepal 1988.

Taken: 17th, Sept 2011 at 4:30pm

 I enjoy taking photos and these were taken on a Canon point and shoot... a very basic camera that I've had for a few years now; and takes a great photo in almost any light.

What photos have you taken with your most basic of cameras which has turned out great?  Please do share your best.