Watercolour play February 17, 2008

  

Being on holidays is oh so lovely and the other day after feeling creative but having no supplies on hand, I visited a little art store in Wangaratta and picked up a watercolour pad, some watercolours, a couple of brushes and a fantastic liquid pencil medium in a jar made by Matisse Derivan http://www.matisse.com.au/pages/LiquidPencil.html.  Available in a few different graphite undertones , I bought the Sepia. It comes in a reworkable, rewettable format or a permanent  choice.  I wanted to be able to work with the product on the paper so I went for the reworkable formula.  Although I did use this product for my initial drawing, I then overworked with my watercolours, a layer of black sharpie and a white watercolour glaze over the top of the body work to give it a ethereal finish. As I only bought a couple of brushes, I will play more with the liquid graphite when I get home.  It was great to be doing art, on the verandah with a glass of wine. Too good!

Yesterday we visited the lovely towns of Beechworth & Yakandanda complete with a visit to the famous Beechworth Bakery and the latter town being the place where “Strange Bedfellows” was filmed. If you’re not familiar with the movie, it is an Aussie flick with Paul Hogan and Michael Caton. They even kept the name of the town REAL in the movie!!

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what a life! February 12, 2008

    

I’m currently at my good friend, B’s property in King Valley, part of beautiful north east Victoria, totally surrounded by rolling hills and nestled bang smack in wine country. Up the road, some even a stones throw away are great wineries such as Brown Bros, Gapsted, Pizzini, Rose Hill Estate, Koombahla and the list goes on and on. I am sure we will be doing the rounds in the 9 days I am here.  B & R are totally horse mad and have 30 or so magnificent mares and stallions, some of who I met upclose and personal today.  After a lazy sleep in this morning, I spent the rest of the day exploring and taking photos, eating good food and enjoying good company.  After a perfect blue skied day we were treated to an improptu thunderstorm this evening just as the sun set. Doesn’t get much better than this! I’m truly in heaven.

 

Canvas update February 10, 2008

 

Still in progress is my canvas “HOME”. Nearly finished but I am in country Victoria for 2 weeks to visit with friends so I will have to add the last touches when I get back, totally have run out of time!  Just love the Tim Holtz distress crackle paints..mmmmmm! This was my first play with them and I was super impressed.  I bought about 7 colours but have quickly realised that I will have to collect the rest as they are just too yummy!!

  

Home Canvases January 29, 2008

I have noticed since moving 6 months ago that the same contents that was eclectically squished in our previous tiny home is spread out in our larger current house. There is definately greater wall space available too so I thought that I would start some canvases to fill the gaps here and there.

 

I’m working on 2 canvases, the one on the left hand side above is painted with acrylics and has a dressmakers pattern adhered between layers (using Golden gel matte medium). I was just having a play positioning the “home” letters and need to add some more paint before anything.

MIA Photos January 23, 2008

I was most happy today when I found a lost memory stick which was housing all my photos from our trip to Melbourne last year. Yah!!  Apart from lots of blog reading and some ordering of art supplies online, the last couple of days haven’t afforded any hands on art, fingers crossed for tomorrow.  I gathered some amazing pieces of driftwood at one of our local beaches early last week and I can feel a project coming on!  For now, here are a few of my favourite snaps that I retrieved from the memory stick today! (all taken in Melbourne, Victoria.)

 

 

Ducky Day January 21, 2008

 

On one of the days last week my sister Helen and niece Clare were visiting, we drove to Eyres Park to feed the ducks. The seagulls were out in force and the girls took turns chasing them away while the other one fed the very eager (and oh so friendly!!) motley crew of ducks. I was clicking away getting photos all the while.  I’m no duck expert but have eyesight good enough to pick out at least 4 different varieties of our feathered friends.  My favourite was the little guy who features LH in the top photo.  He was very endearing and I was sure that at any moment he was going to open his beak and talk, he was so super cute and perfect- he didn’t seem real! I’ve knicknamed him BILL!

Creating New Space January 20, 2008

 

I’ve been tweaking my art room over the last few days and discovered all sorts of hidden treasures in boxes, drawers and more.  I’m working on lots of new bits and pieces and decided a good clean out was needed to connect with everything in my room again.  It’s amazing what I’ve found that I can use in my new creations and I am eager to get started!  The collection of knick knacks above sit on the top of an old cupboard and are great to look at and really inspire me!