What are you leaving your fingerprints on?
What tracks are you leaving?
Both of these pages are about leaving a mark, a legacy. It's fun to think about what we are leaving behind and how we are affecting those around us. I guess it's the time of year when we look back and reflect on how things have gone, and soon we'll be looking forward to what we want to achieve for the coming year.
So, are you leaving fingerprints as you shape things (and people), or are you walking (or driving) over them?
What's in your nest?
Sometimes pages just seem to take on a life of their own. This is one of those. No idea where it came from, but when it was done it was obviously a nest.
So what are nests all about? They are receptacles and shelters for eggs and young. They are cosy places to wrap up and settle in. They are bowl-like, used to hold, protect, or support something. So what is being laid or sheltered? What is being supported? Or do I just need a bit of quiet time? (Always!) I need to do a bit of thinking here.
Making the familiar feel new again – every year.
That's what we face each Christmas as we run around trying to make the church services new and exciting, bringing a new perspective or awakening forgotten feelings of nostalgia. I'm already sketching in my ideas book, thinking about the installation for the crib service, the midnight service, and the giveaway on Christmas morning. It's sometimes made harder by the shops being full of Christmas items as soon as November hits. Plus my Christmas spirit is difficult to perk up when the days are getting longer and hotter instead of shorter and colder – southern hemisphere problems :)
What makes Christmas for you?
Sometimes you just get an urge to do create certain things. For me at the moment it is landscapes. I don't know why, but I'm having fun doing it, so why not?
The one above is my favourite by far. It is done on Karst stone paper with a palette knife. The smoothness of the paper lends itself well to smooshing the paint around.
The next two below are on a different type of paper that has more of a 'tooth' to it, so the palette knife leaves a different type of mark. The paper was thin as well, so has gone a bit curly, but it's just play.
No matter how organised we try to be, there are always things that won't fall into line.
This page has a lot of clean lines which are unlike my usual way of doing things. The scribble reminded me that we can plan as much as we like, organise things, but there are always those unknowns, those uncontrollable parts of a plan. We have to be ready for them and not thrown off-kilter.
So plan for what you can and be ready for the uncontrollable.
So much fun to support other artists.
Where did the last week go? I suddenly realised that I hadn't posted all week due to... life in general. It happens.
Anyway, last Friday evening I had the privilege of attending the opening night of Tony Busch's first solo show. He does fabulous weavings inspired by Australian nature. Absolutely gorgeous and textural. You can find him on instagram @burningatgbusch
Here's one that we bought at his end of year degree show:
Tony dyes his own fibres with natural materials. This one is inspired by the floor in the Sturt Gorge. If you look carefully at the right hand side, you can see 'pebbles' underneath the fringing inspired by stringy bark and eucalyptus leaves. Tony attended art college after retiring and is now winning prizes as an emerging artist. It just goes to show that retiring can be the beginning of brand new branches of learning.
