Sketching wet season skies

Hello blog friends..... Wow, it's a long time since I posted. I never meant that to happen, it makes it hard to jump back in. Why now? There's nothing special to write about, but I'll just write something and hopefully get back in the habit.

One of the good things that happened last wet season was sketching regularly at the beach... For years and years I've said I want to paint the wet season clouds, skies can be so dramatic at that time of year. About 10 years ago I bought myself a beautiful moleskine A4 sketchbook for this exact purpose. Needless to say it was too beautiful to use, and is still on my shelf it's plastic wrapper unopened!!

So what made it happen this year? One thing was the terrible weather - it was relentlessly hot and humid with little rain to cool things down. Usually I go to the beach to walk, but I realised I was getting home so drained I was worn out for the rest of the day. I thought I don't have to punish myself like this! But I still wanted to go to the beach so I took my sketchbook and a chair instead!

The other thing that helped was sorting out a small sketching kit that worked for me - an aquabrush (no need for a waterpot and extra brushes) a couple of watercolour pencils and a dried up watercolour palette - I squeezed out tube watercolours onto a small palette rather than taking a big watercolour set.

I went sketching a couple of times a week from Xmas to the end of March,  and made around 30 sketches. They are tiny 10x15cm in a little cheap sketchbook. Some are good and some are not so good, and that's ok because it was really about the process; about spending time looking, about playing with watercolours a medium I rarely use, about going back again and again for another try, and in the end achieving something I'd wanted to do for a long time.

Things that have been making me happy in October!!

1) Photos by Geoff Whalan on flickr. I haven't met Geoff but discovered his wonderful photos of Darwin on flickr. He takes photos of my haunts around Nightcliff and it's so wonderful to see my world through his eyes. He has a series called 'the nightcliff sunset ritual' - of the sunset over the sea and people watching the sunset!! I usually do my walks in the morning but he's inspired me to do a few evening walks, the colours of the sky and sea are so glorious and the sea breeze makes it more pleasant (bearable) than in the morning at this humid time of year.

Dogs at the beach high tide and full moon

2) Walking! My workplace has had a 10,000 steps a day challenge through October. It was interesting to clip on the pedometer and find out how many steps I do. I was very pleased to discover I do around 8,000 to 10,000 on a normal day, and really surprised that while my walk to work and back is around 4,000 steps altogether, the rest was made up of all that incidental walking - around the house with piles of washing, putting out the rubbish or watering the garden, even walking round the kitchen cooking a meal. A few times I have topped up my steps with a little walk in the evening (as above) and it's been a real treat!!

Walking by the park at dusk

3) Bon Iver. We have the car radio tuned to Triple J - my kid are teenagers, it's their choice. Now and again I hear something interesting - I check what time it's playing and leater search it up on the triple J website for another listen and to see if I like anything else they've recorded. Well I hit the jackpot with Bon Iver. I heard a sample from their new album, it sounded like a symphony, like choir music, like jazz with a saxophone like Keith Jarrett...I've listened to the whole album about 10 times now on youtube, and I keep coming back to it. It's pretty experimental, not pop songs! There's something 80's about the sound and if you journey on to the end you're rewarded, the last 3 or 4 pieces are gorgeous.

4) Embroidery. Happy to be doing some sewing :)

You're a star - pincushion

Thanks for visiting, and have a great week.

Big cloud, tiny sketchbook

I've been playing around with acrylics in my sketchbooks, (and putting down base coats on some canvas boards, so hopefully something will be happening there soon!)

This little landscape sketch was inspired by a walk in my lunch break. I get very cold at work in the air-conditioning, and seized up from sitting in front of the computer, so I often go for a quick walk around the block in my lunch break. It's not picturesque it's a light industrial area with car mechanics, lock smiths, panel beaters, etc... rows and rabbit warrens of sheds, and roadsides clogged with cars waiting for repair.

So, last week I took a walk in the midday heat, the sky was blue with clouds gathering, a huge cloud formation was boiling up, like a tower block or a mountain, I don't know how to describe it - a cloud that says rain is coming. Maybe that's why I'm so interested in clouds this year, because we haven't had much rain.

Here's one I did based on one of my watercolours at the beach.

Here are the little canvas boards ready to go!!

Build up blossoms

It's the build up, the hot and humid time of year when people go troppo waiting for rain. We did have some early showers in September but nothing in October and the heat is building... the plants don't care though, heaps of trees burst into blossom at this time of year.

Here are some photos of a flower spike on my galangal (Thai ginger) plant, I've been growing them for a few years but haven't noticed them in flower before.

And some photos of the blossom trees I saw on my walk this morning.

And a drawing from my big sketchbook.

sketchbook stuff

I'm glad to say a little bit of sketchbook work is happening! I love drawing with charcoal but I'm trying to push on with adding colour too. Here's a charcoal drawing then with soft pastel added. I think I like the black and white stage better!

This was inspired by doodling flowers from a gardening book and then there was a big gap in the composition so I filled it with the cat!

I've been having a break from choir, we had a very busy first half of the year and I thought I'd take a rest and am trying to focus more on art. (Just for a couple of months, I'll be back once the current production is over in October.) I am missing singing of course and sometimes find myself singing my favourite songs from the gospel concert as I walk through the park!!

The season is changing, it's getting warmer, more humid, we've even had some showers of rain, it feels very early but I suppose it's almost October which is the real start of the build up... have a great weekend.

Tomatoes, walking shoes, and using up the scraps

I can't believe it's a month since I posted, and yet I've very little to show artwise, so here's some of the other stuff that's going on!

Here are my tomato plants. My partner had to make a cage to go round them because the possum ate the first 2 ripe tomatoes and probably would've eaten the lot. They have nearly all split their skins - I don't know why that happens - they don't look like perfect shop tomatoes, but they taste good!!

On my walks I've started pushing myself to walk a bit further, an extra lap of the park (or a sidetrack past the horses!), or a little further along the foreshore. I'm partly inspired by my Mum who's in her late 70's and walks for miles. And partly because I seem to be putting on weight!! I don't know if that's a result of sitting in front of the computer all day at work, or to do with turning 50 and my metabolism slowing down. I even bought myself some new walking shoes...

It's been a gorgeous dry season, lovely cool morning walks, I hope I can keep it up when the humidity sets in.

I did start 2 little paintings but then painted over them - I guess I'm a bit discouraged but trying not to worry about it!!! I always think when I have no deadlines I'll be able to get some real work done, but when it comes to the crunch I think I need those deadlines - exhibitions and craft fairs to get me moving and producing. After my painting sessions I've used up the leftover paint on my palette on some off-cuts of paper. Just playing with colour and patterns. I hope to use these for cardmaking/collage.

August is flying, we've completely missed the Darwin festival this year... I hope your month is going well!!

On my walk this morning

My most favourite walk is along the seafront at Nightcliff, but another regular walk I take is to the local park down the hill from my house. This morning I remembered to take my camera, so here are a few shots of the amazing foliage!

The last few days have been freezing, it feels crazy to write it! We've had temperatures that would be considered a perfect summers day in most places around the world - up around 28 or 29 in the day and down to 16 at night, brrr!! I've been chilling out in other ways too, with the craft fair over and my exhibition packed up, I'm enjoying having no deadlines to work towards, hoping to get back to my sketchbook and interested to see where my work might meander. I hope I'll have some new things to post soon...

Walking in the rain

little sketch I'm doing a lino-cut of

On Monday afternoon at 4.30 it was pouring with rain. There's something stubborn in me that wants my walk home no matter what. So I turned down offers of a lift home from work, waited for a lull in the rain and then set off in my raincoat, umbrella, bag packed in a plastic bag. 

It had been raining heavily for a couple of hours, so paths and gutters were awash. Traffic made bow waves, and drenched myself and a couple of brave cyclists as we waited for the traffic lights to change. 

Walking up the hill my arm ached from wrestling my umbrella against the wind and rain, I was hobbled by my wet skirt clinging to my legs, and my feet sliding about in sodden sandals!! It seems like madness even to me - maybe I still think I'm 26 and newly arrived in the tropics, reveling in warm rain after a lifetime of cold grey English drizzle. At any rate it seems necessary to get well and truly drenched at least once a year. 

At home I discovered rain had managed to get into my bag, the only casualty was the sketch book (I carry all the time but rarely use) which was damp right through and half the drawings have washed away - maybe it can have a new life if I gesso over the ruined pages and start again! 

new cards from last months lino prints

Bird life

I'm lucky that I live close enough to be able to walk to work. Some mornings when I'm running late I take a short cut across a tiny suburban park. It's just a patch of green with a playground, surrounded by houses. In the last few weeks the magpie geese have arrived, as I cross the park they take off in an eruption of honking and flapping wings.

I've had a look online, and I don't think they're migratory, I think it's more that by the end of the dry season there's not much left that's green out bush, so they come into town to the watered parks and playing fields.

Down near the beach the nuts are out on the casuarina trees, and the black cockatoos are enjoying them - very noisily and messily - squabbling over each branch and dropping a carpet of nuts and twigs to the ground.

It's hardly surprising that birds keep turning up in my artwork, here's a recent painting I did of a curlew.

Lovely to see some bird photos on Cathy Cullis's blog last week - which partly inspired this post!

Hope you're having a great weekend, we've had some decent rain in the last few days - at last!!- so I'm feeling a bit saner!

in progress

I don't have much to show you at the moment!! The lino from last week is almost ready to print, I've also started some sewing for the animal theme exhibition but I suppose I should keep them under my hat until exhibition time - late June.

I did another attempt at the horse painting and have been sitting looking at it for a couple of weeks and hate it as much as the first version!! So I'll be gessoing over it today.

A good spin off from doing the walking project is to be doing some sketching, either on the spot

or from my photos.

I'm hoping to do a lino cut based on the dog drawings and photos.
Hope you're enjoying a relaxing long weekend!!

from life

So it seems that the things I'm doing in life are the things that turn up in my artwork - drinking tea...

flags/hangings in progress

pottering in the garden, or bringing pots in from the garden to draw...

walking...

this tiny one inspired by Alison's umbrella from 48 walks

Cups of tea turns out to be a good thing!! as the first members show of the year at Tactile Arts is themed 'the art of tea' and will coincide with the Cancer Council's Biggest Morning Tea fundraiser - more info on this closer to the time April I think!

The next exhibition that I need to get working on has an animal theme, so I need to start paying attention to animals...dogs down at the beach, horses in the paddock near the creek, my own cat like a tiger in our jungly garden, and of course birds everywhere. Perhaps to choose my walks with that subject in mind, perhaps to get my sketchbook out more often.

Hope you're having a great week, best wishes!!

Take a walk

Wandering the internet I found a blog called Chino House by Alison Chino, she's set herself a walking challenge - 48 walks in a year, and has invited anyone who would like to walk too to join in by posting photos of their walks. I'm going to try this!! I do love walking - tho I suspect my 48 walks may all end up being the same one!!! Just a half hour stroll really from the Nightcliff pool

to just past the jetty, where I usually sit for a while and do a bit of drawing or writing, and then walk back again.

These photos are from the walk I took on Monday morning, after a stormy weekend the weather was a bit of everything...

I'm looking forward to seeing all the places around the world that people are taking their walks, and might inspire me to go off the beaten track!

Poem a day - day 1

Just call me crazy!!
It's poetry month in America, the poetic asides blog is doing a poem a day challenge and I'm going to have a try. Here's my day one poem.

How I got here

By the power of my two legs
not fast from A to B
but allowing time for thinking
for noticing - the garden
with a cloud of cream flowers
open in the morning twisted shut
by afternoon, how I first saw
a double-barred finch flit
down to the footpath and up to the fence
I learned to look for them.
On windy mornings I long
to spread my arms out
dive into it like a wave
and ride the current.
I get to work knowing
I'm alive.

Haiku New Year

At midnight fireworks explode
dogs bark then settle
geese pass honking overhead.


Around the dinner table
kids ride their scooters
outside rain is still falling.


Happy coincidence!! a few days ago I rediscovered Watermark a poetry blog by Sharon Brogan. It used to be on my favourites list, but got lost in one of the computer crashes of 2010! She is welcoming in the new year with haiku and anyone can contribute via comments at watermark blog.

As promised here's a random snapshot from one of my walks. Where rapid creek meets the sea, storm clouds are brewing.