Salamanca Market June 29, 2019

Hobart provided a warm winter’s day for the many students on school excursions and holidays.  There were groups of students from Hong Kong, Perth and more. A student from Hong Kong bought a ‘What the Devil?!’ tote bag and earlier in the day a lady from Singapore bought a ‘Spotty Rest Stop’, both bags featuring Tasmanian Devils. The Singaporean also purchased a ‘Salamanca Saturdays’ tote bag and a ‘Scarlet Robins’ print.

Salamanca Saturdays tote bag

A grandmother from Scotland, and her granddaughter from Queensland, is taking back prints with them. ‘Double Date III’ is going to Queensland and ‘Bonnie & Me’ is going to Scotland. She owns a Bonneville Triumph motorbike.

A young lady from Estonia, who’s spent six months in Queensland until she discovered Tasmania, is now living here. She’s bought herself a car to live in. She bushwalks on the weekdays and works in the hospitality industry on the weekends. She says it’s working well.  She’s planning on staying until November before she returns back to Estonia with her small A-5 sized wombat print.

Hanging Out

I met little two year-old Phoebe, who kept telling me her name was “Bob” (her mother said that she really likes Bob the Builder, hence her insisting her name is Bob). “Bob’s” parents purchased ‘Afternoon Siesta’. Another ‘Afternoon Siesta’ was bought for a 10 year old grandson, who likes to draw and bake cakes.

Afternoon Siesta

The wombats and tote bags were the most popular today.

A thought to ponder: “The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.” Aristotle

Wishing you a week full of emu antics and joy,

from the Pjpaintings stall #30 at Salamanca Market.

P.S. Prints and tote bags are available at http://www.pjpaintings.com

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Purging Fears

Hobart, in Tasmania, must be fast becoming the bravest city in the world, as more and more of our fears and worries are getting burned into oblivion, with another Ogoh-Ogoh being burnt to a crisp on the last day of the Dark Mofo Festival.   During the week, Hobartians were invited to write their fears and worries down and deposit them into Ogoh-Ogoh.

Ogoh-Ogoh procession

The annual Balinese festival has been adopted by Tasmania, with a bit of adaption. The Balinese festival aims to restore alignment between the seen world of humans and animals and the unseen world of the spirits.  Large and often ugly Ogoh-Ogoh figures are jostled and turned in circles to confuse them and then burnt, sending the spirits off with the smoke. Then the whole island of Bali observes a day of silence.

Ogoh-Ogoh’s nest and tree

Hobart’s Ogoh-Ogoh this year is the swift parrot.

Hobart’s fear container being moved into position

Nestling in – poor thing doesn’t know what is about to happen

The base of the tree is lit and the loudest procession of fire crackers and fireworks go off

the burning

… and then everything burns and we exit fearless and brave, with our ears ringing and dodging large bits of falling burning embers.

Wool Bombed!

A frosty morning at Franklin Square in Hobart this morning.

Frosty morning

Lucky the trees are warm and cosy.

Wool bombed!

I like the added colour.

Wool bombed Franklin Square trees

beautiful mornings in Hobart, Tasmania

Some beautiful scenes of light hitting historic Hobart buildings. I just wished I was able to sketch instead of heading into work!!!

Wishing everybody a great week with time to hug a tree. 🙂

Heroes at Salamanca Market June 22, 2019

Unbelievable, but we had another quite mild Saturday today. Nice for the Dark Mofo 2000+ people who did the nude swim this morning, and for the couple that got married before dropping their towels. Apparently, the vicar donned a towel too. I would imagine there would have been quite a few phone calls to find a vicar willing to agree to the dress code. Several visitors that stopped by the Pj Paintings stall told me that they had done the swim this morning. The mild weather continued into the evening, which was good for the thousands, including me, doing the Dark Park walk.

Early in the day, I met some of my heroes, anti-extradition protesters from Hong Kong. I asked the students if they sang Hallelujah? They said yes because the police cannot shoot people at religious gatherings.

 

I met a Canadian young lady, who grew up outside of Toronto. She’s doing Animal Studies at the University of Adelaide. She bought some bird greeting cards for her mother, who is an artist too. She mainly paints birds, Canadian birds.

 

I met two ladies visiting from Victoria. One has a daughter that is going to visit the UK. She bought an A-5 ‘Scarlet Robins’ print for her to take as a gift for her mother (the daughter’s grandmother).

Scarlet Robins

A couple from Sydney bought ‘Hiding Ants’, my small original echidna painting. It hasn’t been on display very long before it was claimed. Another couple visited the stall and the husband was quite keen to make some purchases but his wife wasn’t sharing the same level of enthusiasm. As they were leaving he said to me he’d work on convincing her and that they’d be back. I praised his impressive convincing abilities as indeed they did return and they bought four tote bags and three prints! This is a highly skilled man!

Hiding Ants

 

An “Under My Red Umbrella’ was purchased for a sister to go with her ‘Who, Who, Who are You?’ print she bought her last year. A ‘Poppy Fields’ print was purchased by a University of Tasmania Environmental Science student going back to Wales next week. She did the nude swim in the morning.

Poppy Fields

 

A lady, who works at the Lake St Claire Pump House, was spending her fourth day in Hobart but was itching to go back to her wilderness home. She bought a ‘Salamanca Saturdays’ tote bag for a friend that each time she has visited Tasmania has not been able to get to Salamanca Market.

Salamanca Saturdays tote bag

 

Californian brother, sister and mother, with their Great Aunt from Japan, visited the stall. They were enraptured with the art and bought a ‘Bunk beds’ and ‘Scarlet Robins’ print, with the “can I take a photo of you, with family and prints?” request. The mother and son were going back to the US and the daughter was accompanying the Great Aunt to Japan to spend some time with her grandmother in Japan.

Bunk beds

 

The wombats, whales and unfurling prints were the most popular today.

 

A thought to ponder: “Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not”, Pablo Picasso.

 

Wishing you a week full of emu antics and joy,

from the Pjpaintings stall #30 at Salamanca Market.

P.S. Prints and tote bags are available at http://www.pjpaintings.com

PjPaintings at Salamanca Market June 15, 2019

Hobart is red and festivating. After Salamanca Market, I went to see Anna Calvi, a Dark Mofo concert. What a show! She was stunning. The energy from this virtuoso guitarist, at times playing the electric guitar on the floor and dragging her feet along the neck, was unbelievable and left you feeling awe struck.  Her voice range, power and songs were so good.

Anna Calvi 

Thankfully, we had another Saturday of quite mild weather. Next week we have the shortest daylight day and the temperatures’ long-term forecasts are looking grimmer. In the meantime, I had the sun streaming into my site for a few hours and I debuted ‘Square’ to take credit card payments. It worked well, quickly and easily.

I had an adult daughter and mother from Launceston, Tasmania stop at Pj Paintings and the daughter had a difficult time deciding whether to buy an A-4 sized print of ‘Suspended’ and an original echidna painting.  She really liked how the ants were hiding from the echidna.  In the end, she bought an A-3 size print of ‘Suspended’.  Later on in the day, I had a lady in her mid-to-late 20s stop in.  She said that she knows it’s a bit of an OCD request, but did I have a print of ‘Suspended’ that is centred. I provided a short explanation on composition and the rules of thirds, that if the focal point is centred, the painting just doesn’t really work. It must have placated her uneasiness about having the whale in the top third of the picture because she decided to purchase ‘Suspended’.

Suspended

A Sydney-sider, whose house looks out on Ku-ring-gai National Park, is taking a ‘White Faced Scops Owls’ and ‘Hanging Out’ print back home with her. Another Sydney-sider bought every Christmas card I had: ‘Christmas Siesta’, ‘Rudolph the Red Nosed Emu’, ‘Snowbirds’, ‘Tassie Christmas’, ‘Hoo, Hoo, Hoo Merry Christmas’ and ‘Santa’s Helpers’. I have painted other Christmas scenes.  There are more Christmas cards on the http://www.pjpaintings.com website, under the Cards tab.

This wombat has given its hammock a rather Christmas festive appeal. Prints of my original painting are available at: https://pjpaintings.com/collections/christmas/products/christmas-christmas-siesta

This print is titled “Snowbirds” and is also a greeting card. Both are available online, at http://www.pjpaintings.com

A lady bought ‘Devilish Siesta’ for a wedding present for a Canadian that is getting married in Winnipeg, Manitoba. She was neighbours with him, when he was about 2 years old, for 12 months when both families were living about 60 km outside of Winnipeg.  Twenty three years later, he visited and stayed with them in Tasmania and they also visited and stayed with him in the city of Winnipeg. So, spoiler-alert, one of his wedding gifts is a Huon pine bread board and a Tassie Devil print.

Devilish Siesta

Today’s most popular prints were the whales and wombats.

A thought to ponder from the artist, Christina Rossetti: Can anything be sadder than work left unfinished? Yes, work never begun.

Wishing you a week full of emu antics and joy,

from the Pjpaintings stall #30 at Salamanca Market.

P.S. Prints and tote bags are available at http://www.pjpaintings.com

Story telling

Many of my paintings tell a story.  This one, which I finished this week, has ants, hiding, standing upright and pressing themselves against a rock, not daring to breathe, lest the slightest movement attracts unwanted attention from a hungry echidna. I think they’ll be safe thanks to their exemplary hiding skills. 🙂

Hiding Ants

Now here’s a true story about echidnas that you may or may not know. I didn’t know about this until a few weeks ago, when I entered an art gallery and saw a photo of an echidna in a display cabinet and asked why that was.

The gallery curator showed me Jeanette James’, a Tasmanian Aboriginal, who makes traditional jewellery, preserving centuries of Palawa cultural traditions, echidna quill necklaces.  Each quill is silver capped and strung with New Zealand flax.

She sources this protected species’ quills from road kill.  Jeanette is licensed to collect deceased echidnas.  Because their skin is so tough and virtually impossible to get the quills out without damaging them, the echidnas are buried between eight to twelve months to allow the body to decompose.  After being buried, the quills are easier to remove, clean and then make into jewellery.  I had no idea!

They are beautiful but I have a feeling it could be a little risky (painful) to wear.

I hope there are beautiful stories unfolding all around you and congratulations to all the recipients of the Queen’s Birthday 2019 Honours List.

PjPaintings at Salamanca Market June 8, 2019

It was another mild winter’s day at Salamanca Market. It was busier than last weekend with things ramping up for Dark Mofo and other activities taking place this weekend, for example, the Australia School’s Sailing Competition. The manager and organiser, from Adelaide, was very excited to lay her eyes on “Family Outing”. She bought it to give to her friend for her birthday.  She said that the only one in her group of friends at university that had a car, was her girlfriend, who had a red mini.  They used to all pile into her car to go to parties. This friend is turning 60 this year and has ordered a red mini (a real one) as a birthday present for herself and is having a big number “60” painted on it.

A return visitor, who bought a “Richmond Bridge” and “Suspended” print a few years ago, (she gave Suspended to her grandson, who loved it she told me), purchased more prints. This time, she bought: “Bunk beds”, “Surfing Clifton Beach, Tasmania” and “Hayride”.

Bunk Beds

A couple, celebrating their 22^nd anniversary, visiting from Adelaide, purchased a “Salamanca Saturdays” tote bag and small pouch. They moved to Adelaide four years ago from California, USA.  Their daughter married an Australia so they followed her to Australia.

A Salamanca Market Tote bag, made in Australia, 100% polyester and washable

 

A young lady, here from Perth, doing some work with Dark Mofo, bought “Bunk beds”.  She said that she’s going to hang it where her stairs are so it makes her smile each day when she goes down the stairs in the morning.

Taking a Dip

A lovely lady from Sydney, going to Melbourne via a stop-over in Tasmania, visited the stall twice.  She wished that her sister, who also lives in Sydney, had joined her for a sisterly holiday. She’s taking back with her “Bunk beds”, for her sister, “Taking a Dip” for herself, “Duck Crossing”, “Beachside Chatter”, “Who, Who, Who are You II” and “Hanging Out”.

Another conservationist working on the Orange-bellied parrot breeding program at the captive breeding facility at Five Mile Beach, Hobart, stopped by and chatted.  She’d like me to paint the Wedge-tailed eagle, Frogmouth and the Orange-bellied parrot. They are on my bucket list… J

Today’s most popular prints were the wombats: “Afternoon Siesta” and “Bunk beds”.

A thought to ponder from the artist, Bob Ross: “We don’t make mistakes, just happy little accidents.”

Wishing you a week full of emu antics and joy,

from the Pjpaintings stall #30 at Salamanca Market.

P.S. Prints and tote bags are available at http://www.pjpaintings.com

PjPaintings at Salamanca Market June 1, 2019

It was another mild winter’s day at Salamanca Market. It was rather quiet at the market but a different story at Artefacts Gallery in the Salamanca Arts Centre, where two of my originals sold.  The newly painted big A-1 sized ‘Family Outing VI’ is going to hang in a Doctor’s waiting room.

Destined for a life of trying to keep people smiling despite their colds, influenza, broken bones, aches and pains.  

At the stall, I had an adult daughter buy a framed ‘Double Date IV’ for her mother’s birthday. She said that they have a shack in Dover, Tasmania, where Superb Fairy Wrens visit all the time. I had an adult son buy a ‘Black & White + One’ print to give to his piano-playing father for his birthday.

A lady, from Canberra, here for a work conference, bought a ‘Beachside Chatter’ tote bag.

Beachside Chatter tote bag, made in Australia and washable

A young lady, from Spain, travelling the world, bought a ‘Spanish Eyes (Red)’ print to add to her art-work-wall collection.  She showed me a photo.  It looks very cool with masks from Hawaii and Indonesia, ceramic birds from Portugal and prints from the countries she has visited.

A couple touring Tasmania in their camper van bought some greeting cards and a Japanese exchange student bought a ‘Salamanca Saturdays’ tote bag. Ladies, visiting from the mainland, purchased a ‘Double Date III’ print and a pair of fingerless gloves for me!, so unexpectedly kind. They had visited the stall earlier in the day and I commented on the great gloves they had. A stall sells them for $5 a pair and on their return trip, I was presented with these beauties.

Double Date III

My unexpected gift: finger-less gloves for chilly market days

A local mother bought three prints from the Cheer ‘em Up series to decorate her four month old son’s bedroom: ‘Scarlet Robin Rescue’, ‘Duck Crossing’ and ‘Kookaburra Rescue’.

Today’s most popular print was the Superb Fairy wren prints.

A thought to ponder: “If you hear a voice within you saying, ”You are not a painter,” then by all means paint… and that voice will be silenced.” ~ Vincent van Gogh.

Wishing you a joy-filled week,

from the Pjpaintings stall #30 at Salamanca Market.

P.S. Prints and tote bags are available at http://www.pjpaintings.com