Gallery Duty

I did gallery duty today (Sunday) at Artefacts Gallery located in the Salamanca Arts Centre, Hobart, Tasmania. After cleaning shelves, changing displays and pricing art work, I settled down behind the desk and got my paints out. There were very few people about, so painting some of my Inktober drawings seemed like it would be a good use of my time.

A couple from the mainland of Australia came in and he, in particular, was curious and asked me questions about my prints and then about what I was painting. I explained the Inktober Challenge to him, where we receive a prompt word for each day of the month.  I was painting the drawings for Day #10 “pattern” and Day #11 “snow”. He said he really liked “pattern” and asked me if he could buy it? “But, I haven’t finished painting it”, I said. He didn’t want anymore paint added to it. He liked it as it was. “Would you like me to paint the hat?” “No,” was his reply. “The boots?” “Nope”. So, it was pronounced – SOLD after I took a quick photo of it.

finished or unfinished “pattern”

Has anyone else ever sold a painting before they consider it finished???

He left and returned a few minutes later asking if I could paint “snow” and they would come back in two hours for it. So, in between serving customers I painted. When they returned, they both said “wow” when they saw it and commented on how much difference colour made. Another Inktober drawing pronounced, SOLD. That’s six Inktober paintings in two days.

Painting for the prompt word “snow”

Thanks for stopping by. Hope the upcoming week goes well for everyone. PJ Paintings

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More Inktober days

For Inktober’s prompt word “dragon”, surprise-surprise, I drew a dragon (lol).

Dragon Escape

For the prompt word “Ash” I drew emus bushwalking through an Eucalyptus regnans forest. These trees are commonly called Mountain Ash.

the happy wanderers

The following prompt word for Day 14 of the Inktober Challenge is “overgrown”. Those of you have tall children can probably relate to this drawing. I have two tall sons and we had to cut away the end boards of their beds to accommodate their long legs!

I hope you are enjoying Inktober as much as I am.  It certainly gets your creative juices flowing! Take care and thanks for stopping by, PJ Paintings.

http://www.pjpaintings.com

 

Swinging

I’m getting into the swing of this Inktober challenging daily drawing challenge! (lol) Today’s prompt word is “swing”.

 

I’m giving myself an extra pat on the back because I’m visiting my family in Canada while doing this. (I live in Tasmania, Australia). Doing Inktober while abroad has added an extra layer of challenge.  Thankfully the prompt list was released a month or so early, so I was able to get a lot of ideas worked out and a few rough sketches done before the challenge started.

“Swing” (21 x 21 cm painted on paper made 100% from recycled cotton rags)

Hoping your week is going swimmingly, wherever on the globe you are, from PJ Paintings

This original is for sale and can be purchased at http://www.pjpaintings.com

Freezing

The prompt word for Day #4 of the Inktober Challenge is”freeze”. So, I drew an emu that is happily taking full advantage of the the frozen lake to display her graceful ice skating moves.

Thanks for stopping by, PJ Paintings

http://www.pjpaintings.com

A Yoga Aid

I gave an “Afternoon Siesta” print to a work mate as a retirement gift with a card saying that I hope she is able to have frequent afternoon siestas, now that she’s leaving the workforce.  She loved it and was quite visibly moved by it.

She dropped into work last week and told me that she locked her eyes on “Afternoon Siesta” and it helped her relax through her yoga session. She told me again how much she loves it. So, “Afternoon Siesta” is not only much loved in a baby’s nursery, but also in retirement and in the yoga room!

Afternoon Siesta – prints are available at http://www.pjpaintings.com

Hope everybody has a restful and peaceful sleep tonight. Cheers.

Hair Extensions

Last year, I painted Humpback whales to celebrate Sea Shepherd’s 40th anniversary and help raise funds for this non-profit conservation organisation whose mission is to protect and conserve the world’s oceans’ ecosystems and species. (All of these whale paintings are on my website: http://www.pjpaintings.com).

Weightless

Sea Life

Suspended

Sea Shepherd has asked me to support their fund raiser again. This time I focused on other sea creatures, all of whom are suffering in plastic and pollution riddled oceans.

Hair Extensions: Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos have a short crest on the top of their heads compared to the other cockatoos’ crowns that they flaunt and display ostentatiously. Feeling slightly inferior, this cockatoo set about to find a hairdresser that does feather extensions but alas there are none to be found in Tasmania. An octopus seems like a good compromise, and fortunately for this cockatoo, it found a very obliging one to crown its head with long, flowing, attractive tentacles.

This painting will be for sale in support of this worthy cause at Red Parka, 22 Criterion Street, Hobart, Tasmania, commencing Sept 5th.  It is now at Full Gamut, professional photographers, and then prints of it will be available on the Pj Paintings website.

Now, I’m working on my third and final painting of this series titled “The Bun”.

Thanks for visiting.

Octopus

So, Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos have a short crest on the top of their heads compared to the other cockatoos’ crowns that they flaunt and display ostentatiously.  Feeling slightly inferior, this cockatoo set about to find a hairdresser that does feather extensions but alas there are none to be found in Tasmania. An octopus seems like a good compromise, and fortunately for this cockatoo, it found a very obliging one to crown its head with long, flowing, attractive tentacles.

 “Hair Extensions” painting in progress

This painting is for Sea Shepherd’s fundraiser, hosted by Red Parka, 22 Criterion Street, Hobart, Tasmania. The exhibition will be running for 2 weeks, commencing Sept 5th, with proceeds of original painting sales going to Sea Shepherd. Print sales’ proceeds will go to Sea Shepherd, Red Parka and artists.

Sea Shepherd Australia is a non-profit conservation organisation whose mission is to protect and conserve the world’s oceans’ ecosystems and species. This painting will be for sale in support of this worthy cause.  It’s been a marathon effort.

I don’t have to go into work tomorrow so I should be able to finish it tomorrow, all being well.  Fingers (tentacles) crossed!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope the rest of your week goes swimmingly. 🙂

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.

Giving the eye

I’ve read and generally follow the advice that when painting an animal, paint their eye first.  If you don’t get the eye right, give up and start again because no matter matter how good the rest of the painting is, the totality of the painting is going to leave you feeling disappointed.

I like painting the eye first for this reason but also because with the eye painted, I feel an immediate emotional connection developing with what I’m painting.  With that connection there is also the difficult to explain or describe feelings that I want to finish the painting to ‘give it life’ and welcome it to the world, even though it’s a life on a two-dimensional piece of paper. But to me it is more than just the life on a piece of paper, paintings go on to inspire, cheer, awe, provoke thoughts or consciences, ignite imaginations, memories and dreams, and more.

I gave this one the eye and will be bringing it to full life but not until after I return from my urban sketching holiday, which I hope you will be able to share with me via my blog posts.

Until then, take care, Pj Paintings

Runnymede National Trust House

Runnymede National Trust House & Gardens hosted today’s Hobart urban sketching meet-up. It is a well maintained and protected house, built in the 1840s. It was Captain Charles Bayley and his family’s home for over 100 years. It was named after his favourite ship, Runnymede, and the house now promotes marine conservation.

The colonial marine villa was constructed for one of the first lawyers admitted to the Supreme Court of Van Diemen’s Land, Robert Pitcairn, who was a prominent campaigner against the transportation of convicts.  Runnymede also houses historic artworks and possessions of Tasmania’s first Anglican Bishop, Francis Nixon.

We found ourselves a spot on the lawn and viewed the house from the outside, so I will have to see the inside of the house and its artworks another time. This is the viewpoint I drew.

Runnymede

Firstly, I loosely sketched the house with a purple coloured watercolour pencil and then added Artline pen.

When I’m urban sketching, I rarely get to the painting part of the day, so I felt pleased that I actually finished a painting in one session and outdoors!

Runnymede March 17, 2019

After I returned home, I resumed working on my newest addition to my “Sleepyhead” series.

Untitled: Tasmanian Devil lounging in a hammock in the shade of an old gum tree.

Sleep peacefully everybody and thanks for stopping by.