Calendar is ready

The 2012 calendar is ready! All the artwork is from my linocuts: some are new ones which I made especially for the calendar, and others are from my recent series entitled 'The Lost Snail' which was exhibited at Sheffer Gallery in July/August.

The calendar is in a CD-style acrylic case and opens up to sit on your desk. It is a great present as it is unique, useful and arty, as well as being easy to post. You can buy it online at Duck Books :-)

Summer is coming

...... time flies.

The weather is getting warm again and the sky is beautiful clear blue today.

I got very sick at the end of July and spent most of August in hospital, but now I am recovering well. New art ideas are developing in my imagination. Time to tidy up my studio desk and get to work on the 2012 calendar!

"Things left behind"

Heather and I have been friends for many years and when we realised that both of our current work relates to traces and memories of childhood, albeit in very different ways, we decided to collaborate with a joint exhibition.

So we are having an exhibition at Sheffer Gallery which opens on 19 July, and we would love YOU to come.

The vernissage will be a bit unusual and hopefully also alot of fun, because guests at the gallery on 19 July (6-8pm) can have a drink and a chat with Heather who will be "attending" via skype from London. I will be at the gallery, so you can have a drink and a chat with me too :-)

Heather is currently working on her Masters in Printmaking at Camberwell in London; I am doing the same at Sydney College of the Arts.

Narrabeen Printmakers

Last night was the end of term for the "Narrabeen Printmakers", and we celebrated with a print portfolio exchange.

Everyone did such beautiful prints and it was fun to share them. Now each of us has a folder with a suite of linoprints as a souvenir of a group of lovely artists and a fun term.

We also enjoyed with a glass of wine, some soup and a loaf of warm fresh bread, followed by Tara's delicious chocolate cake. A good way to warm up on a cold evening.

Thank you so much Anne, Richard, Tara and Philippa :-)

Book of Birds

I am working on a small artist book, tentatively titled "Book of Birds".

Meanwhile, there is a man outside in the rain, chopping down some trees.

Poor trees, poor birds. Poor garden now looks ugly and empty.

Red washing

Today I washed and hung out my red washing, but then the rain came.

Wet red washing.

Day 26 - The shoebox

On my last day before leaving for Papua New Guinea, the girls at school gave me a present.

It was a shoebox that had pictures of models from glossy magazines cut out and pasted all over it. On a nest of tissue paper inside were lots different make-up things. It must have cost a fortune.

I felt like an imposter, receiving a gift like that. The other girls looked mature and sophisticated when they put on make-up; I just looked like a clown. I liked Pot o'Gloss though, because it tasted like delicious sweet berries. It was usually gone from my lips in about three minutes because that's about how long it took me to lick it all off.

In any event, I never ever used any of it because I would have felt totally out of place wearing make-up in the highlands of Papua New Guinea.

It only dawned on me years later that this lavish present had not been bought but that in reality, light fingers must have pocketed the items from department store shelves.

Day 25 - Pot o'Gloss

In my second year of high school, I felt like I was beginning to fit in. My friends still teased me about my very uncool pigtails hairstyle, but still, we did stuff together on weekends and during the summer holidays, and we talked about which songs and which bands were groovy, and we made ourselves look glamorous with Mary Quant eyeshadow and Yardley Pot o'Gloss on our lips.

When we went back to school after the Christmas holidays, our science teacher handed out text books for the new school year. I told her that I didn't need any because I was going to Papua New Guinea the next week. The teacher laughed and told me not to make up stories. The other kids told her I was telling the truth. She looked dumbfounded because she had never heard of anyone going to Papua New Guinea before.

I was looking forward to this new adventure, but I at the same time, I sort of realised that the fleeting moment of those few months with the cool girls had just slipped through my fingers.

Day 24 - Brown legs

When I started high school, I saw how important it was too be cool, only I wasn't very good at it.

Most of my friends knew how to be cool and often on weekends, we went to the beach with a transistor radio and we stretched out on our towels in our bikinis, and talked about the surfy boys. Only I didn't know what to say about the surfy boys so I just stayed quiet and listened. My bikini was a hand-me-down from one of my friends.

On school days, we all sat in a row on the concrete outside the classroom in our lunch breaks. Our legs were stretched out in the sun and we smothered them in cocoa butter. It was cool to have very brown legs. That was the only cool thing I was good at.