Missing

Four weeks this time!  But what a busy time I've been having.  No, I'm not sunning myself in the Caribbean, I'm sitting in front of this wretched computer working on the Art Society Stuff!  And thank you Marian for the great words.

For some reason I have taken on the secretarial work for the society and besides learning the ropes, have had to transfer a load of information (including 450 email addresses) onto my systems.  Just when I thought everything was running smoothly, along comes an exhibition which required a tonne of paperwork!  But now I know what's what, should be easier next month.

Despite the work, I managed to finish (and sell) a painting for this last exhibition.  In winter, sales are notoriously slow, so I am very happy that someone liked mine. 

All in a Day's Work

Greyton Pastures

I'm still figuring out my work load at the moment and as a result haven't been painting like I should! (or want to)!

We are having the most beautiful Indian Summer with temperatures during the day in the mid to late 20s (centigrade, that is) - the one downside is that we are lacking in rain!  But it still makes for lovely plein air weather and I have been trying my hand at that.  Nothing good to post yet, because trying is still the operative word here.

The weekend after Easter I'm off on a pottery/ceramics course in the middle of nowhere - a village called McGregor which is utterly beautiful and unspoilt and an artists' haven.  Am taking my paints with me, so besides the new venture of pottery, I am going to try and put some paint on canvas.

One of my country forays was into Greyton two years back and I finally got round to painting these cows.  I am happy with this - it is looong, 48x18, but what a great size to work on.

Busy Bee

I seem to spend my time apologising for not blogging!  I haven't been visiting or blogging these past 3 weeks - how time flies - as I'm still coming to grips with this new 'job' I've taken on.  But it's slowly coming together and I'm getting my head around what is needed.

But I'm making no promises.  I will TRY to visit more often, post more often, and in order to do so, paint more often!  That's kind of taken a back seat as well - just my two mandatory days a week.

This little painting I did a few weeks ago and it's done from a photograph, with permission, taken by incredible photographer Marty.  Pay her blog a visit -she does the most amazing close-up work, and when I saw this bee, I had to ask her if I could paint it.  Merci Marty.

Well done India on winning the World Cup!

Stumps, Day One

Cricket season has hit, so I'm using that as part excuse for not blogging.  The other reason is that I've taken on the secretarial duties at the Art Society and, wow, what a learning curve.  But I'm getting there and hopefully will be jacked enough to find time to paint and blog again.  And to leave comments on your blogs!

I did make a promise to myself though, that whatever happened, I would paint with my groups every Monday and Friday mornings.  Well, I'm still doing that on Friday, but on Monday I have started with a fantastic watercolour teacher, so I'm looking at big improvements in my frustrating watercolour paintings!

But just to show I haven't been totally idle with a paint brush, I took this pic when India was here in South Africa playing the test at Newlands, of two of the South African batsmen leaving the ground at the end of a day's play.

And I thought it doubly fitting to post this as the ICC Cricket World Cup is currently on in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

Just Having Fun!

My favourite photographer, Shelley Smart, gave me permission to paint this from her amazing photograph!

This little boy, skipping on the beach, oblivious to everyone around him, just enjoying life was just so appealing, I had to ask Shelley if I could paint him.  I have muted the background sea and mountains significantly from the original pic - I just wanted the focus on him.

After taking this photo, I realised that his face was a bit too dark, and will be lightening it somewhat.  But here's the 'before' shot!

This is the place where you'll find the original photo.  Thank you Shelley!

Nice Kitty

Ok, I haven't been around for a while - 3 weeks in fact, but my gosh it's been HOT here!  Plus I've been working at the exhibition at Kirstenbosch, sweltering under the thatch roof and spotlights and by the time I get home, it's total melt down time.

This all sounds so strange when I look at pics from the Northern Hemisphere where there just seems to be snow, snow and more snow.  Oh for a little bit of that cool!

Early morning is the best - from 5am to 8am and I did a little bit of painting during those hours, in between walking the dogs, feeding the birds, watering the garden.....  So my humble apologies for not having visited - I am trying to make up for it now!

This is a smaller one (10x10) I finished before the exhibition and was sold, which is always nice!  A picture my sister took of a friends little black cat.

Silhouette - Sold

There is just something about Shelley Smart's photos that draw me, and she so kindly gives me permission, when I ask, to paint those ones that call to me.  

This is one of them.  An amazing photo, taken at sunset of this lone bird gave me the opportunity to put it on canvas.

Thank you Shelley and I would encourage everyone to visit her blog, A Year at the Beach - her beach, seabirds and waves bring a lovely feeling of tranquility.  But please respect her copyright!

David

This is our friend, David.

I've known him and his partner, Gail, for some time now and see them annually on Christmas Day.  Now Christmas lunch is a festive meal and with good food, red wine and hot summer weather, lots of photos are taken of all the happenings.

I was snapping away and got this rather great pic of David listening to someone, and with his kind permission I decided to paint it and put it up on exhibition at the end of this month.

It was fantastic to paint.  I hope I caught is intelligence, gentleness and generosity of spirit.

And now my prized piece.  I posted that sketch of Indian cricketer, Sachin Tendulkar a couple of posts ago.  For my non-cricketing-country readers, Sachin is known as the 'Little Master', round the world.  He is a phenomenal sportsman having started his international cricketing career at the age of 15, getting his first Test 100 against England at age 16. 

India are in South Africa at the moment, having just completed the third and final test in my home town.  And I was lucky enough to get this great man to autograph my humble sketch.  And it is a real autograph, not a hurried scribble in passing!

 I'm sure it's going to be worth millions!!

The Face of Vietnam

A photographer friend of a friend took this photo of a little girl who lives in the northern hills of Vietnam and asked if she would paint it.  

I was given the great task of putting a beautiful, sad face on canvas.

A Great Festive Season to Everyone!

I hope everyone out there had the most wonderful Christmas ever!  Whatever you did, I hope you did it well.

Here in Sunny SA we lunched next to the water wearing our cut-off jeans and t-shirts and didn't envy anyone in the Northern Hemisphere AT ALL!  What dreadful weather you guys up there are having - all those airplanes being grounded and just before Christmas as well!  All we see are pictures of snow and more snow!  So here's a picture of the Father Christmas who visited us - (it's actually our friend Dawne, but who cares, we had a good laugh!)

And despite the fact that I haven't been blogging or computing very much, I have done a couple of paintings.  I get up really early (5am), take the dogs for their walk, feed the birds (and the dogs) and then get into the studio for a couple of hours before it gets too hot.   This I did over a few days that way.  It's of a gorgeous young lady who lives in Sweden.  Her name is Sophie and if she sees it, I hope she likes it.

By then it's too hot and after pottering in the garden, it's time to watch cricket!  Yes, Summertime is Cricket Time!  Love it.  And for all my Indian friends out there, my small tribute to one of the greatest cricketers in the World!

Sachin Tendulkar

Pensioners Tea, Kistenbosch

My blogging has seriously been off lately.  Have just noticed it's two weeks since I posted.  In fact, I've been avoiding the computer just lately - spending more time in the garden which needs tending to more often now with all this new growth!  Plus it's kind of nice outside in the Summer Sunshine.

I spotted these two lovely older ladies at Kirstenbosch one Tuesday (pensioners get free entrance on Tuesdays) having a cup of tea from their picnic basket.  Note the elegance of the china cup!

I so enjoyed painting this one, and for once put in a background of trees!  Hope you enjoy it too.

Holding On!

This is another painting taken from one of Shelley Smart's blog, A Year at the Beach.  Thank you Shelley!

As usual I've not been blogging or visiting this past week, for which I (yet again) apologise.  And with Summer and looming holidays and sports fixtures, I keep falling behind.

But to celebrate Summer (although it's very peculiar weather we're having at the moment!), I thought I would post this one.  I loved it when I started it, but was not all that happy with the end result.  Oh well, another learning curve!

And on a final note, and I KNOW it's late, but I hope all my American and Canadian blogging friends had a great Thanksgiving.  Because it's not an event we celebrate, I tend to forget.  Sorry.

Kalk Bay Fisher Folk

Life has suddenly turned a bit topsy turvy!

I spent last week at the exhibition doing duty and in between have been running to and from the city to  get my visa for Sweden.  I am off on Thursday to visit the family for 10 days, the main reason for going is for my grandson's Christening.  I will also see my year and a half granddaughter for the first time (outside of Skype, that is).

So, if I haven't visited you, I beg forgiveness!

This painting was done a few weeks ago and is of two youngsters who frequent the fishing village of Kalk Bay, helping their dad market the day's catch.  For a lot of these people it is their sole source of income and the whole family come out to help.  

I am donating this one to a fund raiser Art and Wine auction.  It is run by Rock Community Care which is continually looking to raise money to help the local crisis centres.  Hope it gets a few bucks for them!

Brothers

Missing again for a week and this time I wasn't even painting!

I have been trying to catch up with mundane things though, like all this blasted administrative work I seem to be surrounded with lately.  But I've promised myself, it's painting tomorrow, come rain or shine!

This painting was done a few weeks back and submitted for our Annual selection day.  Unfortunately the judges didn't like it, so it didn't make it.  But I was quite pleased with it, and after the initial disappointment, am still happy with it.  Hope you like it too.

Buddy

No time!  No time!  Isn't that what the White Rabbit said in Alice in Wonderland?  Or maybe it was We're late, we're late!  Well I've felt like that this past week and a half.  Down a hole!

We had our annual selection day and I seem to get involved with loads of administrative functions which eat away at Time.  So I haven't been visiting anyone in blogland and haven't done any blogging myself.  What little time I had, I did some painting!   Isn't that what we're supposed to do?

One of the smaller paintings I did was of Buddy, a cute looking, short legged Cocker Spaniel looking for a home at DARG.  Carrie Jacobsen who runs the blog of Art for Shelter Animals, wrote a lovely piece on DARG and put Buddy's picture up as well.  Have a look at the site.

But here's Buddy, a little fellow unable to be kept by his owners.

SMS

Signs of modern times.

This young fellow was enjoying the sunshine outside The Gardener's Cottage, a popular place to have breakfast in Newlands here in Cape Town, and I couldn't resist sneaking this pic of him while he wasn't looking at us.

Only when I uploaded it, did I realise what he was doing - sending messages on his cellphone!  I hope he got a great response.

A Dog Challenge

How can I resist challenges like last month's one on James Parker's Windows to the Words blog?  Especially when it involves DOGS!

This is a beautiful dog owned by Laura Rowe.  Unfortunately I don't have her details or a blog address for her, or the name of this beautiful dog, but she did one of my Katie in return.

Here they both are -

Laura Rowe's Dog

Katie

Donkey Sanctuary

Outside Cape Town, on the road to the Eastern Cape, there is a sanctuary specially for abused and neglected donkeys.

These humble animals have been used and abused for centuries, worked to death and because they are so unglamorous, not much attention is paid to their plight.  Thank goodness for places like this one.

A friend took this picture whilst travelling through the area, a wonderful composition which I have tried to do justice to.  Landscapes again!  Oh dear!

A close-up of the three.

Lunch at Camps Bay

In every corner of every city all around the world, there is a group of people we label - hobos, tramps, homeless - here in Cape Town, anyone who lives off the pickings of the street is called a 'Bergie'.  This is a derivative of an Afrikaans word, Berg, which means mountain. 

Now the mountain that is referred to is Table Mountain, that flat topped edifice associated around the world with our city.  The original homeless inhabitants used to live on the slopes of the mountain, finding caves and rock shelters, hence the name.  

Of course, they no longer live on the mountain, instead taking shelter in doorways. There are a number of houses that have been turned into hostels for overnight stays, but not that many take advantage of them except when it gets really cold or when the rain comes pouring down.  They are fiercely independent and very rarely beg.

This gentleman is a resident of the Camps Bay area, a quiet, well mannered person who, for reasons unknown to us, lives on the streets.  He had no trouble with having his picture taken, asking for nothing in return.  Someone had given him a piece of fried fish for his lunch.

 I have included a google map of Camps Bay if you feel like gazing out at the Atlantic Ocean!

Waiting for the Tide

One of the last things I'd do right now, is go down to the beach.  

It's been raining and the temperature is still pretty chilly - but there is a slight increase so that possibly means Summer is trying to find us here in the Southern Hemisphere.

Up til now we've had the most amazing Winter.  All in all only about one month of seriously cold weather - a 6deg Celsius minimum early morning is Cold!  Which also means that I've only had to light the fire about 5 times so far.  But it's not over yet.  August can be colder than July sometimes.

But back to the beach.  

This is from one of Shelley Smart's photographs from her blog, A Year at the Beach.  She's from California and from her photos, she lives in an amazing place. She very kindly gave me permission to paint this one - I loved the composition (yes I know it breaks all the rules) and it took me a lot longer than I thought it would.

Thank you Shelley.