Adding to My Collection

I am so excited! Yesterday I received the beautiful and funky floral still life abstract painting that I bought from Lisa Daria Kennedy. She is one of the daily painters I have been watching and swooning over for the past five or so years. This is painting #2303 for her. Can you imagine that dedication? It is impressive to say the least. One of my other favourites, Abbey Ryan, just celebrated her eighth year of daily painting and today my painting hero, Edward B. Gordon is on painting #3168. The king of them all is Duane Keiser who pioneered the daily painting movement in 2004. His work is breathtaking. Please click on the links to learn more about each artist and to see the work they create.

So yes, with the purchase of "#2303 Beak" I have added to my sub-collection of Lisa Daria Kennedy paintings (I have five now) as well as my over-all collection of work by artists I admire. The shear joy and excitement I felt when I found the package in the mail is what I can only hope my clients feel when they receive my boxes. This summer I have shipped paintings to Edmonton, Calgary, Kelowna and I have paintings waiting to go to Mexico! It is a wild ride and I love it!

I have said it before and I will say it again... there is something, a certain je ne sais quoi, about owning and living with original art. I don't say that because I am trying to convince people to buy my work, I say that because I have experienced it first hand. To sit and look at a piece that belongs to you, an original piece of art nowhere else to be found, to imagine the mood of the artist, the thought process, the skill and vision they have. And the passion! It moves me to another place. And to know I am supporting an artist in their journey is huge to me. Huge. I will support original art when I can... like the simple and stunning faux vase I bought from Paula Cooley at Art @ Solar Gardens this past weekend. I have always wanted a piece of her work and even though buying it put me in the red for the weekend, I knew it was the piece I had to have. It was the one.

 

Can you blame me? It is a delight. And trust me, I am delighted. 

Thank you Lisa, thank you Paula!

Prairie Pool

# 1 - Prairie Pool
(30 paintings in 30 days project)

6 x 6"

oil on board
© Nicki Ault, 2011 
sold

A babysitter came this afternoon so I could get to the studio to paint. It felt good. I've been missing it. I am using "Field of Blues" as a study for a 30 x 30" canvas. I worked on it for quite a while then sat down and did this small painting with the same palette. I am stepping into the deep end and starting a small project... 30 paintings in 30 days! Okay, maybe it's not so much the deep end as the deepest part of the shallow end!!! I already have no idea how I will find time to paint tomorrow! I have always been intrigued by the "Daily Painting Movement" (started by Duane Keiser in 2004) and although I have no plan to continue beyond the next thirty days, I want to see what happens. This is going to be a real test and challenge. I'm definitely going to be scaring myself a bit each day! This project will wrap up at the end of May at which point I have committed to be one of ten artists in the first annual Friends of the Forestry Farm House Art Show and Sale. I will take my "daily paintings" to this venue along with some larger pieces and hopefully sell a few.

As an aside, one of my all time favorite Daily Painters, Edward B. Gordon (who started his project in 2006), just completed painting #1607! Doesn't make 30 look very ambitious does it?

New Year... New Goals

Happy New Year!!!

May 2010 be a peaceful and enlightening year for all who inhabit this glorious earth of ours. May we find a way to share it and save it so that our children can enjoy it's wonders.

Today's post is one of my two ever attempts to use chalk pastels to convey the figure. This is a slightly cropped image of a piece I did many years ago in a night class I took. It was quite intimidating to create a flesh tone with no actual flesh toned chalk! At least with paint you can mix to get the colour you need. With chalk pastels it is all about the layering. It was fun, however, and after about two hours or so I guess I ended up with this.

I'm not huge on resolutions... they never seem to stick. Unfortunately the pounds I've always resolved to lose sure do! As a result, this year I will not make any resolutions, but I am okay with making goals for myself. I think that in this coming year I would like to experiment with new subject matter. I've made mention of this in the past and I would like to explore the beautiful river and river bank that runs through Saskatoon. I also found a beautiful area of town while accompanying Sammy's class on a field trip this past fall. Right in our city is a protected area of grasslands and while there with his class I took many lovely photos which have the potential to make exciting paintings. Those landscapes are on my to-do list. As well, I have long admired artists that paint the figure and portraits. I always enjoy seeing what Rahina is up to in Glasgow... I have really been inspired by her and over the last year that I have been visiting her blog, I have seen her skills and talent grow. As well, I am a huge fan of Berlin artist, Edward B.Gordon, and have found that my favorite paintings of his always seem to involve a figure. And then there is Barbara Muir in Toronto who paints her figures with such joy and vibrancy you can't help but want to try it yourself. She has just had the most incredible life experience in Florence, Italy and she has even sketched Oprah via Skype! So in effort to learn something new and expand my horizons, I would like to delve into the figure as a subject this year and I will look to these bloggers for inspiration. Aside from all of that I have wanted to experiment with collage and more abstract ideas that are stuck in my head. Ah, so many ideas and so little time.

As for any other art related goals I might have, well, I am excited to see what paintings I might find for my fledgling art collection. I definitely hope to add to it over the next twelve months. I have purchased four amazing pieces from other bloggers over the last year and a half. Two paintings you know about from previous posts (Orange Flower by Duane Keiser and Tattooed Bridge by Pierre Raby), but the other two I have not talked about. One I bought way before I began my blog and it was through discovering this artist on Etsy that I, in fact, found out about art blogs. Like Edward B. Gordon, she was also inspired to paint daily by Mr. Keiser. Who is it, you ask??? And which painting did I buy??? Well, my first ever online purchase was the spectacular little painting called "Stand Oil And Brushes on a Sill" by Philadelphia artist, Abbey Ryan. This painting actually ended up being chosen as a finalist for a competition she entered! She is extremely gifted and if you have never seen her work please make sure you check out the highlighted link. The second ever painting I bought online was soon after I began my blog and I fell in love with it as soon as I saw it. It is quirky and different and simple and complex all at the same time. I'm talking about Aaron Lifferth's "Tomato Distortion". It's so good. There you have it... four fantastic paintings by four fantastic artists. Maybe by the end of 2010 I will actually own a prized Edward B. Gordon.... or one of yours....!

I'm actually excited to be starting a new year. Hopefully a new year and a new slate. I'm fine with closing the door on 2009... it was a rough year... and I want to get off the roller coaster for awhile! There were some rocky times in a couple of very important relationships to me, the economy, so much illness this past fall and then our traumatic car accident. All of those things really let the wind out of my sails so-to-speak. But at the same time there were some true highs... like our first big family trip (Disney World), a visit to see my sister in Guelph and my first gallery show. Yup, 2009 was about peaks and valleys... I hope 2010 is about those flat grasslands I was talking about!